Anxiety meds for chronic irritability

[Anonymous]

would love to hear more about these. Specifically:
1. Does chronic irritability warrant an anti anxiety med in your opinion? Our psych is v reluctant to rx these but I'm a little unclear why and
2. what have been the results for those who went this route?
ty!

[Anonymous]

Is the irritability preventing your child from doing anything? Can they function with daily living? If not, then I might consider medication. There are antipsychotics that help treat irritability in kids with autism. These are very serious medications that I would not want my child on unless they absolutely, 100%, needed them.

[Anonymous]

Prozac works well for my autistic kid, but the irritability is a function of his anxiety.

[Anonymous]

A combination of Zoloft and abilify was life changing for my autistic/anxious child, where the anxiety showed up as irritability and emotional dysregulation.

[Anonymous]

What do you mean by “irritability”? The fact that a psych doesn’t want to prescribe likely means that the behavior is within the range of normal. When they talk about meds for “irritability” what they mean is severe dysregulation with aggression. Not just being grouchy.

How old is your child, and what sort of parenting therapy have you gotten?

[Anonymous]

Because psych meds like SSRIs and anti-psychotics are very serious medications with a lot of side effects. They shouldn’t be prescribed just because your child is showing behavioral that you think is suboptimal.

[Anonymous]

It depends on what is causing the irritability and how severe it is. We haven't found a solution to the problem yet, but DC has an anxiety diagnosis that mostly shows up as irritability and there was no hesitation to prescribe. Still working on dosage and the right med, but it's pretty clear there's anxiety. If it's unclear what the case is it a feeling it isn't severe enough, that might be why there is hesitation.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Because psych meds like SSRIs and anti-psychotics are very serious medications with a lot of side effects. They shouldn’t be prescribed just because your child is showing behavioral that you think is suboptimal.

Medication shouldn't be taken lightly, of course, but behavior that significantly bothers other people isn't why you medicate. You medicate because of how a person feels. You don't want your child to experience life always feeling terrible, on edge, anxious, angry at the world. Not because the resulting behavior is "suboptimal," but because that's a miserable way to feel.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Prozac works well for my autistic kid, but the irritability is a function of his anxiety.

Similar experience with my son. He has been diagnosed with adhd, not autism, but struggles with intense emotional regulation and frequent meltdowns. A low dose of Prozac has helped a lot.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Because psych meds like SSRIs and anti-psychotics are very serious medications with a lot of side effects. They shouldn’t be prescribed just because your child is showing behavioral that you think is suboptimal.

Medication shouldn't be taken lightly, of course, but behavior that significantly bothers other people isn't why you medicate. You medicate because of how a person feels. You don't want your child to experience life always feeling terrible, on edge, anxious, angry at the world. Not because the resulting behavior is "suboptimal," but because that's a miserable way to feel.

Well if your child isn’t old enough to decide for themselves about what feels unbearable, all you have to go on is their behavior. Medicating kids just because you subjectively believe they feel terrible isn’t appropriate.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Because psych meds like SSRIs and anti-psychotics are very serious medications with a lot of side effects. They shouldn’t be prescribed just because your child is showing behavioral that you think is suboptimal.

Medication shouldn't be taken lightly, of course, but behavior that significantly bothers other people isn't why you medicate. You medicate because of how a person feels. You don't want your child to experience life always feeling terrible, on edge, anxious, angry at the world. Not because the resulting behavior is "suboptimal," but because that's a miserable way to feel.

Well if your child isn’t old enough to decide for themselves about what feels unbearable, all you have to go on is their behavior. Medicating kids just because you subjectively believe they feel terrible isn’t appropriate.

For all parenting decisions, we can only go by what we see. My point is, externalizing behavior isn't the only reason to decide to medicate. Medicating because all signs suggest they feel terrible is appropriate.

And even young kids can communicate that something feels unbearable. Or even super unpleasant.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Because psych meds like SSRIs and anti-psychotics are very serious medications with a lot of side effects. They shouldn’t be prescribed just because your child is showing behavioral that you think is suboptimal.

Medication shouldn't be taken lightly, of course, but behavior that significantly bothers other people isn't why you medicate. You medicate because of how a person feels. You don't want your child to experience life always feeling terrible, on edge, anxious, angry at the world. Not because the resulting behavior is "suboptimal," but because that's a miserable way to feel.

Well if your child isn’t old enough to decide for themselves about what feels unbearable, all you have to go on is their behavior. Medicating kids just because you subjectively believe they feel terrible isn’t appropriate.

For all parenting decisions, we can only go by what we see. My point is, externalizing behavior isn't the only reason to decide to medicate. Medicating because all signs suggest they feel terrible is appropriate.

And even young kids can communicate that something feels unbearable. Or even super unpleasant.

what “signs”?

[Anonymous]

(and no, don’t put your kid on an ssri just because you believe they are experiencing “unpleasant” emotions.)

[Anonymous]

My teen took a small amount of an antipsychotic to manage irritability. It worked well for us. He had many fewer outbursts and felt better.

The antipsychotics doses for irritatability are much smaller than for bipolar or schizophrenia. Like 2mg for irritability versus 15mg for the serious mental illnesses. So it might be worth a trial if your kid is having life difficulties and supports the change.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Because psych meds like SSRIs and anti-psychotics are very serious medications with a lot of side effects. They shouldn’t be prescribed just because your child is showing behavioral that you think is suboptimal.

Medication shouldn't be taken lightly, of course, but behavior that significantly bothers other people isn't why you medicate. You medicate because of how a person feels. You don't want your child to experience life always feeling terrible, on edge, anxious, angry at the world. Not because the resulting behavior is "suboptimal," but because that's a miserable way to feel.

Well if your child isn’t old enough to decide for themselves about what feels unbearable, all you have to go on is their behavior. Medicating kids just because you subjectively believe they feel terrible isn’t appropriate.

For all parenting decisions, we can only go by what we see. My point is, externalizing behavior isn't the only reason to decide to medicate. Medicating because all signs suggest they feel terrible is appropriate.

And even young kids can communicate that something feels unbearable. Or even super unpleasant.

I think young kids being unable to function on a daily basis makes it quite evident that things are unbearable for them. Parents deciding to medicate young kids aren’t doing it because they refuse to eat their peas at dinner or sometimes get into mischief. They are doing it because their kids have significant integration challenges. We are lucky that medication exists to help these things and that it is becoming less stigmatized to treat neurodevelopmental and mental health challenges.