Medical Update

Thank you to all those who have asked about Madi lately.  She's doing much better.

She no longer has constant dizziness; I wish I could explain why, but it just cleared up after she took Antivert for two days.  She still has trouble with dark spots in her vision on standing up, but they occur much less frequently, and definitely seem to be caused by dehydration - well, at least hydrating makes them few and far between.  She takes several bottles of flavored water to school each day, and on the days when she actually drinks them, she feels good.

The visit to the epilepsy clinic two weeks ago was such a roller coaster ride!

Madi had lots of wires hooked up, and then had 30 minutes of monitoring.  During that time, they did all they could to induce a seizure, including flashing the lights and getting her to hyperventilate.

During the hyperventilation sequence, Madi had one of her "space outs", where she was acting exactly like what I've seen at home, and what school describes.  She wasn't responding to us, seemed very confused, and didn't have any memory of the incident at all immediately after it occured.  The tech declared that she was having a seizure... and, heaven help me, I was SO glad!  I wanted to cry with relief that what I was seeing was real, and that it was treatable.  I would never wish epilepsy on anyone, but at least it was an answer!

Although I wanted to start texting everyone to let them know the "good" news, I refrained, and I'm glad I did.  The neurologist reviewed the data, and declared that the "event" was not a seizure, so no signs of epilepsy.  Unfortunately, they had no further explanation for me, thankyouverymuch - goodbye.  To give them credit - they are an epilepsy clinic, after all.  So - back to the drawing board on the staring spells.

Of course, even though I am a scientist at heart, and should know better, I'm also a parent who needs results... so we've been changing more than one variable at a time in order to improve the quality of life around here.  I'm happy to report that we seem to have hit upon a combination of SSRI (for anxiety) and stimulant (for ADD) that has completely changed the climate in our house.

Madi now gets ready for school almost completely independently, has very little homework, and is able to complete what homework she does have very quickly.  She's now able to do things she likes, like play outside, hang out with her rabbit, or play electronics... all because she isn't spending hours on homework and basic living.


The before and after shots of her room speak volumes.  During the "before" period, she was so overwhelmed and flustered that she literally couldn't keep a single thought in her head.  Her possessions mirrored the chaos in her brain.

After we got the meds right, it only took her about an hour to take her room from "before" to "after", with minimal help from me.  She was easily able to throw things away, showing that she appears to have left her hoarding behavior behind, and was able to divide the task into manageable parts, complete them, and move on.  The school reports that she now seems to understand and follow what is going on, is able to organize her stuff, and complete her assignments independently.  Huge!

I don't think that meds are for every kid, and frankly, I'm not crazy that my kid is on them, but I can't deny the truth - she is SO much happier now, and so are we!  I'm actually starting to relate to those parents who LIKE spending time with their kids!  :)

I hate not having all the answers - there are still uncrossed t's and undotted i's - but life is so much better.