Multi vitamins - Catatonic?

[Mayleng]

Can you tell me what brand multi Vitamin you recommend? My son is 9, 61 lbs. Currently on Omega3 (as you know) and Cal/mag plus Ritalin.

I don't know if the Omega3 is actually helping his attention/focus but I did notice that it has helped his emotional rebound from ritalin and have helped him control his emotions better generally. While I was away on vacation I stopped giving him the Omega3s for a week because he was staying with my cousin, and I noticed that during that particular week he was more emotional and less able to control it. It could be also that he did not have enough sleep then and was tired but since he has been back on the Omega3 I can see him better able to control his emotions and not have as many outbursts. I thought I would just mention to you and see if it was my imagination.

Thanks as usual for your help.

[catatonic]

I doubt it's your imagination. When the brainis nourished properly, it's going to function better, and the type of improvement you see will vary tremendously from child to child depending on how a lack of essential fatty acids affects them. I'd take it as a good sign that the Omega-3 is helping him.

Multi-vitamins...hmmm...my personal favorite is "Special Two" made by Now. It's got lots of trace minerals, low B-vitamin content, and includes iron. It is fairly inexpensive, and has the advantage of being a 2-a-day formulation, so that I can take 2 and give the kids 1 tablet. Drawbacks are that it is large and smells like the alfalfa treats we give the horses. It also causes a bad behavioral reaction in Challenge Boy, so he is the only one in the family who does not take it.

For Challenge Boy, Kirkman Labs makes a very good children's multi-vitamin, not excessively expensive ($15 for a 2-month supply), no artificials or common allergens, plenty of minerals (including the all-important 15mg zinc). You still need additional Vitamin E and magnesium with it. I would particularly recommend this one. You can see it here:
www.kirkmanlabs.com/products/multivitamins/children/childrenMV299_120.html

It's also available in chewable, also without artificials, but I personally would avoid that one because it contains a corn syrup sweetener (dextrose), the reduced calorie sweetener sucralose, and the concentrated peach flavoring is high in salicylates. However, if none of these things bother you, it's a fine vitamin, too.
www.kirkmanlabs.com/products/multivitamins/children/childrenMV288-120.html

[Mayleng]

Thanks Catatonic, I will check out the links.

Hopefully, we will see more improvements, especially with his focus and attention, when he has been on Omega3 longer.

[AustinsMom]

Mayleng,

Glad to hear you are having luck with the Omega. I just wanted to add a cautionary note from my own experience. If my memory serves me correct, I believe your child takes strattera also? We were using strattera when we started omega 3, and about 3 months into using the omega we started having meltdowns and anger problems. We ended up stopping the strattera, but in retrospect, I think we needed less of the strattera when the omegas kicked in. I believe we ended up with too high of a strattera dose, even though dosage and weight hadn't changed.

I know from reading your posts at schwab that you know much more about strattera than I did when we were using it, so I'm sure you would recongnize dosage problems more than we did. Good luck with your vitamin experiment.

[Mayleng]

Hi Austinsmom, Thanks for your input - I will keep that in mind. Unfortunately, I had to stopped strattera for my son about a month ago. It was great for alot of things for him, but was just helping about 70% with his attention and focus. It was just not there. So I decided to try ritalin, lo and behold, it helped him and with minimum side effects. We have been on Concerta, Adderall, Adderall Xr and strattera, and also combo of strattera/concerta, strattera/adderall. Too many side effects for me to accept. So I am happy that ritalin is working. I might consider Ritalin LA or Metadate at some point just because I would like to get rid of the afternoon dose. But I digress. I am happy with the initial results of OmegaIII/Vit E, Cal/Mag and multivits plus the ritalin for now. He had problems sleeping last night ie. 1 am (for the first time in 3 weeks) so I may have to add back the Melatonin - 1mg. I had thought the Cal/mag was helping with that regards (I give it to him after dinner). I had upped it last night.
All is going pretty well, the test will be when he goes back to school.