My 8-year-old son takes Adderall - his dosage is 10 mg at 7:00 am, 10 mg at noon and 5 mg at 3:30-4:00 pm.The issue is he has been complaining of headaches and stomach aches while on the Adderall. Says he feels like he is going to throw up and actually has about 4-5 times in the last 6 months. He says things “get too loud and it makes him want to throw up”. Can this be from the Adderall? Should I change him? To what?He was on Ritalin for about a year in during 1999-2000 school year and we had some emotional problems (anger & crying spells) during the re-bound time. Other than that and the appetite loss he did fine on it. I changed him to Adderall at the beginning of this school year (2000-2001) and since he’s started with the stomach/headache thing. I spoke with my Dr. about it a month ago and asked about Concerta and he said that whatever happened with the Ritilan would happen with the Concerta. Then he prescribed Clondine to help him sleep at night and we added the afternoon dose of Adderall so that he could stay focused during “My Time” with him aka: homework time. Since then the nausea/headach/stomachache thing has gotten worse. Is there anything else to try?
Re: Adderall & Stomach/Head Aches
Tyree,The main advantage adderall has over ritalin is that it is longer lasting and generally requires less frequent dosing. Rebound is supposedly less because the medication takes affect more slowly and wears off more gradually. It sounds to me like it is not working this way for your child. My 10 year old son takes 15 mg once a day and has no side effects other than loss of appetite and occasional mild rebound. On a higher dose my son did complain about people talking too loudly. So did one of his friends who also takes adderall. I wonder if 1) your son’s overall dose is too high and 2) if Concerta wouldn’t be better for him. Concerta is a sustained release ritalin, so if your son’s major problem was rebound it seems like Concerta might avoid that problem. Of course, I’m not a doctor, but maybe you could raise the issue again with yours.Andrea
Re: Adderall & Stomach/Head Aches
My son just started Adderall the end of January. We started 5 mg a week and increased it by 2.5 mg every week. We are now at 12.5 mgs for the last two weeks. He has some stomach aches, but it generally is only the day we increase the dose.
: My 8-year-old son takes Adderall - his dosage is 10 mg at 7:00 am, 10
: mg at noon and 5 mg at 3:30-4:00 pm.: The issue is he has been complaining of headaches and stomach aches
: while on the Adderall. Says he feels like he is going to throw up
: and actually has about 4-5 times in the last 6 months. He says
: things “get too loud and it makes him want to throw up”.
: Can this be from the Adderall? Should I change him? To what?: He was on Ritalin for about a year in during 1999-2000 school year
: and we had some emotional problems (anger & crying spells)
: during the re-bound time. Other than that and the appetite loss he
: did fine on it. I changed him to Adderall at the beginning of this
: school year (2000-2001) and since he’s started with the
: stomach/headache thing. I spoke with my Dr. about it a month ago
: and asked about Concerta and he said that whatever happened with
: the Ritilan would happen with the Concerta. Then he prescribed
: Clondine to help him sleep at night and we added the afternoon
: dose of Adderall so that he could stay focused during “My
: Time” with him aka: homework time. Since then the
: nausea/headach/stomachache thing has gotten worse. Is there
: anything else to try? My 8 year old ADHD did get sick and nausea on adderall and was taken off of it after 1 week of being onit and his psychartist said that was a side affect it happened every day about 2 hours after he took it that week and was okay in the evening hours after it wore off and he had the rebound effect.