hi,

we are in our 4th week of intuniv and so far it looks good. my son has been on either adderallXR or daytrana for 5 years (he's 11) and during that time has never eaten lunch and needs melatonin to sleep. (adderall was a nightmare, daytrana better) And we had problems with facial ticks, so we couldn't use a lot of the stimulants. It seemed they worked well for the hyper/impulsive but not the attentional issues.

so far on intuniv he has a more normal eating pattern and has stopped using melatonin. we are doing now testing 4 mg of the intuniv and may have to back down to 3 because of sedation but we'll give it a few more days. He's not been on stimulants since about day 5 of the 1 mg test and the fact that he functions fine in school is amazing. He sat down the other day and worked for 45 minutes straight on a geography map he was making for school, which was shocking itself.

so....I'm tentatively optimistic that this may be a better med for us.

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We have just very recently begun to hear about Intuniv and am wondering if this will be a viable option for our son. He is 9 and has been taking Guanfacine and Strattera for about a year now. While these meds make a slight difference he is still quite impulsive and has a VERY difficult time focusing. I think that we saw improvement in his level of impulsivity after we introduced the Guanfacine. We have him on a low dose (10 mg) of Strattera and have tried to increase dose many times but he always ends experiencing depression and despair so we back him off. We tried Daytrana and Vyvanse but had to discontinue because of pretty severe tics. We started down the Guanfacine and Strattera road after discovering that the Mehthyphenidate based drugs were causing these tics. I guess I am curious if there are more success stories about Intuniv out there. If this seems to help I would like to discuss this with our Doctor. thanks.

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Hi there! We have just begun the 2nd week of my son's treatment on Intuniv. He started with an entry level dose of 1mg and as of Wednesday went up to 2mg. So far, we have heard some positive feedback from the school but I suppose its still too early to tell. I am crushed though, because a playground incident occured yesterday which caused him to be suspended from school today and on Monday. I think the Zero Tolerance stuff is a little ridiculous but the school will not bend on their policy. My son, like many of thesekids, will act impulsively and can be aggressive towards other kids. This has always been the case for him, however, I believe there is another side to this particular story which I don't believe warrants a full suspension- my opinion, of course. I called the psych to report this incident and he felt it would be a good idea to see him earlier than we had originally scheduled. He said he may have to add something else to his regimen but we shall see after we visit w/him in next 2 weeks. He will also have his first therapy appt. this eve. Hopefully, as time goes on we will have better news to report and will try to post his progress. I wish you all the success with your child in finding the right med(s).

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I took my 5 year old son to the medication doctor today and she told me about Intuniv. When I read the brochure I felt that this could be a medication that I've been looking for. My son struggles with ADHD, ODD, and is especially impulsive and aggressive. He's been on Abilify for mood stabilization but it doesn't help with everything. I'm going to start him 1 mg this Saturday for 2 weeks and keep him on the Abilify. After 2 weeks, if he is tolerating the Intuniv, I'll start him on 2 mg and after a week reduce the dose of Abilify. I would love it if he isn't on 2 medications. I would love it even more if he wasn't on any medications at all, but I don't think that's an option. I feel for you, Neutron Mom, as I have concerns about my son being kicked out of kindergarten because of his issues. Have you ever heard of a 504 plan that is available for kids diagnosed with ADHD? I had one made for my son - it's prevention measures and things a teacher should do in a classroom to make it easier for the student. What I really like about this plan is that it is designed for each child individually. For example, it is in my son's plan that even if he gets in trouble for hitting, punching, spitting (yes, spitting on people), etc. he cannot be denied recess because he needs the physical activity. I am a little leary about the Intuniv as I didn't want him on Tenex. I've tried blood pressure medicine before and I don't like messing around with it. It only made my son go to sleep. While he wasn't hurting anyone while he was sleeping it wasn't helping him either. But since Intuniv is approved for ADHD I'm going to give it a try. I'll post again after he has been on it.

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Hi There! No, I have never heard about the 504. I will research it though. Thanks for the heads up. Though it was my understanding that the IDEA laws no longer provide immunity to those kids with an IEP from a school's individual disciplinary action policy. Now as we are into our 3rd week on the Intuniv (still at 2mg) I see a bit more focus emerging. He has been complaining of nausea and fatigue but yet he still has a lot of energy. I wish you all the best with your child. Please keep me posted on your progress! Thanks for sharing.

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My 7 year old daughter who was extremely oppositional/rageful ADD was on TENEX since the summer with great results (1mg). We started her on Intuniv about a week ago and I must say, the results are even better. The extended release seems to work even better than the twice a day version. I'm thrilled. She is happy and so are we.

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I just got some samples of Intuniv today and from what I've read so far it sounds good. My son has ADHD and was given Stratera which he's been on for about 4 weeks. With the Stratera we noticed that he was more hyper than usual and more emotional. I'm hoping that the Intuniv works for him. I guess we'll see.

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Thanks to everyone who has posted to my thread. I should update on my son's progress... He is on the 5th week and since about week 3 has been on a 3mg dose. There are some changes good and not-so-good but at least the latter is not horrible. The worst is that it makes him sleepy and he had a strange experience in his sleep where he got out of bed and was laughing uncontrollably. At first we thought he was wide awake but then he began speaking jibberish and wasn't responding to me or his father when we called him by name. I got a little scared. He climbed back into bed and then woke up at which point he began crying. I think he was embarrassed because although he wasn't completely cognizant of what just happened he knew he did something strange. We spoke to his therapist about it and he seemed to think it may be due to the recent move to our new home. He thinks the transition might have something to do with it. We'll see. Other than that, the teachers are reporting much better behavior. He seems to be more on task and listening to direction. Hope this keeps up.

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My son started on Intuniv 2 weeks ago, started on 1mg first week , 2nd week bumped up to 2mg, He is also on Vyvanse...He is 13 years old, we have tried every adhd medicine..strattera, concerta (couldn't sleep), Adderal, Ritalin. We still struggle with his behavior every day..he is extremely hyper and always causing trouble. I have not noticed a significant difference with intuniv...we just bumped him up to 3mg. We are giving it to him at night and I notice around 7:00 pm he becomes aggitated (he is coming off the vyvance)...I am wondering if we should give him the intuniv in the morning. Does anyone have any feedback on when to give this medicine...my doctor said to give it to him at night to help him sleep........any feedback is greatly appreciated.

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my 4 year old has been on tenex for nearly a year and focolin for maybe 6-8 months - together they work really well but she doesn't sleep at night and mornings are a nightmare before her meds kick in. We just switched the tenex for intuniv. she was 1 mg tenex in the am and 1/2 in the afternoon. Doc started her this week at 1 mg intuniv but it's not touching her behaviors so we're bumping to 2 mg tomorrow - that will be closer to her tenex dosage so am hoping for good things.

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Although my son seemed to adjust well to the Intuniv after almost two months now, he was still having bad meltdowns (he's also PDD-NOS). His doc added Abilify to the regimen, which we haven't started yet. I'd be interested in hearing about anyone's experiences with Abilify or the combination of Abilify/Intuniv. Thanks.

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My son has been on intuniv for about a week and on Abilify for about 1.5 years. He is also on Adderall XR during the day and we seem to be having some major improvements. Im hopeful we can remove him from the abilify eventually but right now we can only change one thing at a time. The abilify in my case is for ODD and agression and wasnt a hit out of the park but without it we were much worse off. I havent noticed any major issues using them together but we are only at about a week of the intuniv but so far he hasnt had any major meltdowns in about 2 days. This is a record for my tough defiant 7yo.. :) Good luck! Quote:

Neutron Mom said: Although my son seemed to adjust well to the Intuniv after almost two months now, he was still having bad meltdowns (he's also PDD-NOS). His doc added Abilify to the regimen, which we haven't started yet. I'd be interested in hearing about anyone's experiences with Abilify or the combination of Abilify/Intuniv. Thanks.

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I started my son on Intuniv in November. He was still taking Abilify for his ODD, aggression, and impulsivity. I was really hoping the Intuniv would work on him. Unfortunately I took him to the doctor today and we decided to take him off the Intuniv. He was on 1 mg. When I upped it to 1.5 and 2.0 mg, he was sleeping a lot and peeing in his pants. I can't let that happen. When he woke up he will still as defiant, aggressive, and impulsive as before. So we are going to back to 1 mg of Abilify in the morning (he was on .5 with the Intuniv) and we're going to start .5 in the afternoon at school. I've also started him in karate but he has only been in for about a month but hoping that will help with self control. He's struggling academically at school and if he doesn't start learning simple words he will have to repeat kindergarten. That may not be a bad thing, though. He is a very young kindergartener.

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I am new to these sites and have been researching more on Intuniv since I just started it on my 7 almost 8 year old son. He has had problems since prek. Currently in 2nd grade and very smart, but has been suspended so many times feared he would be kicked out. His impulsiveness is the worse. He has thrown rocks at kids, pencils, head butted, etc, etc. He is disruptive in class, cannot sit in his seat, calls out, sings, walks around, doesn't complete his work,etc. He is better at home and it seems the school atmosphere and others kids "bothering" him is very hard on him. Well, he just finished his first week of 1mg Intuniv and this Friday he will complete 2nd week on 2mg. Going back to the doctor's this week so I'd like to stay on 2mg or even back down to 1mg. (even with the 1mg he had a 180% change as the school said)He has made a COMPLETE turnaround. He is getting great reports from school, completing his assignments, keeping organized, focused, not calling out, and so on. It is amazing.He has not even needed much redirections as in the past the teacher spent the whole day redirectinng my son. I was so happy that this medication was not a stimulant and this was the first medication he has been on. The teachers/school cannot believe it and especially for him that it worked so fast. We noticed his changes after being on it for three days and then going back to school after the long weekend. I am not sure it it will continue, but we will see. He was very tired the first week mostly in the late afternoons and fell asleep one time in class, but this is going away.Tiredness has been his only side effect (so far) Hopefully this will work for him and it seems every child is different. I can tell you though, my son has a very severe case of ADHD(bumped up a notch) and VERY impulsive. I am so happy this medication is working for him (so far at least) I will keep you posted in a couple weeks and see how it is going.

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We started the Intuniv today frist dose this morning. Would love to update as we go and let you know how it works. Some of the post on here are from Sept Nov last year. Would love to hear an update on how things are going with this med

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Chris has been on the Abilify/Intuniv combo now since Dec. We are frustrated because we've been told he's conking out during the school day. We've tried playing around with the timing so at present he's taking the Intuniv at night and the Abilify in the morning before school since it was my understanding that the Intuniv (of the two) would cause the greatest drowsy effect. We originally started with him taking both during the morning, which was really making him tired and so changed to both at night but this ended up being worse because he was having severe melt downs in school. I chose for him to be a little sleepy and cooperative than awake and combative but nonetheless, I'm at my wit's end. I can't have him sleep at school either. I have to talk to the doc and see what our next strategy might be.

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This is my 13 year old son's 2 week on Intuniv. Stimunlants were a total nightmare, made him way more aggressive and easy to anger. I took him off all stimulants/medication in Sept of 2009 and took him to the Clements Clinic in Plano for a SPECT brain Image scan a couple of weeks ago. I can't tell you how relieved I was to actually be able to see what area of my son's brain were effected "prefrontal cortex" and "anterior cingulate gyrus". This area is only exacerbated by stimulants! Dr. Clements started my son on the Intuniv last week, and I just recieved an email from a teacher, saying she could not ask for better behavior. My son told me he can concentrate much better and he actually, for the first time, completed an entire book! He's had that book for a couple of months now, and said he just got into it last week. He starts the 3mg on Tuesday. Keep you posted.

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Wow, the description JR'smom wrote about her son could have been written about mine! They sound exactly the same. My son is five and in kindergarten, and was diagnosed with primarily inattentive ADD in November. We initially tried the non-medication route, taking him for neurofeedback sessions in an attempt to control the ADD. Unfortunately, that's a very slow process, if it works at all. The jury is still out on that one. After 36 sessions so far we've seen no results, but we'll keep plugging away a little longer. My son is never a problem at home at all. His problems only seem to surface in the classroom environment. He can't focus and won't do his work, and is distracted by everything. He tested to be very gifted, which is ironic because we were told he's probably the brightest kid in his school, but is the absolute worst student there. The school finally got fed up with his behavior after some parent complaints about his aggression towards the other kids, and we realized we'd have to see about medication for him. We started him on Intuniv in a desparate attempt to keep him from getting kicked out of school. We're still continuing the neurofeedback, and plan to continue it all summer. Our plan is to stop the Intuniv over the summer, since he's not a problem out of school anyway, and hopefully after a couple more months of neurofeedback he'll be able to start first grade without any medication. I don't hold out high hopes, but we're going to see what happens. He's been on Intuniv for only two days now, and he's very groggy. He fell asleep in school the first day, and took a nap again this afternoon, totally unlike him. His personality seems subdued and muted due to the grogginess. I'm hoping this stage passes soon. I'm heartsick at having to medicate him anyway, and this is really bothering me. His first day of school on the medication was astounding--his behavior was perfect and he actually did some work at school. Now if only the zombie-like grogginess would pass!

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My son is 8 years old and just started his 3rd week of Intuniv. He started at 1mg for a week, then moved to 2mg and will stay at 2mg for another 3 weeks. I have noticed his anxiety level has decreased and he seems to be letting things roll off his back a bit more. His grades are a bit better. I am hoping to see a positive change in his schoolwork over the next few weeks. I believe it can take a few weeks to see this. He started out with Vyvanse which was the most horrible experience I have ever seen. Let's just say he only took it one day. He moved to Focalin which wasn't much better. The side effects were not as severe as Vyvanse, but were still not good. I will post again in a few weeks to see how things are going.

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JMAC said: My son is 8 years old and just started his 3rd week of Intuniv. He started at 1mg for a week, then moved to 2mg and will stay at 2mg for another 3 weeks. I have noticed his anxiety level has decreased and he seems to be letting things roll off his back a bit more. His grades are a bit better. I am hoping to see a positive change in his schoolwork over the next few weeks. I believe it can take a few weeks to see this. He started out with Vyvanse which was the most horrible experience I have ever seen. Let's just say he only took it one day. He moved to Focalin which wasn't much better. The side effects were not as severe as Vyvanse, but were still not good. I will post again in a few weeks to see how things are going.

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I'm so glad that I found this site - everyones stories are so like mine, I feel like I'm not alone anymore. My daughter was diagnosed ADHD/ODD at 5 - we have gone thru so many different things trying to get her in control. We just got the Intuniv today, so will start it tomorrow - I am hoping this will finally be something that will help. I'm looking forward to keeping up on everyone's results with it - and will keep up with any changes that I may have. Good luck to all of you!

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We have a similar story...our son is 8 and we are at the end of our rope. We tried intuniv, at 3mg his Focalin was decreased, appitite was up, our happy boy was back, but it wasn't enough to control his impulsivity so we went up to 4mg...knocked him out! We rode it out for 2 weeks hoping he would get used to it, but he didn't. We stopped the intuniv, went back to Focalin in the afternoons. We would love to get him off the Focalin, the mood swings are awful. He has yet another evaulation this week, this time at our Children's hospital.

I hope it works for your son!

I love this site, it has so much helpful information!! I know I'm not alone and we are not the only ones dealing with these issues.

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My Son is 8 yrs old it has been interesting reading the post before my son started kindergarden his Dr said we would have to talk about his hyperactivity (I use to joke that the energizer bunny had nothing on him) well we waited till after the first half of 1st grade( thank you to his teacher for working with us) till I talked to his Dr. I just did not want to put him on medication but he was not doing well in school, grades were good but he could not pay attention or sit still for 5 minutes. well we stared out with Vyvanse 30 mg then added adderal what a nightmare that was. He was so aggressive and would change from happy to mad in 2 seconds so we stopped the adderal and increased the Vyvanse. Well he is now in 3rd grade and up to 70 mg of Vyvanse and taking Omega 3 (childerns). we went to the Dr, today because he is not turning in homework even if he does it, or he looses school work, toys, clothes,does not write things down because he gets distracted and in the evening homework feels like we have begun a world war. He is getting angry far to often and nothing is his fault (so he says) which is another ADHA trait. well we are starting Intuniv tomorrow and will decrease the Vyanse over the next couple weeks. my Dr. has us giving him the medication in the morning and accordig to the information I have found it will help with sleeping when given in the morning I am hoping for an improvement which is all we can hope for. My Dr said he feel that this medication will be a better one for my son with the combination of ADHA and ODD since one of the side effects of the vyanse is aggression and anger. I will also be starting the organization charts again which we had done before but did not seem to help, I think I gave up too soon but I have decided that I have to help make them work and my sons school is going to work on a plan to make sure he is getting assignments written down and has assigned a kid in his class to remind him to turn in homework in the morning to help him stay focused since mornings at school can be very busy, then as he improves it will be left to him to get homework turned in and get assignments written down. I would like to thank everyone again for posting comments it is helpful to hear from other parents about how medications work for their child even though each child is differnent and how the medication work for them vary there is a lot that is simular and it is always helpful to know that you are not the only one in the boat.

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My 10 yr old son has been taking Intuniv 4mg since Nov. 09. In addition, he also takes Vyvanse. We have seem remarkable results with his anger, moodiness, restraint with brother/friends, etc. He seems to be making a real effort to get along with his younger brother instead of ALWAYS trying to take over and control everything. School is much better with grades and also friends. He just seems more calm and content. His manners are WONDERFUL! He has been very thoughtful and helpful. It is like I knew this child existed, it was just that I did not always see these wonderful traits. He follows directions without arguing so much easier now. The side effects for us have been mild with some stomach irritation. Sleep and the night time routine have improved. I'd love to hear other experiences with this mediciation.

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My 13 yo son is on day 5 of Intuniv. As of today he is on 2mg. He also takes the 30 mg daytrana patch. He suffers a great deal with the inability to fall asleep so we have added melatonin to our ritual. My son has been on everything out there including the combination of tenex, focalin 5mg & daytrana all in one day. My son has a super high metabolism so he burns off the meds in 1/2 the amount of time most people would. My son has suffered from low weight levels since treating him for the ADHD (age 5). Our hopes and goals are to get some weight on him and still have the focusing ability and rid him of the ODD. I have read everyones posts and our children sound like they all come out of the same molds. It is somewhat nice to know that it's NOT just my kid that has the same reactions. I am interested if anyone else has the same treatment plan with the daytrana and the intuniv?

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