How has ADHD medication helped your DC academically and socially?

[Sunmoonstarr]

DS10 has dyslexia, ASD and ADHD (inattentive type). He has a very lovely personality (often complimented on this) but can't seem to form friendships with his peers and struggles with emotions (though only at home where he can release any pent up emotion from the school day).

He feels everything in a magnified way. If he's upset or frustrated, or sees some type of perceived injustice he'll shout, cry, get really oppositional.

At school he has always struggled to just remember things. I would say he's a good 3 years behind in terms of emotional maturity and academic achievement. He's pretty good at sport a few different sports.

Up until about a year ago, he was still behaving in a silly way to try and get the attention of his peers - poking, annoying, that sort of thing. He has grown up a lot this last year and we've involved him in a couple more sports more seriously which has helped his self esteem.

Our psychiatrist has suggested medication as a possibility and we are wondering what kind of changes others have seen. Trying to weigh up whether to trial. We would have to explain to DS and have him in agreement - at 10 he's too old not to be on board with this.

We would also need to inform school I think. Are there risks to taking the medication that school need to be aware of?

Interested to hear experiences of medication having an impact on school - concentration and ultimately has it changed their attainment levels at school?

Hi, my son is 10 also and has ASD and ADHD, currently in year 6. His ASD diagnosis came first and it was only when his year 5 teacher suggested we have him assessed for ADHD too that I actually found out more about it and realised that it was the main reason for his struggles at school! (I’m sure the ASD will impact more in time).
My son cries a lot when he’s upset, also a good 2-3 yrs behind his peers emotionally though not so academically as he doesn’t have any cognitive difficulties. After diagnosis I was keen to get him on medication having heard how great it is for some children and he started just before Christmas. He was really reluctant initially and I almost had to bribe him to take it! We upped the dose after Christmas and after a week on the higher dose I asked his class teacher for feedback and she said she had really noticed an improvement. When he would usually stop in a test if he came across a question he couldn’t do, that week they were doing practice SATS all week and she got him to the end of every paper with some encouragement - he never would have before. I also notice a change in how willing he is to do things he isn’t keen on - without medication it is a struggle but on it he is much more willing to do things. He complains every day about going to school, but 30 mins after his meds he stops complaint and heads off to school with minimal fuss. It really is helping.
I bought a book called The Parents Guide to ADHD Medicine and I read certain bits of it to him. He was really interested in hearing how children behaved before the meds and how it helped them when they took them. He started commenting on how it is the same for him. He looked sheepish when he realised he was admitting how much the meds were helping him and he now doesn’t complain about taking them. He started football sessions on a Saturday morning recently and when he was getting up he reminded me about his medicine - I told him he didn’t need it but he asked if he could have it as he felt it would help him with his football.
So for us it’s been really beneficial and I really recommend the book as it helps you understand How the medicine helps. Good luck!

Oh, I meant to say that it helps to let school know as they can feed back on whether they are helping or not. The ones my son takes are taken on the morning before school and then tend to wear off by home time. He says he notices he is still able to concentrate in the afternoons so he can really tell how the medicine helps him to focus.

Yes, the school should know what medication they are taking. The class teacher filled in a "SNAP" questionnaire which asks what their behaviour, focus, concentration is like in the classroom. The consultant used the questionnaire from the teacher to make sure the dosage was correct. My DS didn't notice much difference in behaviour but it does seem to help him focus

Hi all. Updating as we are almost 2 weeks in with 10mg of Equasym XL and 4mg of Circadin for sleep.

The Circadin is amazing and allows him to sleep a full night which he wasn't doing before. He'd take ages to fall asleep and sometimes wake at odd hours.

The Equasym I'm not sure if having any effect. He is still ruled by impulses when it comes to being silly or oppositional. School have reported no noticeable positive changes - if anything he is more distracted.

We think he seems a little bit more even in temperament but it's hard to say whether that's psychosomatic - DS is aware he's taking 'concentration medicine' as he calls it.

He does seem to be able to sit for longer in front of a piece of homework and not constantly get up or get distracted. His focus - if he's in the right frame of mind - seems slightly better.

We see his doctor again in a week. Wonder if the dose is not high enough to see a marked difference, or does it just take a while for DC to change old habits and get used to the medication. Interested to hear others' experiences.

@Sunmoonstarr great to hear you've got started on the meds and that the sleep medicine is helping. I (in my limited experience) would think it is still early days with the Equasym. I don't know how it compares to the Medikinet my son takes, but we started on 10mg and the Dr told me it was a low dose to check he didn't have any adverse side effects. We then increased to 20mg and both my son and his teacher noticed improvements in his concentration and behaviour. My son told me he could feel the medicine helping him, but it didn't quite overcome his tendency to drift off in class. Upped to 30mg and he can really tell a difference! He came out of school telling his Dad he thought Mummy had upped the dose (I'd told him the Dr said we could, but I couldn't get the 10mg to add to his 20mg straight away - he seemed concerned about the increase so I told him it was okay I hadn't managed to get the higher dose yet, but when I did, I didn't mention it as I didn't want to make him anxious before school, but after 2 days he realised for himself that the dose had increased because of the effect it had). He said he knew because he was calling out less in class.
I've checked in my 'Parents guide to ADHD medication' book and says that Medikinet and Equasym are both long acting forms of methylphenidate, but Medikinet is 50% immediate release and 50% extended release, whereas Equasym is 30% immediate release and 70% extended release. Immmediate is 3-4 hours and extended is 6-12 hours (according to my book!). I'm sure ypu'll get to increase the dose at the next review (our Dr was happy to increase after 2 weeks on the initial dose) and you may see a difference then. It might be worth asking why they chose the Equasym not Medikinet - I will be asking my Dr that on Friday when we have our next review, though my son seems to be doing well on the current dose and I imagine we'll stay as we are for a while now.
My son does say he can feel the medicine wear off by the afternoon and I wonder if he were on Equasym if that would be less so, but as he's doing well on the Medikinet I'm quite happy to stay as we are. I did speak to a mum recently whose son has a 5mg top-up dose of Medikinet at 1.30pm (administered by school) to help him through the afternoon, so I don't know whether our Dr might suggest that some time.
I hope all continues to go well and that your son starts to see some improvement in his concentration.

Thank you so much for telling me about your experiences, it’s really helpful to hear.