Please Help

[andysmom]

My son is going to be 6 next month and was recently diagnosed with ADHD. This is affecting him in school and the teachers and Doctors think he would benefit by being put on medication. Although at the beginning I did not want to put him on medication but now that I see he is getting worse and how it is affecting him in school I have decided that it might be a good idea. The problem I have is that my ex husband does not agree and says that the reason for his behavior is not because of ADHD he says it is because of me and that I am not hard enough on him. Even thought he was diagnosed by the doctor my ex husbands thinks the only reason they want to put our son on medication is because they get a kick back from the people who make the medication. He wants me to give him custody and says that he can fix his behavior because he is a lot more strict on him than I am. I don’t want to give up my son, but he keeps telling me that I am being selfish, and that I need to do what is best for my son which in his opinion would be me giving him custody so he can as he says “Whoop the kids ass in shape” I do not spank my son, and we were both advised not to because my son has a problem hitting other children but my ex husband feels that is all my son will need and he learn. I don’t know what to do, I cant give up my son and I feel that I am doing the best I can, but my ex husband makes me think sometimes that I am not good enough. I don’t know what to do!!!!!!!!1

[AnneM]

andysmom and a BIG WELCOME !!

Your ex husband is WRONG ... I am sorry .. but he is so wrong!! ...

Andy's adhd is NOT NOT NOT your fault .... it may be genetically inherited ... either from yourself or from your ex?? ... BUT it is NOT "caused" by your parenting ... I promise you that totally !

Yes its true that various ways of parenting can improve things or make things worse ... but adhd is NOT a fault of parenting... period!!

"Heavy discipline" is also a NO NO with our adhd'ers ... in fact in my honest opinion makes things way worse!! Yes be firm and follow things through ... but concentrate on praising and encouraging and rewarding GOOD behaviour rather than homing in on 'negative' comments and 'punishment' .... The former works so much better - I can vouch for that!!

There is a WHOLE bunch of information right here ... I really hope you will take a good look around and stay with us ....

It sounds to me like you are most DEFINITELY doing the very best for your son .... keep with it ... read around and you will learn even more ....

WELCOME ABOARD !!

[SKay]

Hello, andysmom, and welcome to our site. I'm sure others here will have good ideas to help you.

When our children first start exhibiting behavior problems, I think most of us look at our parenting first to see if there's anything we're doing that's causing the problems. One thing that my DH and I did was to ask relatives and close friends if they saw anything that we were doing to encourage our son's poor behavior. Sometimes it helps to get a viewpoint separate from our own. Just make sure it's someone who will be honest with you, rather than just telling you what you want to hear.

Another idea: maybe you and your ex can come up with a compromise, like trying natural alternatives first to see if they help the behavior. There is a good section here on this message board.

I'm modifying this to say that I accidentally neglected the fact that your son has been diagnosed with ADHD. The doctors apparently believe that his problems are not due to poor parenting so maybe you can get some help from them--specifics as to how they came to the ADHD diagnosis.

[andysmom]

Thanks for your reply, I have a appointment with the doctor next week to discuss different medication options, I am still having a hard time with putting him on medication. My ex husband and some people I have talked to have told me stories about children who take medication act differently and kind of act like zombie's is how they have described it to me. What kind of emotional changes should I expect?

[tridlette]

Each child is unique... so the medication result will also be unique. Some of us have had good results, some awful results, from various meds. What works for one child, doesn't for another. My son has been through 4 different meds in an attempt to find the right one. MY SON asked the doctor this week to adjust his meds again... HE knows it is not anybody's fault!

Next, ask yourself, why is the husband an "X". Are there signs there that one, or both, of you has undiagnosed ADHD symptoms? Obiviously, it isn't my business, and I don't ask you to explain, but sometimes the very things that are mis~wired in our kids~ can be a reflection of the parents. I know it is true in my case... Michael is ME all over again!

I think that trying some behavior modifications and looking at natural alternatives, or the feingold diet might be a great step in the direction of compromise. Look into the feingold diet... I hear it is actually pretty easy to adapt to... it is just changing the BRANDs of a lot of food and drink. There are links under the Natural Alternatives threads.

Welcome to the family. I hope you find the answers that your family is comfortable with.

DON'T let the X give you a self esteem issue. You are doing what you feel is best for your son. And what feels best, usually IS best!

[kurs10b]

I hear the "zombie" excuse all the time, but I work at a school and there are a bunch of kids there that take meds for ADHD. None of them are anything close to zombies. The meds just give them a bit more self control and the ability to concentrate. If they are a zombie, then they are on too high a dose or on the wrong stuff.

[Kaiti]

Welcome to a safe haven andysmom

One question that I have for you.......can I ask what the parental status is for your son?

If you are named custodial parent, meaning that you make all of the decisions, then it is totally up to you as to whether or not to medicate your son.

If you have joint custody, that's where it falls into a limbo, that I have seen before.

I personally do not medicate. We have our son on the Feingold Program www.feingold.org

It has worked wonders for us. I can see from behavior what Mikey has gotten into just from his reactions....whiney, off the wall, violent, etc.

As far as the "zoning" kurs10b put it correctly. There is too much medication going into the system, so there is non-production going on.

I have worked with kids for the past 13 years, and a few have slipped under my personal radar as to them having a diagnosis at all :I'm usually pretty good at pin pointing kids with add/adhd, but with the medication they were one, heck, threw me a curve ball.

Do the teachers modify for your son? In kindergarten they didn't at first, then one thing lead to another and I got on my broom and flew

DON"T EVER GIVE UP :-XThis isn't your fault, nor the fault of your ex, it's something that as another said is genetic, and like Tridlette, my son is pulled out of my butt :-/And I don't know how my mom didn't kill me at the time

Take care of yourself too. Get on down to the natural alternatives section, and fire away with the questions. There are no stupid ones, Tridlette and I asked them all already.

Take care
Kaiti

[Linda]

kurs10b said:

I hear the "zombie" excuse all the time, but I work at a school and there are a bunch of kids there that take meds for ADHD. None of them are anything close to zombies. The meds just give them a bit more self control and the ability to concentrate. If they are a zombie, then they are on too high a dose or on the wrong stuff.

:)and welcome I too work in a school and completely agree with kurs.

I also agree with the others in what they are saying.

Keep your boy with you and fight for him. Your journey has just begun. Things DO get better and you are your sons best advocate.

We are here for you and we will give you strength if you need it.

[catseye]

What to do? First dont panic, this is NOT an emergency decision you all have to make quickly here...

Are the teachers actually suggesting medication? Legally they are NOT supposed to... Is the school doing anything else? IEP or testing at school? Your son should qualify for an IEP (individual education plan) under the POHI (physcially or otherwise health impaired) classification... Please dont let my acronyms through you off they are going to be important to you...

Basically what the IEP does is gives your child unique guidelines to learn with... For instance my sd's IEP, says that any time the teacher see's her getting ansy, teacher hands my sd a note to take to office... This gets my sd moving, and we all know those ADHD'ers want to MOVE LOL ...

There are other things more directed to her learning, such as only 30 minutes a night on homework, if it isnt completely done and I sign that she did 30 minutes they will not grade her down... Ok I am getting ahead of myself here, sorry about that, just didnt want to frighten you!!

As for your ex, whoooo boy do I know what you are talking about there... My dh has an ex wife (my sd's mom) who didnt want sd medicated, this is after years of sd being medicated, and everything going well.... So my dh even though he probably could of fought it in court, asked the teachers to write down ANYTHING they thought related to ADHD symptoms daily... Dh took those papers to the dr, made sd's mom meet him there, and basically the dr said that "we gave it a shot without medication, this obviously isnt working" type speach... And really it wasnt within a week, my sd had 3 write ups on the bus, (4 you get bus suspension), 7 referrals (yes that is more then one a day) for hitting, mouthing, running etc...

Oh yeah I cant SCREAM loud enough echoing anne, ADHD IS NOT BAD PARENTING!! It simply isnt... I have 2 children in my home I am raising exactly the same, one has it the other one doesnt.... IT IS NOT BAD PARENTING!

WOW anne is right on again, you have to catch your son being good! I know we all want to fix the bad behaviors, so we as adults are FOCUSED on the bad behaviors, this is WRONG thing to do! We need to turn our thinking around and FOCUS on the good behaviors... Praise, rewards, tell the child how proud you are of him etc...

Forget what your ex husband and some people say about the zombie junk... It is simply a stigma that ignorant people are putting on ADHD kids... It is so not true... Many people judge parents of ADHD kids, with the same things your ex is throwing at you...

Hang in there, and ask around! Fight your ex's ignorance, with your research and knowledge!!

cat

[finnmom]

Andysmom and A BIG WELCOME HOME

Other´s have already covered the thing´s I wanted to say, but here it goes again.

First; ADHD is deffenately not from bad parenting!!!! Neather can it be treated by "whooping @ss" NO WAY!!Strickt rule´s, close monitoring, lot´s of love.... that´ll benefit him, but yelling, whooping, screaming etc. is not good at all, our adhder´s know they are different and they already have low selfesteem, you dont want to hurt him any more.

Kaiti asked of the parental status, do you have to listen ex´s opinion´s legally ?? If not, then I would just skip the bad talk´s and decide by yourself.

Med´s.... Every kid is unique, and so is the responce to med´s, some work for some and some kid´s will never find a totally good one, it´s a try and error all the way. The zombie effect... I think we´ve all heard that if the kid is acting some how different then the med is not good for him/her and should be thought again

Like Catseye said, you dont have to rush on this, you have plenty of time to think this through. School can not stress you to medicate, it´s your decision totally, not them.

We´ve been lucky, we tried al the other option´s(behavioural modification, chart´s, smaller class, personal assist...) before med´s and we found the right one by the first try, but I can tell you I too, was horrified of the thought of giving med´s to my kid. These great folk´s in here helped me a lot

So, keep coming in here,shearch through the site and ask... we´ve been through this too.

[jenninae]

Do we have the same ex??
We went through the same thing when Brigham was diagnosed. His father only has him every other weekend. So, I told him that if he chose not to give him meds on the weekend that was fine (most doctors will allow for weekend holidays if the child can handle it). However, he was not aloud to call me over the weekend to complain about behaviors. He still threatened to take me to court to sue for custody, but he never did. Even if he had, what was he going to say?
"Our son is having trouble in school, and his neglectful mother took him to a doctor and they diagnosed him with ADHD, and now she is abusing him by giving him the medication the doctor prescribed."
Let him do his venting and just know you are doing what is best for his son.
If he pushes the issue further you will have the doctor and school to back you up. Who will back him up.

DON'T LET HIM BULLY YOU. You need to do what is right for your son.
Good work mom. Hang in there.

[camismom]

Welcome to the site, andysmom! There is nothing more I can say that hasn't already...I just echo it all. ADHD is a chemical imbalance, a MEDICAL disorder, not the result of bad parenting. The only advice I have to offer up in addition to what's already been offered is this: do your research, and print anything and everything you can find on ADHD and give it to the ex to read...educate the fool if you can. Slip it into your son's bag when he goes for a visit if you don't think the ex will accept it ffrom you. I'd be willing to bet if he finds it he'll read it out of curiousity and thinking noone will know. lol

As far as him not wanting your son to take meds, Kaiti touched on that correctly. If you have full custody, your ex has no say-so...if you have joint, then as custodial parent you have control of what takes place while he's in your house, and he has control of what takes place in his. How often does he see Andy? If it's the usual ever other weekend then jenninae has a great suggestion...your ex can have him med-free and you can give him meds on the school days so he can benefit from them when it matters the most.

Keep an open mind at first because it does take a good bit of trial and error (sometimes) to get the right medicine at the right dose...but when you do, I promise you, you will have a little boy that is much more focused in school and ultimately happier because life won't be such a struggle and he won't get in trouble as much. lol If he seems like a "zombie" then he is simply getting too much. with the right dose the only change in your son you will see is a calmer, more focused boy.

Good luck in whatever route you go!

[aimee30]

Welcome!

I can't say anymore than the others have said here. I am in the same boat as you with my DD. The X and I fought over this for awhile, him saying he wanted custody and that it's just me. Your parenting skills have nothing to do with ADHD.

I can't really give any good advice other than what has already been given. Know that you aren't alone.

The "family" here will be your best route for advice, comforting, and love.

Good luck with whatever you decide and try to keep us all posted.

[shadygirl]

Andysmom,

I surely feel for you and understand the trouble with your ex. Though my problem is with my estranged brother who seriously believes my son don't have ADHD/ODD. My son is 10 and was diagnosed about 4 years ago. So, I'm not really worried on him calling child services on me. I know that I have my son's doctors and school to back me up if needed. People(family or not) who see your child having bad behaviors. They immediately assume you're a bad parent. And even some schools don't know how to handle ADHD children. My son "was" in one of those schools. So, I've been fighting for my son and for his rights. So, YOU hang in there for your son.

Shadygirl

[tridlette]

Hi SHADYGIRL... welcome to the family... I see you are already jumping right in with a great answer. Hope we can help you as well!