collcampbell,

HI! My son also has inattentive type ADHD as does my daughter. He was diagnosed at 10 and is now 16. My daughter wasn't diagnosed until 21 when she suspected she had it too after her brother was diagnosed. He started with Ritalin and later switched to Concerta for longer coverage. He started at 36 mg., later revised to 54 mg. and then again to 72 mg. Your son may need a stronger dose of the Concerta. Research has shown that many individuals with ADHD are undertreated with medication. And as children grow or life becomes more challenging (such as the transition to middle school, where changing classes and additional teachers require more organizational skills), their medication may need to be adjusted.

Is your doctor very knowledgeable regarding ADHD? I have found that there are varying degrees of knowledge when it comes to ADHD and having a knowledgeable doctor who is updated with the latest findings and research is invaluable. We switched to a different doctor, not because I was unhappy with our pediatrician but because we found a doctor who truly understood ADHD, knew his medication and kept up to date on all of the latest research findings. He also was able to answer our questions and communicated effectively with us. Some doctors are not as comfortable with treating ADHD and prefer to stay with the lowest dosage of medication, even though the child is not receiving optimal relief.

My son also had a shorter acting medication, Focalin, which he used if he needed it for the late afternoon or early evening.. He did not use it every day but as needed. He also used the Focalin on the evenings he played baseball. It greatly improved his focusing skills especially as a pitcher. Just recently, he was having additional problems in school and the doctor switched him to Vyvanse (similar to Adderall) because the doctor had found these particular medications seemed to work better once the child reached teenage years and adulthood., although Concerta worked fine for many in childhood. And of course, individuals can respond differently to the different medications.

My daughter's medication was switched because she was found to have the Generalized Anxiety Disorder and due to the GAD, there were certain ADHD medications that were preferable, that is, it did not exacerbate her GAD. Her other doctor was not aware of this. The doctor also switched the anxiety medication she was on and it made a tremendous difference.

One tip I can give you for organization is the importance of color. For example, if your son has math, cover his math book in one color, say red and have his math folder, notebook, and/or binder all match. that way if he has to remember to bring home his math notebook, he will find it easier to find because everything relating to math is red.. Or, in our case, the school has different classes on different days. They have odd and even days, so a separate colored binder for the two different days makes it easier to make sure you have the right work you need for that day. If you have more than one child using the same bathroom, have one child's towel be blue, along with a blue toothbrush, etc. and the other child have yellow, or whatever. Also, if there is a towel left on the floor, you now know who left it there because of the color!!

some other ideas we learned for the bedroom, esp. if that is where they do homework. Remove excess chothing and items, use neutral colors or pastels for walls and linens. Avoid using red, yellow, orange or floral or horizontal patterns on bedding. Vertical stripes and geometric shapes are better. For studying use an accent lamp rather than an overhead light and avoid flourescent lighting (those with ADHD register the movement of flourescent lights and find it distracting). An artist table or inclined drafting table keep them better focused on their work than a flat desk. In their closet, group clothing together by color. Separate play clothes from school clothes. Use open shelves and transparent bins with labels. I hope some of this was useful and helpful to you.

Elaine

Quote

My son is eight years old. He was diagnosed with the inattentive type of ADD in January. He also has dyslexia and an auditory processing disorder. His doctor started him out on Focalin XR-5mg about a month ago. It is a time released medication. It has been amazing. The very first day he managed to write 12 sentences, using his spelling words in less than 30 minutes. He is much less distractable and we are impressed with his new found ability to focus. He has not had any of the negative side effects that we were worried about. My only complaint is that I think it is wearing off a little earlier than it should. He takes it at about 7:00a.m. If we get to homework before 5:00p.m. he does okay. If we don't get it done until later, it is just like it was before he was on the meds. His doctor just increased his dose to 10mg. We are hoping that this will be just what he needs to be able to maintain his focus throughout the evening...without creating sleep problems. I will update you on how it goes. Good luck. :-)

Quote

I just thought I would update you regarding my son's increase in the Focalin XR. He started taking 10mg. around February 25th. It does seem to be working better for him. He usually doesn't do very well on his spelling sentences test, but he has really improved. He has scored a 92% and an 88%. That is way better than the 68-75% before the meds. His teacher says that he is doing better at school, getting things done without being nagged about it. I was able to observe him in class a couple of weeks ago. He still seemed a little bit unfocused to me. I am curious to see if this will continue to work well for him. Sometimes I wonder if something else might work better. I am very happy to report that aside from a couple of meltdowns, he is not experiencing any negative side effects. We did notice that he had some some side effects( a little hyper, grumpy) the first few days after we increased the dose, but after the first few days things returned to normal.

Quote

My suggestion right now is to get to any/all administrative personnel regarding your child and IEP for his inattentive behaviors. These are part of the symptoms, but teachers/administration does not like to work with them if they don't have to. Don't believe everything you are hearing from teacher. Believe papers, homework, your child. There are ways you can work around his inattentive behaviors: Resource Rooms, quiet areas for testing, longer time for homework, more one-on-one (whether a tutor, student tutor, learning center/resource room w/special ed. teacher).

Don't ever think or let your child think this is an excuse not to do the work. They just need a 'different' way of completing the tasks. I have struggled for years. My son goes to after school, resource room, and has my step-mom (a teacher) working w/him on weekends after trying for 10 years to get an IEP for him. (The school actually finally suggested it!!!). He is in Resource Room now and completing his homework. Only 4-5 kids, and he can ask any questions, his questions are answered and someone is showing him what to do. He actually gets it!! Gee, .....

My son has always known he is ADHD, with a strong accent on the H. It is who he is, not what he has or his disability. I refuse to let him label himself or anyone else label him. Getting an IEP and 'labeling' him for school is just going to help him as he goes thru to graduation and maybe to college/technical school in the future. It is the only way to get him the style/type of teaching and learning environment he is good at.

We are too busy worrying about our politicians sex lives rather than our children's education. I guess it is more profitable.

Stay strong and keep strong for yourself and your child.

Quote

I just thought that I would give you some additional background information in the hope that you might be able to offer some additional advice. My son has had an IEP for Speech therapy since he was a preschooler. I called in the Fall of 2007(beginning of second grade) and requested that he be evaluated for ADD and other learning disabilities. I don't know if you have read my earlier posts, but he is also dyslexic and he has an auditory processing disorder. The school district did all of their testing and we met in December. It was a joke! We were told that he had some of the markers for ADD, but not all of the classic markers. The cognitive tests showed that our son was of average intelligence and performing at low to average levels. There wasn't a big enough gap for the school district to offer him any assistance. My son was displaying just about every sign possible as far as inattentive ADD is concerned. Some of the most difficult things for us were the afterschool meltdowns and the amount of time spent on homework . It was nearly impossible for him to stay on track and memorize things. Things that were supposed to take fifteen minutes would take over an hour most nights...that was with me helping him stay on track. If I left him on his own, he would get four problems done in an hour with nothing going on his room at all. Just him and his desk. They asked if we used natural consequences. They said that we should set a time limit for homework and that if our son didn't get it done within that time period he could go to the 'Opportunity Room' during recess and finish his homework there. I didn't feel that was fair because I could see that what my son was experiencing was beyond his ability to control. How can you punish somebody for something that they are unable to change because of some rapid firing in their brain??? We had tried EVERYTHING to motivate him to stay on track and get things done. Rewarding him in many different ways, taking things away...you name it. When none of it worked we came to realize that there was something else going on. Basically my husband and I left the IEP meeting feeling like our parenting was attacked. Anybody that know us will tell you that we are very consistent and loving parents. There are consequences for negative behavior in our home. I discovered that there was a reason(not an excuse!) for his meltdowns because I found some information on this site and because we took our son to a wonderful doctor that specializes in working with children with ADD and other learning disabilities. He told us that our son was becoming cognitively exhausted because of how much effort it took for him to sit and TRY SO HARD to focus and stay on task. The meltdowns were a result of his exhaustion and frustration. It was almost music to my ears. My son is normally a very happy go lucky type of kid. He is very well behaved and you can take him anywhere without a problem. These meltdowns were not in his character and they were extremely concerning to me. We could see that our son felt like the weight of the world was on his shoulders. He would come home with unfinished work, homework, spelling words and spelling sentences to study, and reading every night. The amount of time that we were spending on all of it was insane. When I had shared that with the district psychologist she told me that it wasn't my responsibility to get him to memorize his spelling words. She said that I needed to put the responsibility back onto my son, and that I wouldn't be so stressed out. What planet was this woman from??? If we did not help him by trying to come up with ways for him to remember, he would fail so fast that her head would spin! Then, I am almost certain that we would be sitting there discussing why we weren't helping our son...why he was failing. There is just no getting it right as far as the school system is concerned. Bottom line...they don't want to help and they will only help when he is seriously at risk of failing. So much for No Child Left Behind! Well, we are not going to let our son fail just so he can receive help at school. We have all worked too hard to get him to the point where he is now to watch him fail. I feel blessed that we took him to the private doctor that we took him too. He talked with us about medication. I wasn't crazy about the thought of putting my son on meds, but I knew that we had already tried so many other things that didn't work. We decided it was worth a shot. I truly believe that medication is something that my son's brain NEEDS...just the way my body NEEDS me to take insulin injections to control my diabetes. I have seen a HUGE difference in his personality since we began this journey in January. He is much happier and he is becoming more confident in his abilities as a student. Overall, there has been a twenty percent improvement in his grades. We have had to make some adjustments to his medication because it seems to be wearing off before he gets through with his homework. That has been difficult because he becomes frustrated and sad that he can't stay focused long enough to get done with what needs to be done. He works much harder and longer to get the grades he gets than just about every other kid I know...including his brother that gets straight A's. I look forward to the day when he will not need to spend as much time on school stuff...when he can just be a kid. He is an amazing kid and I love him with all of my heart. :-)

Quote

I am thinking that Staterra is not doing much for my 9 year old son. He has been on this medication since June of 2007, 40 mg. He takes it every night before he goes to bed. Around 9:30. He was doing much better in school but I am starting to see a change in him. He is taking longer to finish projects in school, thus he has to miss his recess to finish them. Getting him to do his homework after school is becoming impossible again. We are starting another season of baseball and I keep thinking this is the year he will focus and control himself on his team. I have try to talk him into not playing but this is the only activity that he is involved in and enjoys. He is so hard on himself. If he strikes out or has a minor mistake his head automatically goes down and the downing himself begins. Even crying. His friends are becoming distant because of this imaturity. I just think it is getting worse than better. He is so unhappy and worried about things he shouldn't worry about. I work full time but have reduced my hours at work because I have to "pep talk" him up to get things done at home with him. I have become a full time teacher at night. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Quote

My 16-year-old son has been diagnosed with mild ADHD Inattaentive type and a mild case of depression. There seems to be a chicken and the egg approach toward treatment among the health professionals -- some suggesting we treat the depression first and others thinking we focus on the ADHD. I wonder if anyone has encountered this dual diagnosis with their child and can offer some guidance from their experience.

Quote

Our children both have coexisting conditions with AD/HD. Our son has anxiety disorder, and our 12 year old daughter has anxiety/depression. We shopped for a psychiatrist, and ended up with one some friends found for their son. He is very cautious and he listens to us and respects our concerns about medicating our kids. He addressed the anxiety/depression first, though he said it could go either way. These things are so intertwined that it is difficult to tease out which is the main problem. The psychiatrist treated the anxiety depression and then had us keep careful watch on AD/HD symptoms. They are currently taking medication for both and doing much better. I hope your son gets some relief soon. Best wishes!

Quote