metu

Has anyone had the experience of their child's ADD meds losing their effectiveness over time?

My 13 year old went on adderall about three years ago, and for the first two years it was like a miracle. All of a sudden she could pay attention in class, she got organized, her handwriting improved dramatically, she'd take the time to correct and edit her writing, etc. She even made the honor roll. Plus, she was happy.

Then she hit puberty. She grew five inches and got her period. We bumped her up to 20 mg. XR at 7:00 a.m. and 10 mg. regular at 4:00 to get though HW ending at 10:30-ish. But, in 8th grade her grades went down to pre-adderall levels, her notebooks were a disorganized mess, she would sit in her room doing who knows what when she was supposed to be doing her homework. She would dawdle and procrastinate like crazy. We took her to a psychologist to talk about whether she just didn't care about schoolwork, as we thought we'd better know how motivated she was before she chose a rigorous high school. She told him she doesn't care much about grades, but does like learning.

Now, in discussing her starting HS next year, she asked me if its possible that the Adderall stopped working. She thinks that might have happened last year. She seems to want to be as on-top-of-it as she was for those two years when her medication was optimizing her performance. For her its not just about grades (although we think it would be nice if someday they might approach her ability level). She actually had to do less homework when the meds worked well because she remembered more from class, and the work she did was of a much higher quality. She felt good about yourself, and proud of her work.

Is it possible for meds to lose effectiveness, or is this in her imagination?

-Metu