The Diary of a Crazy Woman

I was finally able to get Trevor into the psychiatrist to discuss his medications.  He had been so depressed all summer – socially withdrawn.  I hated to see him feel that way, he just seemed so sad, didn’t feel like doing anything with anyone.  That’s totally unlike Trevor, he’s a pretty social boy and loves to be out doing things.  We went camping and stuff, but when it came to his friends there was little interaction.  Honestly, I felt really bad for him.  After laying in bed one night thinking about Trevor and Dylan being withdrawn and unhappy it hit me that their medication could be making them depressed.  They were both taking Concerta and both had been depressed since.  The medication did have a positive affect in some ways.  Trevor was less combative, and it seemed to help him with his impulse control.  Dylan had the same response, and he became a little genus sorting things, literally spending hours sorting anything that could be sorted, but he wasn’t himself.  He wouldn’t play and he didn’t want to do anything but play on the computer or sort things.  He never smiled, and was really cranky.

With my epiphany that their medication was causing their depression I completely stopped giving it to Dylan.  He came off of it smoothly without too much of a rebound effect that I had seen before.  The rebound effect he got most nights was 10 times worse than the symptoms we were treating, so I was really glad he did ok completely coming off the Concerta.   After a day or two without the medication Dylan started to be more of his self.  He was willing to go play, and he was happy, smiling, and laughing, something we had seen little of while he was taking Concerta.  He’s been doing pretty good so right now I have no plans to re-medicate him with anything.

Now for Trevor once finally meeting with the psychiatrist the first thing I brought up was that I had increased his anti-depressant, and I had two concerns with Concerta.  The first,  depression, second, the PRICE!!  Outrageous co-pays and they are only going to increase come January.  When I mentioned I had gone online and checked up on the side effects of Concerta and depression was one of them, he was quick to say drug companies just have to list that, almost like I was projecting the depression because I read it could be a side effect.  When I explained I only checked to see if it was a side effect after BOTH of my boys showed signs of clinical depression he was a little more willing to hear what I had to say.

It was decided to take Trevor off of Concerta and increase his Strattera to 60 mg.  He has been taking Welbutrin for depression, which also helps ADHD – that was something new I learned!!  So, his increased concentration could have been from the Welbutrin, but we will see.  I’m pretty nervous about completely taking Trevor off of a stimulant because it does help, and when he hasn’t taken his meds it’s awful.  The psychiatrist wanted to take him off over a couple of days at a decreased dose so that he didn’t have the rebound or withdrawal effects.  It’s been two days at a decreased dose of Concerta.  So far so good, and I’m praying we can get this figured out without a huge backlash.   Trevor is glad to be taking less pills everyday.  Poor kid is like a pharmacy.  I’ve been concerned about everything he takes too, it just seems like so much for a 13 year old.  Now we are down to Welbutrin, Straterra, and Celexa.   YAY!!