Adderall Success or not ? How do we know?

[SunshineF]

My 4.5 yr old son just started 2.5mg of adderall in the morning. He also takes .5mg of guanfacine in the morning and midday. How do you know if the adderall is having any effect ? His day was so so today - not that great but not horrible either. I thought we’d see obvious effects for good or for bad within an hour or so.. my husband and I are really confused. Thanks for your help.

[Nats2005]

By "just started" do you mean within the last day or so, or have a couple of weeks gone by? My recollection is it takes a few weeks for the various meds to start having their full effect. Also, 2.5 mg is a pretty small dose, I feel like it took until our son (at about the same age) was taking 5 mg before we could discern a clear improvement in focus.

Note also meds only help to a point; parenting techniques (i.e. positive/collaborative parenting), therapy and support/accommodation at school are needed along with the meds for best results. (Ask me how I know - we're falling short on parenting and therapy at the moment.)

[SunshineF in reply to Nats2005]

looks like my original reply didn’t post. Thanks for sharing. Yesterday was his first day of the stimulant. It’s short acting so I thought we’d see a change that day but maybe it takes a few days to see it like you mentioned. He gets therapy at school and has been for about a year. And we’ve changed our parenting approach but are still learning. How old is your son now?

[MamaBear90s]

Hi SunshineF, my understanding is typically stimulants show results in real time versus others that build up in the system and take a few weeks to show. That said it does take a few days or so for our kiddos to get used to the new feeling and they def need help expressing their feelings sometimes. I think it’s tricky for them to interpret or can be scary. My son (8 at the time) didn’t do well on his adhd stimulant and became verbose and emotional (like pondering his existence and the universe!). We knew within a week that he was not improving. 3 different meds later….. we are still doing Guanfacine for it’s calming effects but also we do an antidepressant liquid Zoloft and he’s doing better but still need to find better meds for his adhd. I hope you find success faster! My suggestion is to have open conversations with them about how they’re feeling and encourage them to share. Hopefully your safe space will keep communications flowing <3 good luck to you and your child it does improve after trial and error.

[SunshineF in reply to MamaBear90s]

thank you for your feedback. I wish he was a little older where he could communicate how he’s feeling better. He just tells us good right now.

[MamaBear90s]

I had missed that he's only 4.5 yo, that's great that he's saying good right now! I think you'd know by now if it wasn't a positive response. Fingers crossed!

[SunshineF]

Yeah I agree I mean he’s not saying bad so that’s a plus! but his behavior is kind of the same. That’s what we’re unsure of.

[Onthemove1971]

Sounds like you are doing a great job with him starting so young. This journey includes many ups and downs( even with medication). Our child psychiatrist told us medication helps with 60% of behaviors, the rest is educational plan and change in parenting style.

Our son's guanfacine is a 24 hour dose so it really helps when the stimulant wears off.

When it is all right... it will be right. We also don't worry about what dose his body needs, we just listen to the doctor and watch/report the behavior. When the stimulant dose was to low I reported the behavior and we increased the stimulate.

Hope this helps.. we are so glad you are here with us and once it is all dialed in it will really work well for a long time.

Take care,

[SunshineF]

thanks for this. So he takes 10 mg total - 5mg in the morning and another 5 mg after lunch ?