Day One

I have to admit that I went to bed excited and woke up excited - I have alot of faith that the shakes and supplements will work for Preston. I was listening to a woman talk yesterday and she mentioned that God has the power to do anything - if it is the right course of action. She said that it didn't matter what anybody told you (you will never be able to have kids, you have six months to live) because if you had faith and didn't give up, anything could happen. This really struck me as I know several people and have heard stories of people beating the odds; I have even heard of a few miracles. I know people that were told they wouldn't have children, and now have a family. Miracles do happen and I think they happen when there is alot faith. This thought gave me strength and I am excited because anything can happen really.

With that being said, when I got Preston back from his dad last night I gave him 1 C-Lyte and 1 Grapefruit Seed Extract capsule. I need to first say that when I picked Preston up he was bouncing off the walls. He was motor-mouthing and couldn't sit still; per his Dad he had been like this all day. There may or may not be a correlation, but both my Mom and I did notice that shortly after he had the Vitamin C and the GSE, he calmed down. Per Dr. Gray, the Vitamin C and the GSE alone was 'proven to be more effective than Ritalin.' I'm not sure it would happen that fast, but anything is possible right? Besides the issue of hyperactivity, there is the self-control and more importantly the depression issue that I will be watching carefully. It could take 4-6 weeks for the Zoloft to completely leave his system and during that time I understand there to be withdrawl symptoms. I saw this a couple of weeks ago when he went off it initially and that is when the knife incident occurred; he was just not in a good place. He was beligerant on the ride home from Sunday dinner last night, but mellowed and actually normalized once we got home.

I initially thought that I would incorporate the supplements slowly and one at a time but ultimately felt that there wasn't really a reason to hold off. The shakes are food and the other supplements are minerals that he is apparently very deficient in. This morning I took the Super Cleanse down to his room with two capsules of the Mars and Venus Super Minerals. He really didn't like the drink but I bribed him with offering some scoops of ice cream in his chocolate shake (Mars and Venus Wellness Shakes). Now before anyone freaks out - I made this ice cream over the weekend and I would actually describe it as healthy. It is made with coconut milk, Grade B maple syrup, vanilla, real salt, and stevia. The recipe calls for vanilla bean paste (haven't found any yet) which I think would make it amazing, but just with the vanilla it is still very tasty. So creamy! Love it! I found the recipe on http://www.heathereatsalmondbutter.com/ and love her for sharing because it is going to become a staple for the boys (and me-love creamy!). I doubled the recipe so I would have plenty on hand. So, actually pretty good to add the shake! I also gave hime 1 C-Lyte, 1 GSE and 1 Lithium Orotate. I'm going to have to figure out how to tweak the cleanse drink which he didn't like and of which he is supposed to have twice a day. I will give him his second shake when he gets home from school along with another GSE. Hopefully adding the ice cream to that will be okay. Whatever it takes to get it down?

He was happy and fairly manageable this morning. I still had to shadow him to make sure he gets stuff done, but I was able to coax him dangling carrots this morning which was helpful. Today, I will also be reading Dr. Barkley's book and his outline for the eight steps in behavior modification. I will add to this post later this evening with some of those details and see how Preston is doing. I'm going to start having Preston contribute to his page as well if he is still interested.   

As for the gumdrops and unicorns - isn't there some 'be happy' saying involving 'life's all about gumdrops and unicorns?' That's my way of having a positive outlook on this. *I do not encourage actually consumption of gumdrops. They are naughty. VERY, VERY NAUGHTY!

AFTERNOON UPDATE
Unfortunately, the universe couldn't handle the gumdrops and unicorns because he came storming in the door after school without his coat on and no back-pack (thinks he forgot his coat on the bus and his friends brought by his back pack saying  he threw it in the street and started jumping on it). He immediately went down to his room and tried to keep me out. He started yelling at me that everyone hated him. He repeated this sentiment in several different ways. I told him to hang out in his room to cool off. He came upstairs and I was trying to bridge and calm myself down and asked him to go back down to his room. He mouthed off to me and spit his tongue out so I escorted him to his room. He slammed the door three times before I went back in. He then emptied a few of his drawers and took some stuff off the wall after I left again. I just went upstairs to cool off. Ironically, Braeden went in his room and talked him down.
The truth is, raising a child with ADHD is by far and away the hardest, most gut-wrenching, emotionally-taxing job I've ever had. Some days it takes all I have to get through it and have a glimmer of hope. I'm going to keep thinking positive and remind myself that his withdrawl symptoms will probably get worse before they get better. At any rate, I did make his cleanse drink with my home-made ice cream and he got most of it down; he started off liking it and it went downhill from there. I think I can get him used to it. For everyone out there reading this - please send positive thoughts our way. I need all the help I can get.