Kids & Zoloft

[jreeds]

We recently started DS (ADHD, GAD)on Zoloft. I'm curious about people's experience with how long it took for them to notice any change. In addition to the Zoloft the psychiatrist prescribed Vyvanse with the instruction to wait until we had a day to be able to stay at home so we could follow his reaction. So I'm also curious if anyone has any experience with that particular combo. DD has ADHD and has been on Concerta for about 4 years and she tolerates it well so we're not totally unfamiliar. Dealing with DS's behaviors has always been a bit more challenging though. It's been tough to sort out exactly what we're dealing with. TIA!

[funchicken]

We started DD1 (9) on Zoloft in October, and I think we started to see some benefits after about 3 weeks and continued improvement for 2-3 weeks after that. I also think that now that DD has some relief from anxiety her mood and approachability have improved. She is also able to access the calming techniques she's been working on with her therapist.

[jreeds]

Feb 23, 2018 13:21:18 GMT -5 funchicken said:

We started DD1 (9) on Zoloft in October, and I think we started to see some benefits after about 3 weeks and continued improvement for 2-3 weeks after that. I also think that now that DD has some relief from anxiety her mood and approachability have improved. She is also able to access the calming techniques she's been working on with her therapist.

Thanks for your response!

The bolded is one of our hopes as well. When calm DS can tell you exactly how he should respond in situations when he starts feeling upset/anxious. As soon as he starts feeling worked up it all goes out the window.

[auntie]

With any of the SSRIs you should see some improvement in 3-6 weeks. If you see something sooner, it could be that the dose is too high and may become activating. For this reason, low and show are best with this classification of meds.

Kudos to you for seeing a psychiatrist. I'm sort of surprised s/he they didn't trial your DS on Concerta since his sister does well on it; some folks do better on either the Ritalin or the Dexedrine based stimulants. This can run in families. My mother is a witch on Ritalin-like meds, my niece can take either and DS is a sobbing hot mess on meds with the active ingredient used in Ritalin. That said, I would start with Vyvanse for an older kid because it's harder to abuse. It's more expensive for us, but seems like you get less of a side eye when filling Vyvanse.

I'm also sort of surprised the doc didn't trial one medication at a time. DS's docs- both his dev pedi and his psychiatrist only add/change one medication at a time. Most will start with the stimulant because you'll know almost immediately whether it's a good fit or not whereas an SSRI can take over a month to start to see whether it's the right medication for the child. I liked to tweak stimulants over a school break because DS tended to have some trouble sleeping the first night or two with an increase in dosage.

DS has taken a stimulant and SSRI for over 10 years. He's done really well with them.

[akafred]

DD has not taken Zoloft. She also has ADHD and anxiety. Prozac was exactly as auntie described; it started working sooner and was activating. It made her ADHD symptoms (impulsivity esp) WAY worse.

I started taking Zoloft on Friday a week ago, but OMG it made me so incredibly dizzy. It took a few days because I also had intestinal symptoms and it seemed like I had a stomach bug, but once the intestinal symptoms got better, the dizziness did not. I took the last dose on Monday morning and it took until Tuesday evening to not be debilitatingly dizzy. So I would just keep an eye out for that kind of side effect.

[jreeds]

Feb 23, 2018 17:03:17 GMT -5 auntie said:

With any of the SSRIs you should see some improvement in 3-6 weeks. If you see something sooner, it could be that the dose is too high and may become activating. For this reason, low and show are best with this classification of meds.
Thank you
Kudos to you for seeing a psychiatrist. I'm sort of surprised s/he they didn't trial your DS on Concerta since his sister does well on it; some folks do better on either the Ritalin or the Dexedrine based stimulants. This can run in families. My mother is a witch on Ritalin-like meds, my niece can take either and DS is a sobbing hot mess on meds with the active ingredient used in Ritalin. That said, I would start with Vyvanse for an older kid because it's harder to abuse. It's more expensive for us, but seems like you get less of a side eye when filling Vyvanse.
She did mention how reactions to meds can run in families, we have history in our family of people taking Zoloft and tolerating it well and she mentioned that aspect. I'm not sure 100% why she chose Vyvanse over Concerta except that she did mention something about Vyvanse can sometimes treat symptoms better in kids with ADHD & ASD. A psychologist that previously evaluated DS ( when he was 5) did not list ASD in her evaluation, however he has several red flags and the psychiatrist said she has a lower threshold for diagnosis. So I guess going forward there is still a question of ruling that out. She has all his previous evals and we go back in March to follow up with her. I will be honest and say I left the appointment overwhelmed and a little surprised to actually walk out with a presc.
I'm also sort of surprised the doc didn't trial one medication at a time. DS's docs- both his dev pedi and his psychiatrist only add/change one medication at a time. Most will start with the stimulant because you'll know almost immediately whether it's a good fit or not whereas an SSRI can take over a month to start to see whether it's the right medication for the child. I called her back last Friday and let her know we are holding off on Vyvanse until we see how he does on just the Zoloft. She was very supportive of that. When originally talking about medication she did say we could wait a month then trial the Vyvanse. However then she wrote for both presc. I liked to tweak stimulants over a school break because DS tended to have some trouble sleeping the first night or two with an increase in dosage. This is what we do for DD too.

DS has taken a stimulant and SSRI for over 10 years. He's done really well with them.

[jreeds]

Feb 24, 2018 9:35:18 GMT -5 akafred said:

DD has not taken Zoloft. She also has ADHD and anxiety. Prozac was exactly as auntie described; it started working sooner and was activating. It made her ADHD symptoms (impulsivity esp) WAY worse. This is what we've been warned about with DS. Depending on meds either his Anxiety symptoms or ADHD symptoms could be made worse. We are treading lightly.

I started taking Zoloft on Friday a week ago, but OMG it made me so incredibly dizzy. It took a few days because I also had intestinal symptoms and it seemed like I had a stomach bug, but once the intestinal symptoms got better, the dizziness did not. I took the last dose on Monday morning and it took until Tuesday evening to not be debilitatingly dizzy. So I would just keep an eye out for that kind of side effect. Thank you. So far he has not complained of anything except a few random stomach aches. Though he was getting those before every so often too. We associated them with his anxiety. I will keep my eye out for the dizziness.