spectrumom

So the Lithium hasn't really worked out.  We started decreasing the dose yesterday even before I contacted his doctor.  She had us take the dose down even farther. Today was better.  He was much more in control through the day.  Less of that crazy cycling in and out of anxiety and agitation.  Tonight, not so much.  He's upstairs screaming and pounding the walls while his dad tries to convince him it's time for bed.  An hour ago. But I'm grateful for the day.  It's like it was given back to us.  Even with the trouble tonight, I still was able to take him to Costco and Goodwill and out to eat by myself and give Paul time off. So much of the time I feel sorry for me and sorry for him and sorry for us.  Autism makes our lives so different compared to other people.  There are places we can't go, things we can't do. Most of the time I don't talk to people about him except in vague terms ("Nathan's doing better (ie. he's not breaki...

It's like dating.  Every time we try a new med on the boys, I think 'Maybe THIS one will help us break through.  Maybe this is THE one.' Not a miracle.  A way to move forward faster.  More communication.  More steadiness of emotional state.  We've had two med changes recently, one for each of the older boys. As I've mentioned before, Sam tried a few meds in the past.  None were THE one.  It was just lots of work, time to mature.  He's made so much progress.  But still lots to go.  We do have him on Adderall, to try to help him to pay attention in class.  It works...some.  Really, no big problem behaviors to address so we just keep plugging along.  He's had some more distractability recently, so Dr. Bernie increased his dose when we saw him yesterday.  Sam's grown a lot, time for his dose to grow too. It's hard to tell if it's a summer of too much computer, puberty, meds, or all three.  We've made adjustm...

Way back in the day, starting when Sam (now 15) was diagnosed, and continuing for about 7 years, we looked for a way to fix our boys. I know.  I've blogged this to death. But we tried DAN! - vitamins, supplements.  Avoided gluten and casein and foods with phenols.  I rubbed them with pink cream (B12).  I went to gazillions of meetings and spent thousands of dollars. We did ABA, VB, RDI.  Bought Floortime videos.  Bought books.  Lordy, I still buy books.  Too many for any one person to read.  Unless I dropped out of the rest of my life. "Hun, keep the kids alive for the next couple months while I read all these books, mkay?" Then I turned to conventional medicine.  We thought maybe Sam did his pacing and stimming because he was nervous, so we started Prozac.  Lordy, turns out that was a mistake.  Then stimulants.  Okay, that helped some.  Pacing and stimming go on, because they serve a purpose - they center h...