DD won't take new med- suggestions?

[Mickeyhead12]

So the new psychiatrist prescribed abilify to help w DD's anxiety. She takes zoloft in the a.m. And is supposed to take this at bedtime. She has always been resistant to any medicine- even Tylenol when she has a fever or headache. Recently she has been taking Tylenol or motrin though. She Does Not want to take the abilify. She is afraid it is going to make her feel sick. We were to just keep talking abt the positives of taking it and see if she will change her mind. She hasn't. She is so anxious that she still has a hard time going to tutoring and is already upset with me because she has a psychiatrist appt tomorrow and I had to change the time of her riding lesson. She wants to go at her regular time. She keeps saying she doesn't want or need help. I told her we all can't keep living like this. My mom has arranged things so she can stay here during the week and we're all making accommodations to help DD. She is adamant abt not getting help and not taking the medicine. I just dont know what to do. DH said we're going to have to start taking things away until she agrees to take it. The psych said something similar. If we do that everyones life is going to be miserable. I wouldn't want DD9 to be here when that happens bcs she is already having a hard time when DD12 gets upset.

Any advice?

 

[Mickeyhead12]

I forgot to say that her pat phrase is "why won't you just let me do what I want to do?". She used to say that in school - that at home she gets to do what she wants. Which wasn't true- she has always had rules and consequences. I'm just at the end of my rope. I don't know what else to do. Things have to get better and soon. I said to DH tonight that maybe someone else could do a better job than us because we're getting nowhere.

 

[lucigo]

Can you make some kind of contract with her? Are you willing to give her a reward if she will try the new medication for a certain amount of time, and then hope by then it will have brought her anxiety level down to the point that she won't mind taking it?

My daugther's psychiatrist asks her weekly what her anxiety level is on a scale of 1-10. If you do that, then she can see visually on a chart (hopefully) that the meds have helped.

 

[kamik86]

So the new psychiatrist prescribed abilify to help w DD's anxiety. She takes zoloft in the a.m. And is supposed to take this at bedtime. She has always been resistant to any medicine- even Tylenol when she has a fever or headache. Recently she has been taking Tylenol or motrin though. She Does Not want to take the abilify. She is afraid it is going to make her feel sick. We were to just keep talking abt the positives of taking it and see if she will change her mind. She hasn't. She is so anxious that she still has a hard time going to tutoring and is already upset with me because she has a psychiatrist appt tomorrow and I had to change the time of her riding lesson. She wants to go at her regular time. She keeps saying she doesn't want or need help. I told her we all can't keep living like this. My mom has arranged things so she can stay here during the week and we're all making accommodations to help DD. She is adamant abt not getting help and not taking the medicine. I just dont know what to do. DH said we're going to have to start taking things away until she agrees to take it. The psych said something similar. If we do that everyones life is going to be miserable. I wouldn't want DD9 to be here when that happens bcs she is already having a hard time when DD12 gets upset.

Any advice?

Has she taken this medicine before? Like did she give in once or twice? I ask because many medicines really do make me feel sick. Especially if I take them on an empty stomach. Or maybe another medicine made her feel sick and she is worried this one will too?

The other thing is this could just be a control issue. I have some anxiety never formally diagnosed or anything just some things that I hate doing and make me anxious and a psych myself out. If I feel out of control it gets worse. So I imagine someone with bigger anxiety issues could have this as well. Maybe she feels she needs to be able to control something. Not sure how knowing this one would help though... since you can't really let her be in control.

As for DD9 I know things are hard and you have a child that is having problems right now so you need to focus on her. However please make sure to do something special with DD9 every once in a while something without DD12. I'm not saying your not doing this just something I wanted to throw out there from someone who had siblings that needed help and got all the attention sometimes.

 

[bopper]

Catch 22: She doesn't want to take the anxiety medication because she is anxious about taking the anxiety medication.


Have you tried something like:
The doctor and i would like you to try this new medication. It is kind of funny, that you don't want to take this medicine because you are scared of what it does when the whole point of the medicine is to make you not so scared of new things.
For most people, if the doctor said "take this new medicine, it would help you" they would try it. I think that you might think "If I take this new medicine, I might feel nausious. If I feel nausious, I won't get to go to riding lesson. I already had to change my riding lesson and I like my regular time and if the time changes my horse might not be ready or maybe my teacher won't be there or there might be new kids there and I don't want to meet new kids because maybe they won't like me and then I won't want to go to riding but I really love riding. All of that thinking takes so much more energy and you fussing takes so much more energy from me that I would rather spend doing fun things with you and your sister. So that is why you can't always do what you want, because it effects others from doing what they want to do to."

 

[Mickeyhead12]

Can you make some kind of contract with her? Are you willing to give her a reward if she will try the new medication for a certain amount of time, and then hope by then it will have brought her anxiety level down to the point that she won't mind taking it?

My daugther's psychiatrist asks her weekly what her anxiety level is on a scale of 1-10. If you do that, then she can see visually on a chart (hopefully) that the meds have helped.

I think the chart might work well when we get to that point. We use rewards for everything including going to and participating in her tutoring. Some rewards are just normal things like her riding lessons- more of a consequence to lose them than a reward to earn them. Right now she doesn't even go into the psychiatrist's office- she sits in the car

Has she taken this medicine before? Like did she give in once or twice? I ask because many medicines really do make me feel sick. Especially if I take them on an empty stomach. Or maybe another medicine made her feel sick and she is worried this one will too?

The other thing is this could just be a control issue. I have some anxiety never formally diagnosed or anything just some things that I hate doing and make me anxious and a psych myself out. If I feel out of control it gets worse. So I imagine someone with bigger anxiety issues could have this as well. Maybe she feels she needs to be able to control something. Not sure how knowing this one would help though... since you can't really let her be in control.

As for DD9 I know things are hard and you have a child that is having problems right now so you need to focus on her. However please make sure to do something special with DD9 every once in a while something without DD12. I'm not saying your not doing this just something I wanted to throw out there from someone who had siblings that needed help and got all the attention sometimes.

This is definitely a combination of anxiety and control issues. We always make sure DD9 gets things to do without DD12 because otherwise it would be chaos!!

Catch 22: She doesn't want to take the anxiety medication because she is anxious about taking the anxiety medication.


Have you tried something like:
The doctor and i would like you to try this new medication. It is kind of funny, that you don't want to take this medicine because you are scared of what it does when the whole point of the medicine is to make you not so scared of new things.
For most people, if the doctor said "take this new medicine, it would help you" they would try it. I think that you might think "If I take this new medicine, I might feel nausious. If I feel nausious, I won't get to go to riding lesson. I already had to change my riding lesson and I like my regular time and if the time changes my horse might not be ready or maybe my teacher won't be there or there might be new kids there and I don't want to meet new kids because maybe they won't like me and then I won't want to go to riding but I really love riding. All of that thinking takes so much more energy and you fussing takes so much more energy from me that I would rather spend doing fun things with you and your sister. So that is why you can't always do what you want, because it effects others from doing what they want to do to."

I really like this explanation because it really applies to DD and how she thinks!

Thank you all! Great suggestions. I met with the psychiatrist today and she said not to push the med right now but do keep talking about it so DD knows it will be coming up. She wants us to work with a post doctoral fellow at Yale who specializes in anxiety and working with families. He's doing a research study involving a training for families so DH and I are going to go. Hopefully it will help us learn the best ways to help DD and reduce her anxiety and need for control so we can get her to take the medicine without a battle or a big contract etc. That's the plan anyway.

Thanks again!

 

[Maggie'sMom]

I'm actually surprised that the psychiatrist prescribed Abilify for anxiety. My DD takes Abilify as a mood stabilizer for her bipolar disorder and has experienced increased levels of anxiety while on it. DD's doctor has indicated increased anxiety is not uncommon on Abilify. Anytime we try to transition DD off the Abilify to another mood stabilizer, her mania goes out of control so we are stuck using the Abilify. We've been debating about adding Klonopin for the anxiety.

As for getting her to take it, I've found that positive incentives are much more effective than negative consequences.

 

[C.Ann]

I'm actually surprised that the psychiatrist prescribed Abilify for anxiety. My DD takes Abilify as a mood stabilizer for her bipolar disorder and has experienced increased levels of anxiety while on it. DD's doctor has indicated increased anxiety is not uncommon on Abilify. Anytime we try to transition DD off the Abilify to another mood stabilizer, her mania goes out of control so we are stuck using the Abilify. We've been debating about adding Klonopin for the anxiety.

As for getting her to take it, I've found that positive incentives are much more effective than negative consequences.

I'm surprised they would prescribe this for someone so young as well.. I know two people who have taken it (both adults) and the shaking hands were intolerable - handwriting was jibberish.. Both went off of it - for one the shaking stopped, the other it didn't..

OP: Whatever the case may be, I hope you can find something she's able to tolerate well - with minimal side effects - that won't be a battle.. I'm sure it's hard on everyone..

 

[Maryr1]

FWIW I believe they use low dose Abilify in children for anxiety as well as mood stability. It it used in larger doses for bipolar disorders.

 

[Maggie'sMom]

FWIW I believe they use low dose Abilify in children for anxiety as well as mood stability. It it used in larger doses for bipolar disorders.

I will agree the anxiety seems related to larger doses of the Abilify. DD's anxiety increased as we increased the Abilify dosage. We didn't notice much when she was on 1 or 2 mgm, but the anxiety went off the charts when we reached tried a 5 mgm dosage. We had to decrease the dose and are now looking at other meds to work with the Abilify.

I'm surprised they would prescribe this for someone so young as well.. I know two people who have taken it (both adults) and the shaking hands were intolerable - handwriting was jibberish.. Both went off of it - for one the shaking stopped, the other it didn't..

My DD was started on Abilify when she was 5. There are very few medications approved for children that have serious mental health issues. The benefits of the Abilify have far outweighed the negatives for us. The dyskinesia your friends experienced is not unheard of, but is also usually associated with larger dosages and prolonged use. We've experienced none of the dyskenesia. Nausea, constipation, and anxiety have been the main side effects we've had to deal with. And the nausea disappeared about a week after we started the Abilify.

 

[Ms_Butterfly]

Could your child just be actually sensing that the med will make her ill? Or is it purely a behavior issue?

I tried that med once for depression and it was horrid. It made my body practically unable to move at all (was laying on the sofa for days, barely moving because I was barely able to, and not being able to sit up for more than a few minutes at a time) while at the same time making my mind race/want to get up and do all sorts of stuff (I'm not bipolar, but maybe that's how it feels when one is manic?). So, just try to imagine that your mind REALLLLY wants to go do all sorts of stuff RIGHT NOW, but your physical body is unable to move except for the tiniest bit and you can't sit up for more than 10-15 min. at a time - yeah, it was definitely irritating!!!

I've had other drugs that have made me throw up, feel like my body under my skin is on fire burning, given me extra pounds, changed my digestive system, etc. Meds and I don't mix!

All this to say, your kid might have some intuition about the med, so find out if it is that or her behavior or her anxiety before you push it too far - though, of course, you can't know your side-effects 'til you try the med, unfortunately.

Have you tried a stress-ball for her anxiety (including as she takes meds)?