Experience with ADD meds

[sangtarah]

2 stimulant medications have produced the ADD zombie effect, where dd feels “stuck” and is really tearful. Her pediatrician wants to put her on Straterra next. I’m not wild about it, since it is an everyday med that will need to be weaned off if she reacts badly, and she is worried that she won’t ever feel like “herself”, which is important to her. My kids seem extra sensitive to medications. 
Anyone want to chime in with experiences?

 

[MEmama]

Mine has only tried Vyvanse (Elvanse) which seems to work pretty well for him. It's not at all unusual to try several for the best fit, though.

More difficult was finding the right anxiety med, but even that only took a couple tries. Do know sometimes "cocktails" are necessary for the best effect. DS takes a med for ADHD, one for anxiety and depression, and a bipolar med to calm his thoughts so he can sleep. 
 

My sister was on Ritalin when she was young and my parents took her off because they didn't like the zombie effect. They never tried anything else or a different dose and managed to forget about her diagnosis. Um, I don't suggest you do that. 😬

[Garga]

My son gets badly depressed on stimulants. He went years being depressed and we had him in counseling for anxiety and depression. He went off his stimulants during a 1.5 month winter break and lo and behold his depression went away. (And yes, I feel horrible guilt for the years that my son was depressed from a drug and we didn’t realize it was the drug doing it. But at the same time, you don’t know what you don’t know—ya know?)

So, he’s seeing a psychiatrist right now to try to sort out his anxiety and ADHD and which meds will work to treat both. Straterra doesn’t seem to be much help for my son’s ADHD. Barely takes the edge off. But it works for others. My son will be meeting with the psych in a couple of weeks to give him feedback that the Straterra isn’t working well and see what else the psych might have to say.

So, my advice is to get a psychiatrist involved (we were going through the regular practitioner at first) and expect it to take a number of months to sort out. 

 

As far as having to wean off Straterra and her not feeling like herself for a while, how old is she? Is she able to mentally acknowledge that it’s the meds making her feel that way and if she holds on, it’ll pass? My son tried a different stimulant after we realized the first one was making him depressed, and even though the second stimulant also made him depressed, he wasn’t as depressed as the first, simply because he understood that the feelings weren’t real and would fade as he stopped the drug. He could acknowledge that he was feeling the sad feelings, but he could understand that they would be temporary and had nothing to do with his real life, but was just a side effect. But he is 20 and has the maturity to see it that way. 

Edited April 15, 2023 by Garga

[Paige]

We had to go through a few. I don't think Strattera works for many people but if it does, the benefit is that it's not controlled. We tried it when one child was having heart issues and it was worthless on its own, but marginal with a low dose stimulant that wouldn't have been effective at all on its own. We were happy to quit it and go back to normal stimulants when cleared for it. If you don't have contraindictions, I'd try all the different stimulant formulations before strattera. We've tried some that were awful, some meh, and Vyvanse seems to be best for us. 

[Paige]

3 minutes ago, Garga said:

My son gets badly depressed on stimulants. He went years being depressed and we had him in counseling for anxiety and depression. He went off his stimulants during a 1.5 month winter break and lo and behold his depression went away. (And yes, I feel horrible guilt for the years that my son was depressed from a drug and we didn’t realize it was the drug doing it. But at the same time, you don’t know what you don’t know—ya know?)

So, he’s seeing a psychiatrist right now to try to sort out his anxiety and ADHD and which meds will work to treat both. Straterra doesn’t seem to be much help for my son’s ADHD. Barely takes the edge off. But it works for others. My son will be meeting with the psych in a couple of weeks to give him feedback that the Straterra isn’t working well and see what else the psych might have to say.

So, my advice is to get a psychiatrist involved (we were going through the regular practitioner at first) and expect it to take a number of months to sort out. 

 

As far as having to wean off Straterra and her not feeling like herself for a while, how old is she? Is she able to mentally acknowledge that it’s the meds making her feel that way and if she holds on, it’ll pass? My son tried a different stimulant after we realized the first one was making him depressed, and even though the second stimulant also made him depressed, he wasn’t as depressed as the first, simply because he understood that the feelings weren’t real and would fade as he stopped the drug. He could acknowledge that he was feeling the sad feelings, but he could understand that they would be temporary and had nothing to do with his real life, but was just a side effect. But he 20 and has the maturity to see it that way. 

Has he tried wellbutrin? That was ok for one of mine for add off label.

[Katy]

We’ve had one family member love strattera and another few hate it. I don’t think you can know without trying it. 

[kirstenhill]

DS14 was on it for about six years, and we found it immensely helpful especially at first, but it was the first med we tried and so I have no idea if a stimulant would have worked equally well. It was just the approach the ped we had at the time wanted to try.  As he got older we were not sure we were still seeing as much benefit from it, and he went off. Honestly, other than a day or two of headaches there was no difficulty stopping.   He is off meds right now, as we saw very little difference off vs. on.   We're still keeping the door open to meds as a future possibility.  

[Ottakee]

I agree with seeing a psychiatrist and you can even have blood tests done to help determine which meds might work best.

personally I hated strattera for my girls.   It was horrible mood wise.  My son became aggressive on it and never was before or since.    That said, it does work well with no/few side effects for many.

[EKS]

My son used Strattera for about a year when he was 15.  It make his heart beat faster than normal (all the time) and didn't really do anything for his attention issues.  Weaning off of it went without incident.

I should mention that I am not at all sure that he ever really had ADHD.

 

[alysee]

My kid has only tried concerta. We asked for it based on two adults who had good responses to it and it seems to work and hasn't changed her personality or mood. 

[KidsHappen]

Me and everyone in my family that has ADD has used Adderall and it has worked well for all of us. I know many other people that it has worked for as well. There have been some shortages of it over the last year and it can be hard to find sometimes but I think that is because it is so popular. I like it because it is so smooth. I take it and I can't even feel the difference. It just works. Plus it wears off in 6-8 hours and then you can sleep at night. You can even take it during the week and then skip weekends if you want. I have never noticed any side effects. 

[kbutton]

I highly recommend genetic testing for any ADHD meds or psych meds if the first one doesn't work. 

[Storygirl]

We haven't used Strattera here, though we've used many others. I will echo what some others have said -- that it can take trying several different medications and dosages before finding one that works. We tried FIVE different kinds for DS in the first months before finding one that worked well without many side effects, and now he takes a sixth kind.

So your experience with having to try several is not uncommon. We do use a psychiatric nurse practitioner for both of my kids on ADHD meds (two different nurses), and I recommend that.

[ktgrok]

How long was she on the medication before deciding to stop? I know my doc said to give it two weeks for brain to adjust to the change - and that was about my experience. Also, timing and food can make a difference. If I take mine before eating or as i sit down to eat it effects me differently than if I take it after eating - even though supposedly it shouldn't matter. 

[Garga]

4 hours ago, Paige said:

Has he tried wellbutrin? That was ok for one of mine for add off label.

He’s on that for the anxiety, but it doesn’t seem to touch the ADHD. 

[ScoutTN]

Ds has been on Intuniv, which worked when he was younger, and Concerta, which only messed up his appetite and his sleep. We took a year completely off meds and are trying Qelbree now. Too early to report. He takes it at night.

So far, over 5 years, meds have been a slight help; no huge changes or really measurable, important effects. 
 

Our psych requires the genetic test (saliva) that shows how one metabolizes the various medications so that he does not prescribe one that is a problem. Easy and not expensive. Also revealed that Ds has both MTHFR mutations.

Edited April 16, 2023 by ScoutTN

[ScoutTN]

12 hours ago, kbutton said:

I highly recommend genetic testing for any ADHD meds or psych meds if the first one doesn't work. 

This!!!

[busymama7]

21 hours ago, kbutton said:

I highly recommend genetic testing for any ADHD meds or psych meds if the first one doesn't work. 

Can you explain more? I did all my genetics a couple years ago and would be curious what to look for.  I don't have a diagnosis but my son does and I'm suspicious of me as well 

[kbutton]

2 hours ago, busymama7 said:

Can you explain more? I did all my genetics a couple years ago and would be curious what to look for.  I don't have a diagnosis but my son does and I'm suspicious of me as well 

There are probably multiple companies that do it, but it's a medical genetics test you get through a doctor. It's not like 23 and Me. It looks at what meds are more and less likely to be a good fit. I assume there are panels with more and fewer classes of drugs, depending on what you need.

[sangtarah]

OP here. Dd is 17. We’ve tried adderall, and I forgot the first one. We tried each for over a month. One of my other kids did the genesight testing, which was only mildly helpful in her case. This dd hasn’t seen a psychiatrist, we are using the pediatrician for meds. She was diagnosed through a psychologist.

We started the stratterra tonight and I’m hoping it goes well. 

[ScoutTN]

The genetic testing we did shows which drugs or classes of drugs a person would react negatively to, metabolize quickly or slowly etc. Very useful when considering any Rx for ADHD, depression, anxiety etc. Adverse effects can be significant, so it is good to prevent them with easily obtained information.