What made you decide to trail adhd medication?

[clare40]

DS (6yrs) was diagnosed with mild adhd and at the time we felt we could with medication. He makes home life very difficult for me (dh works away a lot), but it's school I'm really worried about. He is very bright, but because he has minimum concentration is in the bottom groups and id struggling. He keeps saying he is dumb. He also doesn't have many friends and keeps noticing when he doesn't get invited to parties. Basically his self esteem is really taking a knocking. I would like to trial medication at school. But dh is vehemently against it. What made you decide?

For us, we've just put our 10yo on medication as HIS life was being disturbed greatly. HE was loosing friendships, HE couldn't concentrate in class and turned into the class clown/skateboard. HE was getting low in mood and was feeling desperately unhappy that HIS life was limited by this horrible thing he couldn't control. HE has been a changed boy since being on meds and HIS life has dramatically improved.

For us, we've never looked back. Obviously our family life has improved also and he's much more settled and happy. It's a no brainer here.

Good luck deciding :)

We started medication for the reasons you give in your OP. Self esteem rock bottom and he was just so angry. He was also violent and uncontrollable and I worried about his future.

He is now 24 and all the doomsaying about stunting his growth etc have turned out to be untrue.

we decided to try medication when my ds couldn't sit still long enough to write his name, couldn't sit still long enough to eat a meal, school had given up on him and sent him out of class every lesson, this couldn't carry on as he was putting himself in danger as he was bored staying outside classroom, ie walking along banister above 3 flights of stairs, hanging upside down on rail etc, we had to try something, once the dose was sorted it was like waving a magic wand, he could sit still for more than 30 seconds and concentrate long enough to write a paragraph.

There was nothing else to try in ds's case. We'd been using behaviour management techniques for years but progress was minimal (he also has asd). We deregistered to home educate when he was 9 and thought that now he was stress-free he'd settle down, but he didn't. After a year we caved and asked for a trial of immediate release methylphenidate. It wasn't miraculous but it did give ds the clarity to think and process and function more effectively. Life became livable for him.

Most consultant psychs will start a patient on low dosage immediate release medication when the trial starts. It's only effective for four hours so IF there are any side-effects they will soon subside and you can stop if you want to. Ask your son's consultant to explain about medication to your dh. In my experience the pros far outweigh the cons and if there ARE side effects you can switch to a different medication or abandon altogether. Many people who try are very surprised by how well it can help children with adhd and don't look back. It's is worth giving it a go, IMO.