When ADHD medication goes wrong

I'm a firm believer in medicating my children when it's in their best interests. I feel that's the only responsible approach for me. Medicating my kids for things beside illness has always been a painstaking process or research, thought and discussion with the prescribing doctor. Sometimes even the best laid plans can have unforeseen consequences and then tough choices have to be made.  This is the case with Elliott and his ADHD medications.    As it turns out, the tachycardia he's been experiencing is likely related to his ADHD medication and Dr. Reynolds has taken him off and switched him to different medication that is less likely to cause a problem.  For the next two weeks I will be having to monitor his heart rate for changes and document it…

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The role of medications in my son’s life

It was refill Gavin's weekly pill dispenser time this morning. It's my favorite time of the week <insert sarcasm>.  I actually hate doing this because it's a reminder of everything that Gavin struggles with.  I've got the actual process down to a science but it's relatively tedious. What you see in the picture below is just one weeks worth of his medication. Majority of the pills are actually for his physical health issues. He's on three psychiatric medications and that's actually progress because it used to be more than that.    There are medications to reduce his heart rate and manage his blood pressure. There are medications to reduce the chance of a bad reaction to his biweekly IVIG infusions as well. There are also two inhalers for asthma and…

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