Leaving the parent board for awhile

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I used to like to come in here and I got helpful information and I shared information that I learned but lately all I see are people talking about what types of medication to use. This is very distressing for me. Our children's brains are growing, and giving them the types of medications that some of these kids are on, not to mention the high doses. Its not just here that I have heard this I have removed myself from all parent boards that I was on. I have tried to help but my ideas that are non-medical and do work as Ive seen them work for my kids and others. I guess its just easier to give your child some pills. The thing is if you are over medicating your child....and in my opinion kids with Aspergers do not NEED medication unless they have some type of mental illness and then the doses should be very small. We are building a society of drug addicts. You can disagree with me or agree with me, I dont care, Im not coming back here to check these messages.

I lost my son to addiction due to self medication. The doctors started him on very strong medication and when it caused problems they backed off then he sought out that high that they gave him. He is now a box of ashes and tiny bits in necklaces hanging around my and my daughters, his best friend who found him dead in her bathroom and my parents necks. We all have different necklaces. Mine is a mother and baby dolphin and on the back it says "My Sunshine" in Latin. Im not telling anyone what to do, Im just leaving for my own sanity because I cry every time I come here.

I wasn't going to reply because she says she is not reading replies. But I feel like I have to so please excuse this if it is innapropriate.
I agree with her about medication for children being wrong in many cases.
Adults, imho have the responsibility to decide for themselves.

Her son's story is incredibly sad.
I pray this person and her family finds solace or at least a small measure of peace.

I agree with you. Kids should not be doped unless absolutely necessary, and even then, only in the lowest possible doses!

Asperger's and Autism were not recognized as such when I was growing up. We were diagnosed as having emotional/behavior problems and/or being a discipline problem. I was put on several different drugs back then to try to "cure" me of my misdiagnosed (and unknown) Asperger's. Among the drugs used on me were Phenobarbitol and Ritalin. None of the drugs did a thing to truly help me, and all had unpleasant side effects, so when I was in my early teens I took myself off the last of the drugs being used on me, without consulting my parents or the psych doc. I was fed up with the whole doping thing.--And with being taken to the psych docs and therapists, too.

Because of my unpleasant experiences with psych drugs, and also all the meds I had to take for different illnesses as a child, I developed an aversion to drugs. I will take them if I am convinced they are necessary and beneficial, but not other wise. And I am hard to convince on a drug's being necessary. I am the type of person that looks them up online before I will try it. I want to know what the side effects are, and how good the drug is before I will take it, so I can decide if the benefits outweigh the negatives.

Please keep advocating against drugging kids. Drugs are dangerous if misapplied or overused.

And don't leave all boards over this, or at least not WP. There are plenty of forums here besides the parent one. We need your voice here.

I agree, overmedicating or abusing meds is terrible, especially for kids. While saying that, I do medicate my son, on the lowest possible does of SSRI. After anguishing over the decision, I MADE the decision casue I DONT want my son to grow up with low self esttem and have issues stemming from that.

here is my logic:

My son is constantly doing impulsive things, which in turn gets him either in trouble, redirected, consequence taken, etc...eventually, if every move you make is redirected, met with consequence, talks about what you could have done better, what can be done better next time, and when next time comes you are impulsive and do things you didnt mean. For instance, my son LOVES animals, LOVES his cats, but one day threw one of the cats down a flight of stairs. Impulsive. Luckily the cat wasnt hurt...but if she WAS he would have to live with that for the rest of his life. He has hurt his sister, bit me, etc...all thinsg he never means to do just cant control himeslf. He also has debilitating anxiety and OCD. As an adult who suffered thru anxiety, I cannot imagine being a small child and feeling those things. Meds helped me work thru the worst of it and I am off meds today. My hope for my son, his doc has the same idea. We medicate for a year and take a break to see is he is able to continue without the meds.

To lump all parents in the group of overmedicating and doping their kids is just as unfair as grouping all ASD as being uncaring and not able to function in society.

I take my son to therapy, he is in 5 social groups a week as well as other activities to help him learn to function better. I go to therapy and parent groups to learn how to be a better parent to him and how to help him more effectively. I work very hard with my son to get him to overcome or live with his issues, but when all that fails and he is miserable, and was a family are miserable and cant even go to a family party or to the store without major meltdowns, anxiety, etc...I refuse to let my son suffer. If meds can relieve some of that anxiety and he can go out and smile, so be it.

I feel for the OP. I have also lost a child. I get irate when I hear other preg moms taking risks that might endanger their child. They dont know what it is like to give birth to a dead full term baby. Just as we dont know OPs experience of losing her adult son to drugs. And if I can help educate others, I do as much as I can. I sometimes have to just share my experience and know that it may fall on deaf ears, and pray that those people have healthy babies, etc...I just think it is a bit unfair to shoot down all parents of kids on meds. We medicate kids for epilepsy, tourettes, diabetes, thyroid dysfunction, etc and no one would even think twice about treating tose issues, but when it is a psychological disorder people get all crazy about it.

I agree. I can see where lilomeme's experience colors her perspective on what parents are saying, but I think we should be careful about overgeneralizing. We all want what's best for our kids; I don't think anyone here is medicating solely to make their own life better.

I have chosen not to medicate because that worked for us, but I've met many parents whose kids' lives were improved with medication, and whose kids might have remained "stuck" or worse without that intervention. It is a very difficult path to follow, and one not to be entered lightly, but that doesn't mean it is always inappropriate.

What I am afraid of is creating a brave new world. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brave_New_World

I have to agree with momsparky about the need to avoid overgeneralizing. If you've met one person with autism you've met one person with autism. This statement isn't just about the need to recognize that every autistic person is unique in their behaviors, the things they love, what their special interests are, etc. Its also about how their parents choose to treat them while they are their parents' wards. I don't medicate and at this point I don't think we will because I don't see my son's problems as anything that I think can be helped with medication. However, there are people for whom medication can mitigate symptoms that are absolutely debilitating for them. Who am I to judge? Who are any of us to judge? What I have seen on this forum is many people who try non-drug interventions only to find that extreme aggression or other severe symptoms are not mitigated with behavioral types of interventions. I see parents here who try everything they can find and then AGONIZE over the decision to try medication. I can't help but feel the OP has painted a distorted picture of the parents on this forum.

Medication is a very personal choice. I would hope every parent here can understand that each parent is doing what they feel is best for their child. We may not always agree with one another, but we can still be of support.

I hope you come back soon. I will miss your insightful posts!

The tone of the board has changed. We were always resistant to medication as a community, although supportive of it in certain situations, and it was one of the ways we were different. That is why we developed so many of the great protocols we have here, because most of the kids were not taking anything, and we were forced to try every alternative.

Medication is great in the right situations, but I am unnerved by how fast some of our posters (one in particular) launch into recommending it, without running the bases on what else has been tried first. I think it is wrong. You medicate last, not first. Most of our families have been extremely careful, but that is not always evident in the threads, as medication names get rattled off to newcomers almost as if it really is the magic answer.

It isn't, and lilolme is right that no one knows what the long term effects will be.

I've been pulling back from the board a lot because my son is older, past many of his challenges, but that change in tone is something that I have noticed and that does bother me, I just haven't really felt it is my place to challenge it. The younger families have so more available than we ever did, just in the way of information and therapy, and I am not convinced that all the kids being given medication need it. It is hard and it is personal, but that is also why I wish it mostly stayed off the board, between a family and their doctor, instead of being something that is discussed right off the bat with every new member; one particular person starts it and then the shift is there, it's done, it's assumed this is what everyone does.

I can guess which posts have upset lilolme. But because there are times medication is extremely important, this isn't a very easy issue to solve.

I will miss lilomeme's posts and autistic princess videos.

I haven't followed the medication discussions so I can't really comment on them. Medication was recommended by my daughter's therapist, but we quit the therapy instead and in a few years my daughter outgrew a lot of the issues that supposedly required medication. She's still autistic, but she became more aware of her own limitations, the situations that triggered her stress, and how to cope with stress.

I hope tomorrow is a better day for you lilolme. You weren't alone, I and others here agree with you on this.