Hi Lisa,
This is an old post - so I will give you an update. difficult child started taking Intuniv back then in 2010. We started with 1 mg in the morning, then increased to 2 mg in the morning. We tried 3, but not for very long and it seemed like too much. My goal was always to eventually be able to discontinue the stimulant. No such luck. One day without the Concerta and I was remembering why he takes it. The doctor even suggested to have him slowly go off of Intuniv so we could maybe try Stratterra (as that is pretty much the only thing we haven't tried). That never happened either because when we reduced his Intuniv back down to 1 mg it became evident that the Intuniv really was working and we could tell the difference with the reduction. So now we are back up to 2 mg of Intuniv and still on 27 mg of Concerta. <sigh> Sad seeing all that in writing as a reminder of what we have been doing for the past THREE YEARS! Uggh. We haven't found the magic pill/diagnosis/solution. We are still pretty much dealing with what brought us here SIX YEARS ago.
Basically anything we request him to do or stop doing is met with refusal and defiance if it is not what he wants. It's only getting harder as he gets older. I think even if he were to be reevaluated and diagnosis'd with Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD) or Pervasive Developmental Disorder (PDD) or something else - then what? We still have the behavior -- which is so difficult to deal with.
