I've struggled for over two years with medicine for my twins who are diagnosed with ADHD, OCD and anxiety. We have tried every medicine the doctors (three of them at this point) can think of. One of the stimulants works, slightly but every time they take it they pick at their eyes and lips until they bleed. We tried other medicines with the stimulants but none of them stopped the picking. We stopped the stimulants and tried Prozac to address some of the picking (anxiety). One twin has stopped picking altogether but the other now ties her hair in knots and pulls them out. She is pulling all her hair out in school! I finally stopped the Prozac after a month but she is still pulling and her teacher lets her do it!!! They are very slow in school and are constantly being picked on because of this. Any advice on where I go from here? The psychiatrist said he is out of all medicine options! Some sort of therapy?
Thanks in advance,
Losing it in Raleigh!!!
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mom2twins
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Thanks for posting your issues to the groups. I guess what I will ask is are you see guys seeing a skilled psychiatrist? We do not use 1 type of medication, we use a medication for reducing the hyperactivity and a medication for focus.
Do you have them seeing a counselor to discuss what is making them do the picking? Then do you have a reward system set up for them, if they go so many days without picking they earn XXX?. (If they can go 1day reward them them mive it to two days, it could be some simple reward, extra TV time, ice cream, etc.. ) This is what has worked for us. Yes it is exhausting and I never thought it would take so much but it is what works for us.
Thanks, yes we saw one of the best psychiatrists in the area and tried all imaginable medications. Initially it seems like the stimulant was causing (or bringing out, whichever one it really is, which is up for debate) the picking. They never picked before the stimulants, same with the hair pulling. We stopped stimulants and tried various other medications. I have grocery bags full of failed medications. The last thing we did was to try to treat just the anxiety (picking and pulling out hair) with Prozac, it didn't work at all -- even after increasing the dosage. I use the reward system, but the problem is trying to make them even aware they are doing it. I assume you are using a stimulant for focus? I'm not concerned with the hyperactivity part -- it's not terrible and we can all live with that -- it's always been trying to achieve the focus. I am meeting with an advocate this week to help with the schooling part of this (they do nothing at school and the 504 plan doesn't help much) and she said she has some excellent behavioral therapists we can try, so I'm crossing my fingers. I am also on the lookout for ADHD studies that we might be able to look into.
I've only tried know medicine which is concerts 18mg for a 6yo boy. Stop all together after several tries and a couple breaks. He would or was able to swallow the pill. Have not tried supplements. At thus point we are back to the typical ADHD behaviors of constant movement, climbing the walls and out of focus.
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