gcvmom
Here we go again!
We've been having a lot of problems with difficult child 1's behavior the past few months. He provokes his sibs verbally and physically (name calling, poking, spitting, threatening to hit, etc.) and then when they react he gets violent. He is argumentative with both husband and I and gets confrontational and sometimes violent with us.
At first we thought it was medication rebound because the worst of his episodes happened at night.
husband was at the psychiatrist's last week and mentioned the winter break incident where difficult child 1 was so out of control with us late one night he was fearful for his own safety and was yelling for me to call the police. We managed to diffuse the situation on our own, but psychiatrist was very disturbed by this information. He said it sounded like difficult child 1's emotions were being made raw by the stimulant (this is NOT typical teen behavior) and he told husband that we should reduce difficult child 1's stimulant to 1/2 of a 30mg Daytrana patch instead of our usual 3/4 patch.
Well, I waited until finals were over on Thursday, and so Friday, yesterday and today difficult child 1 has only had 1/2 a patch. And it does not seem to be helping much.
This morning he was his usuall PITA self until his Focalin kicked in. Then he was great! Cooperative, helpful, but as the Focalin started to wear off and the patch kicked in (he puts the patch on about an hour or two after he takes the Focalin because the patch takes a couple hours to start working) he started getting bossy and irritable and annoying.
After lunch he got into it with easy child outside by spitting on her and when she reacted, he started dragging her around the yard on her back (really soiling her favorite shirt badly) which infuriated her further so she started hitting him. He had on his lacrosse gloves and his stick was in his hands. She said he was poke checking her in the side, back and on her shins, and she apparently then started slapping and hitting him back. She got him on the ground and he thought it was funny and was sort of laughing about it, then he got the upper hand and sat on her and started to choke her with the lacrosse stick. I didn't see what was happening until she was hitting him and I hollered from the house for them to stop fighting. Of course, that was like trying to break up a dog fight by singing a lullabye. difficult child 1 was already on top of her by the time I got outside and difficult child 2 was a few steps ahead of me thinking he would come to easy child's rescue, which only inflamed difficult child 1 more.
So I got it broken up and sent everyone in to separate rooms. Then went to talk to easy child to find out what happened. difficult child 1 came out of his room about 5 minutes later and I asked for his side, which completely left out his role in the situation. I asked him if what easy child said was true, and after a few seconds of reflection (he was still quite agitated) he admitted that he had started it all by spitting on her. I got him to apologize (and not too sincerely at that) and told him that there was no way on earth he could ever justify what he did to his sister and that if he wants to continue living under my roof, he's going to have to figure out a solution to his aggressive behavior. And so he's grounded in there for the rest of the day.
Then after I had a good cry in the bathroom (over easy child getting the brunt of this, difficult child 1 not getting it, and easy child feeling like I let her down and let him get away with it) I called the psychiatrist and left a message about what happened. Hopefully he'll call back tomorrow morning and we can get some help with this.
I'm starting to wonder if he needs something like Risperdal. Or if the citalopram is not the right AD for him. Or if he needs something like Lamictal. Or even Tenex. But something definitely has to change.
I'll update when I hear back from the psychiatrist. Hopefully the drama is done for today. He just came out of his room and gave me a loud, exasperated sigh when I told him he was in his room for the rest of the day. We'll see how he handles this as the patch wears off this evening...
At first we thought it was medication rebound because the worst of his episodes happened at night.
husband was at the psychiatrist's last week and mentioned the winter break incident where difficult child 1 was so out of control with us late one night he was fearful for his own safety and was yelling for me to call the police. We managed to diffuse the situation on our own, but psychiatrist was very disturbed by this information. He said it sounded like difficult child 1's emotions were being made raw by the stimulant (this is NOT typical teen behavior) and he told husband that we should reduce difficult child 1's stimulant to 1/2 of a 30mg Daytrana patch instead of our usual 3/4 patch.
Well, I waited until finals were over on Thursday, and so Friday, yesterday and today difficult child 1 has only had 1/2 a patch. And it does not seem to be helping much.
This morning he was his usuall PITA self until his Focalin kicked in. Then he was great! Cooperative, helpful, but as the Focalin started to wear off and the patch kicked in (he puts the patch on about an hour or two after he takes the Focalin because the patch takes a couple hours to start working) he started getting bossy and irritable and annoying.
After lunch he got into it with easy child outside by spitting on her and when she reacted, he started dragging her around the yard on her back (really soiling her favorite shirt badly) which infuriated her further so she started hitting him. He had on his lacrosse gloves and his stick was in his hands. She said he was poke checking her in the side, back and on her shins, and she apparently then started slapping and hitting him back. She got him on the ground and he thought it was funny and was sort of laughing about it, then he got the upper hand and sat on her and started to choke her with the lacrosse stick. I didn't see what was happening until she was hitting him and I hollered from the house for them to stop fighting. Of course, that was like trying to break up a dog fight by singing a lullabye. difficult child 1 was already on top of her by the time I got outside and difficult child 2 was a few steps ahead of me thinking he would come to easy child's rescue, which only inflamed difficult child 1 more.
So I got it broken up and sent everyone in to separate rooms. Then went to talk to easy child to find out what happened. difficult child 1 came out of his room about 5 minutes later and I asked for his side, which completely left out his role in the situation. I asked him if what easy child said was true, and after a few seconds of reflection (he was still quite agitated) he admitted that he had started it all by spitting on her. I got him to apologize (and not too sincerely at that) and told him that there was no way on earth he could ever justify what he did to his sister and that if he wants to continue living under my roof, he's going to have to figure out a solution to his aggressive behavior. And so he's grounded in there for the rest of the day.
Then after I had a good cry in the bathroom (over easy child getting the brunt of this, difficult child 1 not getting it, and easy child feeling like I let her down and let him get away with it) I called the psychiatrist and left a message about what happened. Hopefully he'll call back tomorrow morning and we can get some help with this.
I'm starting to wonder if he needs something like Risperdal. Or if the citalopram is not the right AD for him. Or if he needs something like Lamictal. Or even Tenex. But something definitely has to change.
I'll update when I hear back from the psychiatrist. Hopefully the drama is done for today. He just came out of his room and gave me a loud, exasperated sigh when I told him he was in his room for the rest of the day. We'll see how he handles this as the patch wears off this evening...
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