Reply to ADHD - medicate or not medicate?

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[quote=Anonymous]DS has mild cerebral palsy (CP) and anxiety, so we were already seeing a neurologist for the CP and he had an IEP. We did not have an official ADHD diagnosis at the time. We had issues at home and school. The first thing out of the school's and his doc's mouth was to drug him. During an IEP meeting at school, the school’s psychologist and principal both told me that my son would not be a success without medication. Since certain meds have the opposite effect on DS, I chose not to medicate him. I didn’t want to change too much of him. He loved learning, he was bright, ate well, slept well, and was a good kid.

We worked hard, at home and at school. I removed non-naturally occurring dyes, cut sugar, bought more organic foods, cut down on processed foods, added more protein, removed his allergy meds (switched to a homeopathic allergy med/told his allergist and he didn’t believe that the allergy meds had any effect on his behavior, but we tested the idea and saw issues), added a good multivitamin (Smartypants), and added Tae Kwon Do. Along with these changes, his IEP incorporated things like allowing him more time to respond, reminders about focus and how to respond to situations, OT, PT, ST, break down of assignments, lunch bunch sessions (school psych eats lunch in her office with a small groups of kids and they work on behavior/social response in a fun way), more breaks, a scribe to catch up his writing, etc… Around May of that year, we had the final IEP meeting for Kindergarten. The principal spoke first. He said the following, “While I don’t like admitting that I’m wrong about anything, I have to admit that I was wrong about your son and the outcome of this school year.” His main teacher basically said the same thing. We had big improvements across the board. It was through our hard work, advocating for our son, and commitment that we had some success. I want to mention that I had many discussions with my son, explaining the impact of his behavior. He needed to start understanding what was going on and help with the solutions so that we could work on things as a team.

We did eventually have the day long neuropsych test done at Children’s Hospital and they confirmed adhd at age 6.5. Their first suggestion was meds. The eval didn’t seem to account too much for DS’s CP, so that was a bit disappointing. The eval did look in depth at his executive functions and cognitive abilities. We will have a follow up eval later this summer to see what has changed.

DS is 8.5 and I still feel the pressure to try meds. His biggest issues are planning, focus, and working memory. Certain homework can really be trying and stressful. We do it together and that helps. He says that sometimes his mind can be like a really busy city and that makes me worry how much busier it will get. I want him to have some say on if we try meds. The point to all of this (yes, I know it was a long read) is that trying a less invasive method first may provide you with enough help without using drugs. Do your research. Really try to understand all of your child.
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