What can you tell me about Clonidine?

mattsmum

New Member
The inpatient facility is going to trial 0.05mg 3x/day of Clonidine beginning tonight. He is currently on 1500mg Depakote and 600mg Seroquel.

The psychiatrist told me it can help with hyper arousal, like when he is coming against something when he isn't getting his way. He said it is an alpha 2 blocker (whatever that is) and it is commonly used for high blood pressure...but is used for ADHD as well. He said it improves attention...and they may titrate up to 0.1 mg 3x/day.

Any experience with this medication????
 

Steely

Active Member

Yep.........we started it 4 months ago........and it worked wonders for my son's aggression. Really...it was amazing.

The best of luck to you, as I know each child is different, but perhaps this will be the magic bullet.
 
G

guest3

Guest
hmmmm they tried difficult child II on it in hospital. and it dod not make too much of a dif for us, of cours ehe was so strung out on the depakote, who could tell.
 

wakeupcall

Well-Known Member
My difficult child has taken Clonidine for years. In the beginning it helped tremendously with his aggression. Now I think it mostly takes the "edge" off. Also in the beginning it will cause drowsiness, but that will wear off. Do NOT abruptly stop taking it at any time. It must be weaned from the system. Good Luck!
 

totoro

Mom? What's a difficult child?
We tried .05mg when K was in psychiatric hospital ... I gave her her first dose... (she came back to the hotel to sleep at night) within 45 minutes she passed out cold at the table while eating!!! I was so scared, I took her pulse, listened to her breathing!!! About 20 minutes later after I carried her 58 pound body at the time back to the room... she woke up ready to go!!! This happened 4 days in a row... we stopped taking it!!!LOL

We now use it PRN when she is really amped up. At night only or when we don't need to do anything.

Just a little heads up... it happened twice in a restaraunt!!! I had to get her fed though... we ate in the room ALOT!!!

psychiatrist said it was not a big deal, it just had that effect on her!!!


I hope this works for you!!!
 

mrscatinthehat

Seussical
We have difficult child 2 on it. in my opinion it was ok in the beginning. Not great but ok. Now well I don't know that much works with him so it is just him I am sure.

Good Luck

Beth
 

neednewtechnique

New Member
Our difficult child took it to help her get to sleep at night, because she had night terrors, and it seemed to work pretty good. I have heard stories from her mom of when they tried to use it for her during the day....apparently it made her fall asleep in the middle of class at school, so they decided to keep it just for night time and found something different to give her for the daytime.

We have finally gotten her leveled out on medications, and she has been in a stable positive home environment now for almost 9 months and does not have night terrors anymore and doesn't need it, so we weaned her off of it. Never had any problems with it, but I didn't see a need to keep her on it if she didn't need it.
 

mum2JK&TH

New Member
Similar to all the stories above. difficult child uses it to help combat the tics that are caused from the Concerta. He uses the .5mg (the M&M looking ones is what difficult child calls them). We tried the 1 mg once in the morning and difficult child was so groggy that he slipped on ice and bit through his tongue, stopped that right away. I found last year that he built up an immunity to it over time and we had to up it half way through the school year. We took him off everything for the summer and since he's been back on his medications so far we are managing with just one tablet in the morning.

Doesn't rid of the tics is just supposed to help them, can't say it helps with his ADHD or aggression (mind you the Concerta increases his aggression so who knows?!)

As mentioned above you cannot cut them off suddenly as it can cause a dangerous spike or drop (can't remember) in the blood pressure.
 
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