The meds...

We finally got the Invega back into Brandon. I love my pharmacist, he is the bomb. He helped so much along with me harassing the insurance company and Dr Hubbard’s office it was taken care. And it only took a month!! I was ready to take him to the insurance company and let him throw chairs at THEM, and then see how fast they approved his meds. It’s been a week since he’s been back on it, and we are already seeing him being less of a jerk (which I say with love), he still has a long way to go to get back where he was. That’s what pisses me off the most. The insurance company didn’t only take away a little pill; they took away the last year of progress we made. It also shows me how fragile Brandon and his condition are. Before this mess I was starting to think, “Maybe we can take him off one or two of his meds”, and “maybe he doesn’t need them anymore”. It proved to me that he does most definitely need his meds, and that his meds are doing their job. I used to be one of those parents that was against medicating there kids. I thought it was a tool for parents to use when they didn’t want to deal with the parenting issues that faced them. I now see medication as a foundation for treatment. Medication, with therapy and behavior modification makes it possible for Brandon to think, when before he couldn’t. The more positive brain connections are making the more the bad ones will have a chance to die off letting the new connections grow and thrive. This in turn gives him an opportunity to improve, not just stay at a stand still. In Brandon’s case, medication is about quality of life, for him and us. I can’t see into the future. I don’t know if he will ever be off his medication, or if the meds he is on now will always work. I know what his meds have done, and have seen him without any meds. Brandon is more functional, happy, well rounded, a better student, and the stress level at home has been reduced significantly.