My son may have ADHD

[thanatos144]

I had a meeting with my son's teacher's and school psychologist, and they recommended I take him to a pediatrician that specializes in ADHD etc to be tested for ADHD. Many of you have might already know I have had my son in special programs since before he was two, and that they had diagnosed him with a sensory perception disorder when all this first started.

II have read some on it, but not a lot. The whole thing is scary at this point, for one I have no clue how I feel about medication, how to treat it, and even the diagnoses of ADHD. Feedback, recommendations, stories would be great. Thanks.

Be very careful.....there is a reason mostly boys are on these drugs. It should be called chemical babysitter cause what it does is make you feel slow and zombie like....How do I know this? Cause some 30 years ago I had to take these drugs cause the teachers couldnt handle boys. Attention deficit disorder just mean the teacher doesn't have the attention to to give the student and the deficit causes her class to be in disorder.....

Self control. This is something the boy needs to learn. Most definitely before you put him on amphetamines that are damn dangerous to his heart. These drugs are not aspirin even if the teachers use them as such. They are controlled substances....They are illegal to posses without a prescription and now ask yourself do you really want your son to take that twice a day every day?

 

[thanatos144]

I'm sorry.

Here's what I would do...that's all I'm saying, and I could be totally wrong if I were to do it. Knowing that teachers LOVE chemically restraining children who cause them more work than they would prefer, the LAST thing I would do is take your cutie to the MD they recommend.

Talk to your boy's pediatrician for a reference for an examination, if you have good confidence in your pediatrician. If not, do some research on line, talk to trusted friends and neighbors, etc.

But, no; I would not take him to the 'specialist" the school recommends...last thing I would do.

I agree with Si completely.

ADHD does exist, but there are better methods of dealing with it besides drugging our kids into zombies, and his family pediatrician might be your best defense against over-medication, with the attendant family court drama of (having the audacity to decide you don't like the results after the fact) trying to take him off the medication once it's prescribed, getting an accurate diagnosis of his issues, a realistic and least intrusive treatment plan, and an idea of when they might subside (sometimes they do).

And don't let them keep him in special classes longer than he needs to be. These kids are most often highly intelligent, and they get bored as hell (and pretty annoyed) without any mental challenges all day.

I'm sorry I stunned you by your agreeing with me. (I've run out of rep, too...dammit)

Anyway, thanks for bringing up another excellent point. Once the school is involved in this diagnosis, if at a later date, you find a great MD who has other ideas for treatment that does not include medication (a medication that has street value as a drug, too), you WILL need to go to court to have the school stop medicating him. That will not be cheap, because of court and atty costs, obviously, but also you will need to pay through your teeth for expert witnesses.

schools dont just let you take your child off of these drugs....They will suspend the child first saying they cant have disruptions they know will happen in class. Unless you have been there you dont know shit.

 

[Samson]

I had a meeting with my son's teacher's and school psychologist, and they recommended I take him to a pediatrician that specializes in ADHD etc to be tested for ADHD. Many of you have might already know I have had my son in special programs since before he was two, and that they had diagnosed him with a sensory perception disorder when all this first started.

II have read some on it, but not a lot. The whole thing is scary at this point, for one I have no clue how I feel about medication, how to treat it, and even the diagnoses of ADHD. Feedback, recommendations, stories would be great. Thanks.

Be very careful.....there is a reason mostly boys are on these drugs. It should be called chemical babysitter cause what it does is make you feel slow and zombie like....How do I know this? Cause some 30 years ago I had to take these drugs cause the teachers couldnt handle boys. Attention deficit disorder just mean the teacher doesn't have the attention to to give the student and the deficit causes her class to be in disorder.....

Self control. This is something the boy needs to learn. Most definitely before you put him on amphetamines that are damn dangerous to his heart. These drugs are not aspirin even if the teachers use them as such. They are controlled substances....They are illegal to posses without a prescription and now ask yourself do you really want your son to take that twice a day every day?

Very well stated;

While the ends (self control) might not justify the means (perscriptions), what other means are available?

Teachers are dealing with larger class sizes, and a wide variety of social issues (ESL, Special Education, etc.) than they had 30 years ago.

Single parent homes are more common than 30 years ago.

Electronic "Social Media" that requires not physical participation, much less exertion, is much more common than 30 years ago.

 

[Samson]

I agree with Si completely.

ADHD does exist, but there are better methods of dealing with it besides drugging our kids into zombies, and his family pediatrician might be your best defense against over-medication, with the attendant family court drama of (having the audacity to decide you don't like the results after the fact) trying to take him off the medication once it's prescribed, getting an accurate diagnosis of his issues, a realistic and least intrusive treatment plan, and an idea of when they might subside (sometimes they do).

And don't let them keep him in special classes longer than he needs to be. These kids are most often highly intelligent, and they get bored as hell (and pretty annoyed) without any mental challenges all day.

I'm sorry I stunned you by your agreeing with me. (I've run out of rep, too...dammit)

Anyway, thanks for bringing up another excellent point. Once the school is involved in this diagnosis, if at a later date, you find a great MD who has other ideas for treatment that does not include medication (a medication that has street value as a drug, too), you WILL need to go to court to have the school stop medicating him. That will not be cheap, because of court and atty costs, obviously, but also you will need to pay through your teeth for expert witnesses.

schools dont just let you take your child off of these drugs....They will suspend the child first saying they cant have disruptions they know will happen in class. Unless you have been there you dont know shit.

Well, I'm not sure you know shit.

Without documentation (and a hell of a lot of it) schools cannot suspend a student for "disruptions." Obviously for Violent behavior, bringing weapons or illegal drugs to school, the documentation can be dramatically streamlined.

You cannot document what, "will happen in class;" therefore they cannot keep any child on perscription medication based on what may or may not happen without the child on medication.

 

[thanatos144]

I had a meeting with my son's teacher's and school psychologist, and they recommended I take him to a pediatrician that specializes in ADHD etc to be tested for ADHD. Many of you have might already know I have had my son in special programs since before he was two, and that they had diagnosed him with a sensory perception disorder when all this first started.

II have read some on it, but not a lot. The whole thing is scary at this point, for one I have no clue how I feel about medication, how to treat it, and even the diagnoses of ADHD. Feedback, recommendations, stories would be great. Thanks.

Be very careful.....there is a reason mostly boys are on these drugs. It should be called chemical babysitter cause what it does is make you feel slow and zombie like....How do I know this? Cause some 30 years ago I had to take these drugs cause the teachers couldnt handle boys. Attention deficit disorder just mean the teacher doesn't have the attention to to give the student and the deficit causes her class to be in disorder.....

Self control. This is something the boy needs to learn. Most definitely before you put him on amphetamines that are damn dangerous to his heart. These drugs are not aspirin even if the teachers use them as such. They are controlled substances....They are illegal to posses without a prescription and now ask yourself do you really want your son to take that twice a day every day?

Very well stated;

While the ends (self control) might not justify the means (perscriptions), what other means are available?

Teachers are dealing with larger class sizes, and a wide variety of social issues (ESL, Special Education, etc.) than they had 30 years ago.

Single parent homes are more common than 30 years ago.

Electronic "Social Media" that requires not physical participation, much less exertion, is much more common than 30 years ago.

self control can not be taught by a teacher it is taught at home....It takes a bit of effort but it is a damn sight better then a alternative. A child's mind is developing until the age of around 25 and pumping a shit load of amphetamines in it isn't going to help him. Not even talking about all the psychotropic bullshit we now feed our kids cause they are not as happy as we think they should be. It is tough to be a kid yes but your job as being a parent is to teach them how to be a adult. Self control is part of that. A drug cant do that and I have suspicion that they are more of a problem then a help.

I think a study needs to be done to see how many mentally disturbed young people now were on these drugs as a young person.

 

[thanatos144]

I'm sorry I stunned you by your agreeing with me. (I've run out of rep, too...dammit)

Anyway, thanks for bringing up another excellent point. Once the school is involved in this diagnosis, if at a later date, you find a great MD who has other ideas for treatment that does not include medication (a medication that has street value as a drug, too), you WILL need to go to court to have the school stop medicating him. That will not be cheap, because of court and atty costs, obviously, but also you will need to pay through your teeth for expert witnesses.

schools dont just let you take your child off of these drugs....They will suspend the child first saying they cant have disruptions they know will happen in class. Unless you have been there you dont know shit.

Well, I'm not sure you know shit.

Without documentation (and a hell of a lot of it) schools cannot suspend a student for "disruptions." Obviously for Violent behavior, bringing weapons or illegal drugs to school, the documentation can be dramatically streamlined.

You cannot document what, "will happen in class;" therefore they cannot keep any child on perscription medication based on what may or may not happen without the child on medication.

They dont have to let the student back ether. Sure sounds like suspension to me....Sure sounded like it when they wouldnt let my nephew back in once his mother took him off the drugs as well.....Sure sounded like that when they wouldn't let my close friends son back in for the same thing the difference there is the my friend caved and her son died of a heart attack at 14.

 

[eots]

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RfU9puZQKBY]TeenScreen - Controversial and Unscientific - YouTube[/ame]

 

[eots]

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1XHNJyti1gE]Antidepressants and School Shootings, Suicide, Addiction. - YouTube[/ame]

 

[Si modo]

I agree with Si completely.

ADHD does exist, but there are better methods of dealing with it besides drugging our kids into zombies, and his family pediatrician might be your best defense against over-medication, with the attendant family court drama of (having the audacity to decide you don't like the results after the fact) trying to take him off the medication once it's prescribed, getting an accurate diagnosis of his issues, a realistic and least intrusive treatment plan, and an idea of when they might subside (sometimes they do).

And don't let them keep him in special classes longer than he needs to be. These kids are most often highly intelligent, and they get bored as hell (and pretty annoyed) without any mental challenges all day.

I'm sorry I stunned you by your agreeing with me. (I've run out of rep, too...dammit)

Anyway, thanks for bringing up another excellent point. Once the school is involved in this diagnosis, if at a later date, you find a great MD who has other ideas for treatment that does not include medication (a medication that has street value as a drug, too), you WILL need to go to court to have the school stop medicating him. That will not be cheap, because of court and atty costs, obviously, but also you will need to pay through your teeth for expert witnesses.

schools dont just let you take your child off of these drugs....They will suspend the child first saying they cant have disruptions they know will happen in class. Unless you have been there you dont know shit.

I make no claims to being there and yes, I do know that once one's child is diagnosed and prescribed medication for this, the parent no longer has easy control over getting his/her child off that drug should they choose to have a different MD treat their child in a non-chemical manner.

As you said, one's child gets suspended. In fact, I believe one needs a court order to reverse that suspension. Which is what I thought I said.

 

[Samson]

schools dont just let you take your child off of these drugs....They will suspend the child first saying they cant have disruptions they know will happen in class. Unless you have been there you dont know shit.

Well, I'm not sure you know shit.

Without documentation (and a hell of a lot of it) schools cannot suspend a student for "disruptions." Obviously for Violent behavior, bringing weapons or illegal drugs to school, the documentation can be dramatically streamlined.

You cannot document what, "will happen in class;" therefore they cannot keep any child on perscription medication based on what may or may not happen without the child on medication.

They dont have to let the student back ether. Sure sounds like suspension to me....Sure sounded like it when they wouldnt let my nephew back in once his mother took him off the drugs as well.....Sure sounded like that when they wouldn't let my close friends son back in for the same thing the difference there is the my friend caved and her son died of a heart attack at 14.

You know the difference between expulsion and suspension?

Expulsion is when you do not come back.

Sure sounds like you're not seeing, or more probably, incapable of seeing, the whole picture: a student cannot be expelled ONLY because a they have been taken off medication.

 

[eots]

THE CHILD MEDICATION SAFETY ACT:
SPECIAL TREATMENT FOR THE PARENTS OF
CHILDREN WITH ADHD?
I. INTRODUCTION
Casey is a seven year-old with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity
Disorder (ADHD). For the past year, he has taken Ritalin
to curb his hyperactivity at school and help him function in a mainstream classroom.
However, the Ritalin has also subjected Casey to negative side effects, and
his reading scores have become so low that they are off the charts.
For these reasons, Casey’s parents have decided to stop giving him Ritalin.
In an attempt to effectively treat his ADHD, Casey underwent a series of
tests and examinations at the hospital. The hospital’s recommendations
were taken into consideration when Casey’s school developed an Individualized Educational Program (IEP) for him.Because the hospital
recommended drug therapy, the IEP included a provision that Casey
should be placed on Ritalin, with parental consent. Yet because of
Casey’s past experiences with Ritalin, his parents refused to consent IEP.
Soon after, the school suspended Casey, saying it had “no choice”:
he was simply too difficult to control.


http://digitalcommons.law.wustl.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1261&context=lawreview

 

[Samson]

this Note proposes that legislation such as the CMSA is unnecessary because it has the potential to allow parents of children with ADHD to subvert IDEA’s traditional avenues of administrative redress available to parents wishing to challenge
IEPs.

http://digitalcommons.law.wustl.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1261&context=lawreview[/QUOTE]

 

[gxnelson]

I had a meeting with my son's teacher's and school psychologist, and they recommended I take him to a pediatrician that specializes in ADHD etc to be tested for ADHD. Many of you have might already know I have had my son in special programs since before he was two, and that they had diagnosed him with a sensory perception disorder when all this first started.

II have read some on it, but not a lot. The whole thing is scary at this point, for one I have no clue how I feel about medication, how to treat it, and even the diagnoses of ADHD. Feedback, recommendations, stories would be great. Thanks.

I would suggest taking him to see someone, doesn't have to be a specialist or anything, but just to make absolute sure I would, if you have the funds that is.

Second, it is actually really hard to get a diagnosis for ADHD, there are certain requirements one has to have in order to be officially diagnosed. Every psychologist has to go through a check list of symptoms outlined by the APA. You can find these in the Diagnostics and Statistical Manual (DSM). The latest edition currently out is 4, although edition 5 isn't far behind. So look through it and see if your son meets the requirements.

There are three types of ADHD: Hyperactivity, Inattentive (also known as ADD), and combined. Most people who are diagnosed with ADHD fall in the combined type, mostly males has hyperactivity type and mostly females have inattentive type.

I would like to restate to all of those people who think ADHD is over diagnosed that the assumption is false. It is difficult to get a REAL diagnosis. I wasn't diagnosed until 4 months ago, and I can sure tell you that it wasn't the first mental disorder I jumped to when I realized something was impeding my studies.

 

[High_Gravity]

It's a new name for hyperactivity. It's one of those renamed things like senility and Alzheimer's. My nephew has it it, and I think he's taking Prozac.

The worst thing you can do to a kid is medcate him. My Sister did that to her oldest son and he ended up going to Prison.

Don't f*ckin' medicate your kids no matter what! You know it's not good for them!

Well that depends my dude, my younger brother was diagnosed with ADHD and my parents didn;t medicate him, he still ended up in prison.

 

[eots]

I had a meeting with my son's teacher's and school psychologist, and they recommended I take him to a pediatrician that specializes in ADHD etc to be tested for ADHD. Many of you have might already know I have had my son in special programs since before he was two, and that they had diagnosed him with a sensory perception disorder when all this first started.

II have read some on it, but not a lot. The whole thing is scary at this point, for one I have no clue how I feel about medication, how to treat it, and even the diagnoses of ADHD. Feedback, recommendations, stories would be great. Thanks.

I would suggest taking him to see someone, doesn't have to be a specialist or anything, but just to make absolute sure I would, if you have the funds that is.

Second, it is actually really hard to get a diagnosis for ADHD, there are certain requirements one has to have in order to be officially diagnosed. Every psychologist has to go through a check list of symptoms outlined by the APA. You can find these in the Diagnostics and Statistical Manual (DSM). The latest edition currently out is 4, although edition 5 isn't far behind. So look through it and see if your son meets the requirements.

its a silly little check list of subjective behaviorism and the former chairman of the dsm 4 dr. allen frances came out saying he feels he has created false epidemics with aspbergers and ADHD

here are three types of ADHD: Hyperactivity, Inattentive (also known as ADD), and combined. Most people who are diagnosed with ADHD fall in the combined type, mostly males has hyperactivity type and mostly females have inattentive type. I would like to restate to all of those people who think ADHD is over diagnosed that the assumption is false.

it is all but a rubber stamp

It is difficult to get a REAL diagnosis. I wasn't diagnosed until 4 months ago, and I can sure tell you that it wasn't the first mental disorder I jumped to when I realized something was impeding my studies.

adult ADHDis even a bigger myth and may be harder to get a diagnosis because many student like to do methamphetamine and there is big black market potential

 

[eots]

Dr Frances comments can’t be dismissed as the architect of the old edition protecting his work from revision. While criticising the proposals in DSM5, Dr Frances has identified that the DSMIV process he lead inadvertently helped ‘trigger three false epidemics. One for Autistic Disorder… another for the childhood diagnosis of Bi-Polar Disorder and the third for the wild over-diagnosis of Attention Deficit Disorder.’1 Of course Dr Frances was not solely responsible for the development of the DSMIV diagnostic criteria for ADHD or for other disorders. They were developed by sub-committees of the American Psychiatric Association. However, as the overall leader of the DSMIV development process he has accepted his share of responsibility for the problems DSMIV helped create.
Dr Allen Frances, the lead author of DSMIV, and the British Psychological Association, lead the chorus of opposition to disease mongering proposals in DSM5 | Speed Up & Sit Still

 

[gxnelson]

adult ADHDis even a bigger myth and may be harder to get a diagnosis because many student like to do methamphetamine ad there is big black market potential

Right... because being unable to do my job, even though it's the only thing I really want to do is purely because I want to use drugs... I'm not on medication. I don't want to have ADHD, I didn't think I had it. But I do. It's not harder to get a diagnosis as an adult because students like to use the drugs as study aids or what not, it's harder to diagnos because it's hard to prove. ADHD is often mislabeled as depression or learning disability.

 

[eots]

adult ADHDis even a bigger myth and may be harder to get a diagnosis because many student like to do methamphetamine ad there is big black market potential

Right... because being unable to do my job, even though it's the only thing I really want to do is purely because I want to use drugs... I'm not on medication. I don't want to have ADHD, I didn't think I had it. But I do. It's not harder to get a diagnosis as an adult because students like to use the drugs as study aids or what not, it's harder to diagnos because it's hard to prove. ADHD is often mislabeled as depression or learning disability.

there is zero evidence of a brain disorder called ADHD .there is evidence however methamphetamine can in the short term be a performance enhancing drug

 

[eots]

 

[gxnelson]

adult ADHDis even a bigger myth and may be harder to get a diagnosis because many student like to do methamphetamine ad there is big black market potential

Right... because being unable to do my job, even though it's the only thing I really want to do is purely because I want to use drugs... I'm not on medication. I don't want to have ADHD, I didn't think I had it. But I do. It's not harder to get a diagnosis as an adult because students like to use the drugs as study aids or what not, it's harder to diagnos because it's hard to prove. ADHD is often mislabeled as depression or learning disability.

there is zero evidence of a brain disorder called ADHD .there is evidence however methamphetamine can in the short term be a performance enhancing drug

No shit sherlock, teenagers abuse drugs. How would you like to explain my experiences then? Am I just crazy then?