Medication Side Effect? We Can Fix That With This Medication!

Medication for a lot of our kids is a reality.  Side effects are the humorous slap in the face for most of those medications.  ~Here is a medication for your seizures but your teeth will likely rot out so here is another medication to counter that side effect.  Here is another medication for your seizures but you will gain a lot of weight on it so here is another medication to counter that side effect.~  Ever get the feeling that our kids are walking pharmacies?
I have always been a person who avoids medication at the all costs.  As I approach my one year anniversary of my medical disability starting, I look back at all of the medications that have been tried on me over the past 12 months.  They tried everything for pain including .  a cousin of heroin.  Nothing worked!  I was confined to a bed unable to move without intense pain.  Finally we found PREDNISONE!! It was a miracle!  If I were ever to have another child I would likely name it Prednisone!  It was that special!  I could walk, briefly, again and we moved our bed back upstairs into the bedroom.  But long term steroid use is not great for anyone.  It causes weight gain (YUP!!!!) it can raise blood sugar (they have a medication to lower it), blood pressure (they have a medication to lower it), do damage to major organs..... But it has me more able to handle life so how bad can it possibly be?  It is horrible, but necessary now until something better comes along. Something better did come along but unfortunately it caused more problems than it solved so I just finished an antibiotic for "likely" pneumonia and am wearing a heart monitor for a month because of a heart failure scare (cardiologist assures me I am fine but the monitor beeped the other day urging me to call the cardio center to transmit my EKG strip because the monitor picked something up.  Not sure what and won't know until after a month when I return the monitor and get the report.  Geez, I hope the report won't be addressed to "current occupant"!!) Not sure how this posting turned into an anxiety attack memoir for me (May 23rd is coming too fast) back to the point I started on.

Medication for our kids isn't a laughing matter because it can alter who they intrinsically are.  They may become zombies, aggressive, dangerously overweight (James' BMI is in the 99% but his height % is also in the 90's) or, underweight.  Unfortunately, we don't know until we try as the doctors aren't really sure what will work and cause the least damage.  Work with your doctor until you find something that works and feels okay for your family.  Remember growth spurts and hormones add another level of guesswork to the equation.  I have been told by James' pedi to talk to the neurologist to see about another medication that may work for seizure control and I have been told by his neurologist to talk to his pedi about weight control.  So for now, I chose to find my bliss loving my kid as best I can and letting the rest of the world worry about their weight.  I chose to find my bliss in the knowledge that I have left something for the future to worry about. I definitely find my bliss in the moment we are in now with his seizures are under medical control.