Being the blog that this is, you may think by reading the title of this post that I'm going to be sharing about Olivia's HIV medicine. OR, you may think that I'm going to talk about either Olivia's or Liam's seizure medications. NOPE!

No, of my three children, my one non-medicated child was always my Braeden. And now, it's his turn. :)

I am NOT a proponent of medicating children. Unnecessarily I mean. And in saying that many of you are probably thinking, "Well, who would medicate without needing it?" And as a teacher I'm here to tell you... many. It baffles me too, as both a parent and a teacher, but I've seen it time and again. I've had students, even just last year, put on medication for AD*HD, when I as the teacher was never contacted by a physician, was never asked input by the parent, and I saw not one reason for them to be diagnosed this way, let alone placed on medicine. And when the teacher, who requires students to sit and concentrate and focus and work, doesn't think a child is anywhere near the diagnosis for AD*HD, why on earth are they truly being placed on medicine???

Anyway, I digress. :)

Braeden has always been my active child to say the least. And I mean more than your average active. He is the textbook definition of AD*HD and "being run as if by a motor." He is non-stop movement. From the time he was little he has been this way. In his crib he used to lay on his back, prop his feet up on the top of the sides, and turn around by moving his feet around the top of the crib in circles. Constantly. Until he'd fall asleep. He can't just sit in our living room; he is flipping around, going upside down, moving, moving, moving.

I love him to death. He is my brilliant star. He is reading everything under the sun. He has a sensitive side that touches me deeply. He cares tremendously and cries at the slightest hint of a sad story. He gets embarrassed easily. He is incredibly gentle with younger kiddos. And yet, he is a whirlwind!

The past two years we have been blessed with amazingly WONDERFUL teachers! In preschool we had an amazing teacher who taught him to read, to count to 100 IN SPANISH, to be a gentleman and open doors for ladies, and to focus when it needed to be done. She worked so incredibly well with him, kept him near her, pulled him aside when she thought he needed redirection, and kept in great contact with me as to what was happening in the classroom. And last year in kindergarten we had another unbelievable teacher. We worked well together on where he was at in his impulsiveness and saw that he was getting closer and closer to needing outside help in the form of medication as it was starting to affect his academics. His eyes were beginning to jump around on the page as he read. It was time to look at medicine.

That was last March/April. And, of course, being that Braeden has a medi*caid card, we couldn't get in to see a doctor who could prescribe those kind of meds without jumping through hoops and going to the ONE person who is here only on Mondays who will work with Medic*aid. We finally got in, at the end of the school year, to realize that my boy who also has a heart murmur which is rarely even thought about, needs an ok from his cardiologist in order to begin meds.

Finally getting a hold of the cardiologist who is only here twice a month, we weren't able to schedule a visit until mid July, the day before we were to leave for Florida. They knew WHY we needed the appointment, yet waited until then to tell us he'd need an ECHO before he'd give the ok. Why couldn't we have scheduled that and THEN come in??? So ridiculous. And of course we couldn't schedule that until we returned, now pushing our med start date from April/May to August. Argh!

All of this to say, Saturday Braeden began his morning dose of his new med. And today he started with his second dose at lunch, now taking half a pill in the morning before school and half a pill at lunch.

He is calm. He is focused. He is still himself which I am thrilled to see. I have heard from numerous parents how some meds don't "work" or "click" with that child and they become angry, lose their personality, and just aren't themselves. So far, this is "right." He did great today.

I am extremely excited now to see where this leads. I am thrilled for him and for what this can mean for his future. So far, so good...