My Teen son refuses to take Seroquel

My 16 yr old son has dx bipolar and adhd. He is refusing to take his Seroquel 300 xr. I think he is just being defiant or he wants to stay awake because he likes the mania.

Does anyone have this issue with their children?

Hi, I can't say for giving to kids, but I have taken it in the past myself for other issues, PTSD, but really took it so I could sleep with my bladder issues. It can cause some uncomfortable feelings. I fought it at the high doses because it felt like i was trapped in my body..as is really strong. I had to be mentally tired already to take it without that feeling. But, also have heard bipolar friends say they dont like taking their meds because of enjoying their manic phases too. Did he say why he doesn't want to take it, specifically?

Seroquel has really strong sedative side effects. It really is not a pleasant med for many people and can make you feel really drugged even during the day. I'd say his complaint is probably legitimate and perhaps his doctor needs to be consulted for something that works without the side effects that are causing him not to want to take it.

I can only speak for myself..... I am sometimes non-compliant with Serequol as I like the buzz of staying up and of the mania.... can relate to your son. I am only on 175mg so maybe the dosage is too much for your son? Maybe consult his Dr

I do think the dosage is too high. It makes him feel comatose and trapped in his body at the high dosage.

He was on a hold in the hospital (for trying to hurt himself with overdosing on seroquel during a mania rage). Then they prescribed the increased dosage from 200mg to 300mg, they insisted. They way the doctor talked down to me I felt like a common idiot.

My son tells me now that he pretended it helped him while he was at the hospital so he could get out of the hospital. Now we are waiting for a new pdoc and a new therapist through the county. i've had to apply for assistance because of all the doctor and hospital bills. I'm out of money, I can barely work anymore. This is going to continue to be a long difficult road of finding him a helpful med combo, pdoc, therapist, everything.

I think you should focus on him as a person as much as "finding the right med combo". I am not saying this applies to you, but many times with children with issues it ends up with parents dragging them around doctors and seeing everything as a symptom that needs to be treated.

Not trying to simplify anything, but many teens go through quite wild days and it is not pathological. I guess the most you can do is provide safety net and understanding.

It's pretty hard to be a teen and looking for yourself... and when other factors interfere with it.... it can be almost unbearable.

Thanks for the reply. No - that does not apply to me and my my son. I'm not even generally a pro-med person. Gave birth to 3 babies natural and at home. Never thought my baby boy would have severe bipolar. Never thought he'd cut himself and wish to die. Never thought he'd be hospitalized 3 times by age 16.

I don't know if you have children or not, but when you've been through what I have with mine, you would likely look to the help of modern science in addition to anything and everything else. He is so smart and a gifted musician and psychic and intuitive. I am letting him home school because his anxiety is too high around the high school, and he either cant fall asleep or cant wake up. He wants medicine, he wants that help, and he is at an age to have a say so in it.

I think you missed the point when you say i should focus on him as a person. I am so focused on him as a person you have no idea. I am not shuttling my child around to doctors for every symptom, I am not forcing him to take meds.

My point was: I was asking if any other parents have their children complain of seroquel. And I got the answers i suspected that seroquel is really heavy duty, and I do think the dosage is too high.

BlueInanna, I'm glad you care enough to find help for him. I'm sorry for what you and your son have been going through. Is this his first med? I ask because I wish in the past I had asked for the 'first line of treatment', and tried all those before they jumped straight to the meds they are pushed to prescribe the most. I feel like that is often the first med given by docs that don't care. I think it can be found on the net, or make them show you. It's not right to treat people like they are stupid. Once I was given one that made me very suicidal, and I knew it was the med, they didn't care and kept upping it, 3 times, and it'd get worse every time, till i said i stopped taking it. Then they said, omg you can get a rash and die if you just stop that, its dangerous for you to be on since you did that! And took me off of it. I doubt they even took the time to look up from their paper. I hope you are able to find a good doc and meds that work well for him soon. -Keeping you in my thoughts.

If you are already doing that, than that is more than great. I don't have children myself, but I have seen quite few cases when parents focus on their children issues whether mental or physical, and it's not that they wanted to have it easy, but I guess it easy to focus on the problem. Which can create a huge frustration for the said child. I think it was the part of "just being defiant" that ticked me off a bit.

If medical science works for your son, than great, but that was not my point, no matter what my attitude is.

I did not mean any offense.

When I was on serequol it made me feel so sleepy and like Miss Laura I like the Mania so I wouldn't take it, In fact I hate the med but that is me.Maybe he needs to try something different.

I'm trying to remember all the meds we've tried :/ it's been going on for 5 years now. The dx has gone from depression, to adhd, to mood disorder, to bipolar disorder. I am glad that he is at the age now where it's obviously bipolar, no more dancing around the notion.

So, no, not his first med, but the first real "bipolar" med. He'd also tried Geodon, but the pdoc in the hospital took him off that and just upped the seroquel dosage. He'd been taking it for about a year at a lower dosage along with klonopin and clonodine.

My hope is that we can find him some medicine that will provide him relief. If he doesn't need to suffer like he is with panic attacks, depression, manic rages. He so often breaks things or says the most hurtful things and then feels horrible about it. I want him to be able to complete high school, and go on to college and have a happy life, and right now it's just putting out fires every day with him, and trying to keep him calm, and trying to keep him safe because he'll do really risky behaviors.

And he's already trying to self-medicate with illegal drugs, like impulsive whatever he can get his hands on. I'd rather help him find a legal rx or combo. He likes the klonopin and clonodine and seroquel at a lower dosage.

Since we're in between insurance and doctors, i'm just lowering his seroquel - or allowing him to. So he's taking about 75mg at night, along with his 1 clonodine and 2 klonopins allowed per day. And then we'll consider adjusting things when he can get in with the county pdoc. Unfortunately the waiting time is long, so I will need to get the pdoc from the hospital visit to refill his 'good' meds. We have 1-2 weeks left. I think she will refill if i say, "oh yes the seroquesl is great, thanks so much". (ughhh)

Which meds worked for you by the way? Have you tried or heard of Depakote? It sounds like it might be a good one.

thank you and hugs I need this support so bad and appreciate you all very much

Hi Venus, Defiant probably wasnt the best word for what I wanted to say. I appreciate your input. Thanks.

Does he have a therapist or can you discuss with his pdoc on how to work with him on taking his meds? I wish I had some advice, but maybe a professional does........

Well its very different for everyone. Depakote is often a good one and is a first line of treatment med. Theres goods and bads of them all. I was on a lot and had probs with most, but probably because im not bipolar I, have an allergy to the dyes they use in almost all of them, am extremely sensitive to meds, and physical illnesses that cause chronic pain. Its going to be more difficult if he's taking anything else as they can mimic, and especially the withdrawals.

I'm no expert, but I am a mother, and I am a high school teacher whose been around teenagers for 16 years ... It sounds like he is so gifted and special (in a brilliant kinda way) that harnessing all that energy is too difficult on his own right now, at his age. Poor guy in that's just so much for a teenager to take on, but maybe someday he'll be able to see all of it as a gift ...

Does your son have a passion that he can use more often as an outlet for all that's happening inside him? ... painting, drawing, music, poetry, photography, cooking, basketball, something that would harness some of that energy? And, is he finding ways to work with his intuitive gifts (reading about them, blogging about them, connecting with others who are like him in that respect)?

Just wanted to throw those questions/suggestion out there from a mom/teacher perspective. He's gifted, and I hope he learns to work with those gifts.

I took seroquel xr 300 and it made me very groggy the next day. Changing to the immediate-release really helped with that. Maybe that would be helpful for him. It's been a really good medication for me.

BlueInanna, I can relate to what you are dealing with. While your son is 16, yes he needs to have some say about how his meds make him feel, but he is not old enough to make his own decision about whether to take them or not.

My son also liked being manic - or so he thought. It had become such a huge part of his personality and his way of life. Giving up the manic side was very difficult for him at first. But over time he is discovering that he actually prefers being balanced emotionally. He is making better life decisions now and rarely deals with anxiety now. The Seroquel makes him drowsy as well, so he takes it at night.

I wish you the best. It isn't easy to raise children - much less a child with ADHD and Bipolar.

I would recommend elavil, another Amitriptyline class medication often used for a variety of psychosomatic issues. Seroquel can take up to a couple weeks for a person to adjust to. If possible taking it at night to begin with will help in coping with the sedative effects but waking in the morning will be a bad time for the person taking it. I dislike many of the psychotropics because they can have dramatic effects on the way one perceives reality. Of course this may be why the prescribing doctor recommended it in the first place.

I would avoid Depakote unless the doctors believe his problems may be the result of over stimulation between the hemispheres of his brain. Anti-seizure medications may not have overly noticeable side effects but suppressing the brains natural communication with the rest of the body seems unhealthy for long term usage. Additionally while it is commonly prescribed many of these medications have no documentation as to how they actually work to improve certain conditions. Many current behavioral scientists and psychologists are beginning to find more correlation between the placebo effect and actual treatment then initially thought.

The way we perceive a medication to work will greatly impact its efficacy. Even proven medications become less effective if we believe they won't help us.

And having gone through a stage while a teen myself sometimes the best medication is proper communication. This is of course the most difficult and time consuming treatment for any condition but if it works it would greatly benefit the relationship between the two of you and the future relationships they will develop later in life.