What do I do for my son?
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| Mon, 01-21-2008 - 3:39pm |
Hi I have a 5 1/2 year old son in kindergarten. He has been diagnosed with ADD, early in the school year. We have been trying different medications and having no luck. He is a very sweet boy and does not have behavior problems. At school he has not made any friends and wanders around by himself at lunch time. He does have a few friends outside of school, that he gets along with and has normal interactions with. His teacher complains that he is out in space all the time, he has a hard time following directions and paying attention. She complains he is afraid of getting in trouble, and speaks in a very quiet robot like voice. She also says on the playground he needs to be reminded to play other wise he just walks aound all alone. He has poor motor skills which have been improving, he has no problems throwing a ball, kicking, or jumping. He is clumsy.
The school Psych thinks he needs to be tested for Aspergers. I have an appointment with a Psychiatrist in a few weeks.
At home he plays like a normal child, talks in a normal voice and has no strange obsessions. He has no problem having conversations with family members and adults, especially waiters in restaurants. He does have anxiety that has been improving lately.

I also have a 5.5 yo DS in kindergarten. He is PDD-NOS and ADHD. I don't have him on any meds as we want to work on his behavior first and then think about meds if our behavior modification work is not fruitful. I am not against meds, and I do not judge anyone who have their children on meds. What I heard from my pediatrician is that if none of the meds work, the child is not ADHD, but his inattention is just another symptom of PDD-NOS/ASD. He may be both ADHD and ASD, like my son. You should get him evaluated. You would no one way or another this way.
Your son sounds a lot like my son. My son also has difficulty making friends, has problems following directions, and has an attention span of a gnat. He has fine motor issues and poor hand-eye coordination. He wonders around by himself at recess, not interacting with any kids. He has one friend who is in another kindy class; this kid seeks out my son and plays with him. If he is absent, then my Justin just wonders around by himself.
When I go to his school to volunteer now and then, I notice Justin speaking with non-typical intonation, especially when he is talking to a group, as in his classroom. At home, he talks normally. He has had delays in speech, so he was not diagnosed with Asperger's. Just PDD-NOS. With this diagnosis, I am pursuing the school to evaluate him for more speech and OT.
-- Innie
Welcome!
It sounds like you are wondering whether it's worth it to look a little deeper at your child and if that "label" matches whats going on.
I am having him evaluated in about two weeks. The boys do sound a lot a like! Patrick developed without any delays, but we began to notice very poor attention span about a year ago. He has always been shy so I
My DS has private speech, OT, and pragmatics (to help with his social skills). He doesn't get any additional counseling for his behavior. We mostly work with him at home to reward signs of positive behavior. Rewards work well for him, but very slow progress. Speech and OT has made tremendous improvements in those areas, but attention has improved very little. He gets distracted too often, too much. He also has social skills issues and does not know how to really interact with other kids. Hopefully, getting him additional pragmatics and play group interactions would help him further in this area.
I know what you mean by being overwhelmed. I struggle everyday too. But stick around, this board has been a haven for me. I get so much useful information here from the veterans and other parents. Which medications have you tried on your DS, if you don't mind my asking?
-- Innie
We started with Daytrana, then Focalinxr, then we tried Strattera and focalinxr together and now we are on just Strattera. He deffinatly gets bennefits from the meds. All have improved his attention span, but either do not help enough or cause him to have anxiety attacks. At what age did you begin to notice something different in your son? I feel like my husband and I are crazy for not noticing anything sooner.
THank you for your messages today!
With Justin, I noticed his hyperactivity from the time he was mobile. Now looking back, I would say he was on the go even as an infant as he would always be kicking his legs when I laid him down on the diaper changing table. Hyperactivity has improved significantly that I can now go to a restaurant with him (this change didn't occur until he was almost 5yo). In the past, he would be running around the restaurant, uncontrollably. He would run away from me in shops, at parks, wherever, and he would think it was all fun and games.
He was also delayed in speech, not saying anything until he was 15-18 months, and did not say two words together until after 2, and even at 3, he wasn't speaking a lot of sentences. We all attributed this to the fact that we are in a bilingual household, and because kids are exposed to two languages that they will just naturally be delayed. However, his preschool teachers kept on asking us to get him evaluated as he wonders around during circle time, won't speak much, chants, won't do any preschool work. We got him evaluated and thus embarked on speech therapy. Our speech therapist noticed that he has body awareness and thus we got him an OT evaluation which resulted in OT. At 4, the preschool director said that she sees behavior challenges like no socialization, not doing his work, etc. So it took us one long year to get his complete evaluation. So his preschool, thank goodness, pushed more and we followed. Perhaps we were in denial. I did noticed even when Justin was 8-9 months old, he would lie on the floor moving toy vehicles back and forth watching the wheels spin. He would do that with a vacuum cleaner too. So there were warning signs; I just did not know them. Because Justin exhibits some very un-ASD-characteristic behaviors such as empathy, warmth (he tells me he loves me everyday, without me prompting) along with ASD behaviors like social skills deficits, inconsistent eye contact, etc it was difficult for them to diagnose him. But a couple of specialists independently came up with the PDD-NOS diagnosis. Another specialist questioned whether that was accurate as she thought he was more of a classic ADHD. So we are treating Justin as if had both PDD-NOS and ADHD.
Yes, that is what worries me about the meds; you have to try several kinds to find out what works for your child and then you have to get them on other meds because the initial meds caused unwanted side effects like anxiety, tics, loss or appetite, insomnia, etc. And then those meds cause some other side effects. There was a program on PBS recently titled "The Medicated Child" as part of the Frontline series. It was a very good documentary on pediatric bipolar syndrome and the meds kids are on. It is a follow-on to another documentary on ADHD (called "Medicating Kids") several years back. If you have not seen either one, you can go to the PBS site to watch them. They are both well-done and informative. It talks about the pros and cons of ADHD/mood disorder medication for kids. "The Medicated Child" is on http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/medicatedchild/ and "Medicating Kids" is on http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/medicating/.
-- Innie
My Asperger's kids (13yo AS dd, 9yo AS ds; also have 11yo NT ds, 4yo NT dd) are similar to how you describe your ds. I think it often DOES take longer to diagnose kids like ours because their symptoms aren't as pronounced, they don't fit the stereotypes, and it doesn't initially look like there's a problem.
Although I'd raised the issue with our doctors over the years, it wasn't until a year ago that my kids finally got a formal diagnosis 'cus the docs had always dismissed my concerns. Even after the pediatrician finally acknowledged that my kids had developmental delays, a therapist and a neurologist both told me my kids were DEFINITELY not autistic even tho' they'd each only had a brief conversation with my kids but not done testing.
When my kids DID get formal diagnostic testing (through our local Children's Hospital's neuropsych dept), they were both definitively diagnosed with Asperger's.
One thing I appreciated reading after getting my kids' diagnosis was that it's less important WHAT diagnosis you get but that the diagnosis you receive seems to fit the symptoms of your child. If you get a proper diagnosis, you can begin to learn how best to support your child to benefit them the most. I hope the psychiatrist is able to give you the answers you're seeking!