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Hi Goodyear,

This all sounds horribly familiar! My ad was/is exactly the same, could start a fight in an empty room, very defiant to her own detriment - we would even have battles over her needing to go the loo ! She was DX ADHD and ODD ( oppositional defiant disorder) at age 6 and we started on meds straight away. The meds also have a good effect on odd and so during the day when her meds are effective she is very compliant and not oppositional at all. The meds are not a cure and when they wear off all the features come back. However we have also started her on a med called intuniv which works over a 24 hour period but it is not as good as the stimulant med that she is also on (elvanse), but it definitely takes the edge off.

The above is just to show you that there is hope with the meds to vastly improve your son's behaviour.

We got our ad privately assessed by an organisation called LANC - learning assessment and neurocare centre. Google it

Once we had the ADHD/ODD under control we then found dyslexia, dyspraxia and Asd. So once you have the DX for ADHD, just keep an eye on things

Best wishes xx

Fantastic thank you. I will google the centre you talked about. He has argued all day about everything so far which is such a waste of time .

I wonder did your daughter do this at school and other settings too ? I haven’t asked if he argues with teachers, I am sure I would have heard. But they do think he has adhd as he doesn’t concentrate and fiddles a lot. He also annoys and distracts people so can’t sit next to them in class at present !

I will get an assessment ASAP.

thanks.

Hi Goodyear21

What a nightmare for you all. Sounds like you are all really going through it at the moment.

I don't wish to make any comments on the ADHD assessment. I think impossible on a forum and I am not an expert etc. However, it reads like you are doing some good things, even though it may not feel like it.

On a practical front: why not reduce the home learning time table? Work with the school on this. Just do the "fun" home learning bits, at least then the connection with school remains - otherwise drop the rest. Don't make things any harder than they already are.

I would also recommend asking your post adoption social worker to apply for funding from the Department for Education's Adoption Support Fund (ASF). Get some family therapeutic support. We have just had 12 sessions based around our youngest 12 year old (face to face and virtual sessions with a clinical psychologist). Our youngest didn't attend a single session. This worked really well as he already has more than enough on his plate to cope with. It was just lovely for me and my partner to talk to a professional, off load and get some empathy and good advice etc. Worth its weight in gold and made such a difference to our mental health as parents. We are now coping so much better. Our post adoption social worker is now applying to the ASF for a second round of a further 20 sessions.

Hope some of the above helps.

Take care.

Simon

Yes she did it at school as well. In fact it was worse at school as they obviously had to get her to do school work that she didn't want to do. At home I didn't place any demands on her at all and if she wanted to spend the whole day playing on the computer I would let her in order to avoid more arguments.

Even though her behaviour is now so much better because of the meds, she still argues with teachers but that is due to ASD - she doesn't recognise the social hierarchy and so treats teachers and adults in general as she would her friends. She fails to understand that you should just do what teachers tell you to without argument.

I have always found schools a bit weird to be honest. They would tell me things were fine when clearly they were not. The only time I really find out what is going on is when we go and see LANC and the school has to fill in feedback forms which are very detailed. We are still under LANC and see them on a private basis about once a year. However the meds are prescribed by our GP and so we get them on the NHS.

The initial assessment for ADHD took about 6 weeks if I remember rightly. Part of it was a scan of her brain waves with a skull cap and electrodes. It showed that the brain waves in the frontal lobes was indeed slower than normal. The meds which are stimulant based speed up these waves so that the child is able to control their behaviour. So the child that you have on the meds is the child you would have if he didn't have ADHD.

So hang in there, things will get better. Xx

We also went down the private assessment route - but very late in the day and I wish we had done it earlier. I knew she had ADHD from a very young age and treated her as if she had - I think they did at school too (special school) but no one suggested an actual assessment - medication would really have helped her as she responds very well to this and I didn’t realise that. By the time we went for the assessment we had a lot of information amassed over the years. It took one week to get an appointment and the report came ten days after that. We still however are getting private prescriptions and this is costly so you need to make sure it is taken over by your GP once prescribed.

This is amazing thank you all so much . This is giving so much hope, actually just going to stop worrying about the future and get on with an assessment and see where we go. Also love the idea of the therapy too. We will look into that.

Thank you xxx