Life with an explosive child

So I called our pediatrician and said I was concerned about Bouncy Boy’s behavior, that it seemed like he had some ADHD-ish stuff going on. Said the nurse-practitioner, “Oh, Dr. D is an expert on ADHD. Did you know he’s one of the few pediatricians in the area who actually treats ADHD? Here, fill out this parental evaluation form and then we’ll make an appointment for you, Hubs, and Bouncy Boy to meet with him together.”

Okay. So Hubs and I carefully filled out the form. We dutifully marked down often, sometimes, or never, for the behaviors we saw or didn’t see. Angry outbursts? Check. Impulsivity? Check. Distractibility? Actually, not so much; he’s pretty good at staying on task, if you can only get him started. We filled out the form and the three of us went in to meet with Dr. D. He looked at the form, said it looked like we had the markers for the impulsive/hyperactive piece of ADHD, if not the inattentive piece, and because we were concerned enough to make this appointment, he would give us a prescription for Concerta.

Did you get that? Based on a one-page self-assessment form and the fact that we were concerned enough to make the appointment, he prescribed a controlled psychoactive drug for our six-year-old son. Up until this point we have been very very lucky. The interactions we’ve had with this doctor over the last thirteen years we’ve been in the practice have been either well-child checkups or standard childhood illnesses: one or two ear infections, roseola, chicken pox. This is the first real challenge we’ve ever had for him.

Hubs and I are not opposed to the idea of medication in principle, but we are aware that there are many possible explanations for ADHD-ish behavior, of which a chemical imbalance in the brain is just one. In fact, I suspect that a comprehensive neuropsych eval would show that he is not on the autism spectrum, that he does not have auditory or language processing disorders or other learning disabilities. I suppose it could be a food allergy, although he’s been this way since before he was born. (Seriously. He never stopped kicking.) Anyway, I asked the nurse-practitioner for other options and she gave me the name of a child neuropsych doctor who could do the aforementioned eval; she also gave me the name of a child psychiatrist.

Next Bouncy Boy post will be about our insurance company (oh joy!) and some other options we are considering. Also on my to-do list is looking for a new pediatrician. I cannot tell you how disgusted I am with his lame response to our concerns.