Thoughts from the sick house

                                           
It's two days after Thanksgiving and Miller and I are home sick with the flu.  I got sick the day before Thanksgiving and went to the ER on Thanksgiving night.  The next day Miller was hit hard.  Today (Saturday) she woke up with a fever of 105.  Scary stuff.

Yesterday we picked up a blog book from when she was 1 years old and Colby was three.  We read it together and were laughing hysterically at some of the stories.  The sad and frightening thing is that I don't remember most of it.  That means I won't remember what is happening now, and I'm not keeping any sort of journal.

I also realized that it's not the pictures I want to see- I can pull those up on iPhoto.  What I want are the written words, stories, and thoughts.  It also doesn't matter how much time has gone by...I can start now and shouldn't feel like I need to feel like I have to back track to do it.  

Colby is in second grade and Miller is in first.  Things are going well for both of them in school and swimming.  What's really the focus now is Colby and trying to figure out the right medication combination for him.  To say it has been a roller coaster ride would be an understatement.  We have tried so many combinations- stimulants, non stimulants.  They either work and have horrible side effects or don't work well enough.  Right now, he's taking two non stimulants and they have not been working well for a long time.  Our biggest problem, still, is his teasing of Miller and impulse control.  He also does not follow directions at home and even the smallest of tasks are difficult.  He does not take "no" for an answer and will argue with anyone.  Punishments don't work.  Rewards don't work.  Charts don't work.  NOTHING works. 

He does well in school and doesn't seem to get in trouble, but I know that he's not working to his potential.  It seems like it's unfair not to give him that opportunity to excel.  As it is now, he has ideas but does not have the motivation or ability to follow through with them.  This happens at home with everything- sports, toys, etc.  At home he often has one sock on.  Why?  Because he started to take them off, got distracted, and went to do something else and forgot to take the other one off.  He also only wants to play video games or have a friend to play with.  That's it.  

We tried wellbutrin which really worked well for him, especially with the teasing, but he had the side effect of nausea that would come in waves.  It lasted for two months and usually happened during exercise.  We were told by the pediatric GI that he was backed up, so we did a "clean out" and then tried the wellbutrin a few weeks later.  Same result.  

Now I think we need to try a stimulant again.  I remember the horrible days of not eating and trouble sleeping, and I'm dreading dealing with that again.  He also had a very bad rebound effect which usually hit him right after school. By 3:30 every day, we were in a bad place.  But, we couldn't give any more stimulant or he wouldn't eat or sleep.  

Now we might try Strattera (increased) with a lower dose stimulant.  I have a meeting with the psychiatrist in a week to discuss.  People who think parents should not medicate their child do not have a child with ADHD.  Lucky them.  It's not easy and it's extremely stressful. Our days revolve around Colby's emotions.  If he's having a good day, we all have a good day.  If he's having a bad day, we all have a bad day.  We can't even do simple things as a family because the kids will fight.  Something has to change.  

When I was reading about Colby at 3, it made me really happy to see that he was the center of my world.  I have had guilt that maybe I caused this issue between him and Miller, or that maybe I didn't give him enough attention.  After reading the blog, I realized that I did do many special things with him and gave him as much love as I could.  He was physically hurting her at the age of three, and he's gotten much smarter about it as he's gotten older.  It's like a brain glitch that he can't turn off.  That seems to be a separate issue related to impulse control and it's the biggest problem.  The fact that he can't follow through with tasks will catch up to him at some point.  We need to get things under control.

Colby has such a great group of friends- Jonathan, Julian, Dillon, Harrison, Aaron.  He gets along with them and they like him, and other parents say that Colby is well behaved when he is at their house.  Apparently the only place he is not well behaved is at home.  I just want him to be happy, and I want Miller to be happy.  

Colby is swimming well, but his ability to stick to his three days a week isn't going that well because he doesn't stick to what he says he's going to do.  He has so much potential that he's not living up to, and it makes me sad.  

I love this little boy so much and want to bring out the best in him.  I just gotta figure out how to do it.