Teen athletes and ADHD medications

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m not exactly sure I understand the question but our ADHD kid medicates because it is required for them academically. Unless your child has a legitimate pathway to turn their sport into a long term sustainable career, you need to take the long view here.

OP here. We are first trying to go with therapy/ coaching/ natural supplements route first to see if their academic issues will resolve before we try medications. I just wonder how medications will affect them physically when they train that intensely, especially when several side effects include elevated heart rate and blood pressure.

I assume for the vast majority of kids with ADHD that are experiencing real impact, this is a both/and situation. Many kids need medication to have the mental bandwidth to make therapy and coaching work. And most kids need coaching and other support even with medication.

As noted here lots of parents surround this with all kinds of other things like nutrition, exercise, and the like. You should try what you are most comfortable with, but I think as you go through the process it is good to be open to the idea that it is the concert of interventions that truly moves the needle, not any one single intervention.

[Anonymous]

It shouldn't have any negative impacts. If it does find another medication.

Our main concern with meds and sports is timing. Nights with late practices, multi game tournaments,.etc, all require different time calculations for when and when not to take meds.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We have found exercise has helped with ADHD more than medication. Just our experience

Same. My teen athlete's inattentive ADHD gets better the more intensively he trains.

Same, and so does mine. I was undiagnosed until adulthood, but I did an early morning sport and continued working out early as an adult, not fully understanding how much it helped. My teen goes to the gym before school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It shouldn't have any negative impacts. If it does find another medication.

Our main concern with meds and sports is timing. Nights with late practices, multi game tournaments,.etc, all require different time calculations for when and when not to take meds.

We experimented and settled on taking one XR pill in the morning regardless of sports schedule. My kid likes consistency and plays fine when it wears off.

[Anonymous]

The most common medications (stimulants) do increase heart rate and my DC did initially have some palpitations from it. This seems to wear off as they get used to the medication.If you look online you will see reports of people saying that they try not to take their medication right before training because of that effect.
If you choose to start medication you will obviously be working with a doctor so bring up your concerns to them.
Now my DC uses the medication daily and doesn’t have any issues with exercise.
The one issue is that these medications also seem to make him more dehydrated, so he sometimes gets headaches when he doesn’t eat and drink enough.

[Anonymous]

I was super paranoid when we started so we did a full cardiac workup to look for any occult cardiac issues. That's probably overkill, but some people say all teen athletes should have that anyway. You might be able to get your insurance to cover it (I think ours did).

But there's really been no issues. If your child is having ongoing heart palpitations with hte medicine, you should be bringing the dose down or trying a different medicine anyway. I think you really need to be at a high dose before you get those negative cardiac side effects. It sounds like your child's symptoms are fairly mild and you should definitely be at a low doseage. I would avoid any doctor that doesn't start you at the lowest dose and gradually increase from there.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We have found exercise has helped with ADHD more than medication. Just our experience

Same. My teen athlete's inattentive ADHD gets better the more intensively he trains.

Maybe. But, more likely there is less time for attention to drift when in high seasons.