6 year old girl - extremely challenging! Anxiety and ADHD

[angelinamarina]

Hi
my 6 year old has had a rough start to life.  She started out being dx as ASD at 2 but all experts in our life currently agree she is no longer, or never was ASD.  She has sensory issues with ADHD and a big dose of anxiety as well.  So, when we gave her dexadrine in SMALL (2.5mg) doses she fell asleep but would get very emotional.  We tried several other stimulants and the worst was the daytrana patch....she started screaming and tantruming within a half hour and it got UGLY.....VERY OCD and ANXIOUS and ANGRY.    So, right now she is not being treated for her adhd because we are treating her with abilfy for mood swings and now buspar for the anxiety.  The buspar helped some of the rages, but she now seems like her ADHD is WORSE.   The buspar lessened many of the rages, but maybe her dose is too low to really help completely.  She is on 5 mg two times a day and weighs 51lbs.  
She is VERY GROUCHY and very challenging most of the time.  She is a really sweet kid though (in there somewhere!) , and I know she is a loving child but just is not feeling that way lately.  At any rate, how do we medicate for ADHD when she has anxiety?
(Drugs we have tried that I can remember....depakote (caused depression!), Zoloft for anxiety (ramped her up and made her threaten a kid at school), datrayna made her tantrum, dexadrine made her fall asleep and also be emotional, Risperdal worked the best but always needed to be increased and finally she was at the top of her dose.  She h as been in therapy for 2 years, so please no suggestions from anyone about not giving her meds and trying therapy or special diets....been there and DONE THAT.
In her first week at a new kindergarten she repeatedly hit a kid sitting next to her at circle time.  The teacher asked her to stop and she just kept doing it.  
She is VERY oppositional and we are worried about that!
She is very inattentive too...and is having trouble paying attention to her K homework and refuses to learn how to read.   (one therapist that worked with her said that she thinks our daughter is GIFTED intellectually!??)
She is the light of our lives and we want to help her so much.
Any suggestions on a med that might help ADHD but not make anxiety and tantrums worse?
Right now, the worst thing we deal with is a screaming raging tantrum from her about 5-10 times a day that lasts about 15 minutes that often ends with her hitting or scratching us although she really tries hard not to.  We give her time outs and she rages, screams, and cries in her room like she is being injured!   The tantrums usually start over her OCD'ing on something and then she builds and builds and is SO ANGRY.

Thanks for your help!
Angi

[wj74]

You mentioned her OCDing a few times. Is it possible that she has OCD? That IS an anxiety disorder. It's interesting that you say she isn''t ASD, I was about to mention that it sounds similar to that before I reread your post. But I guess anxiety/adhd/ocd issues could look like that. Good luck!

[Lilak2002]

My son had ADHD, ODD and a mixed receptive speech delay.  He was diagnosed when he was 3 almost 4 years old.  He is 6 now.  The meds that my son is on is Dextormine.  My son has gone through many fazes and continues to be difficult at times. Before he took the medication he could barley say a few words let alone put a sentence together.  After he started taking it he started talking almost overnight.  Behavior improvements took time but he was able to listen and follow directions a lot better.  My son was not a violent child but was carless because he was so busy doing things he never noticed other children in his way and would often run them over push them out of his way etc.  He would also throw tantrums because he was unable to communicate his needs to anyone.  As he has gotten older and grows his meds have to be uped because he is growing.  He will often revert to his old habits and tantrums and not being able to communicate his needs when his meds aren’t having the same affect on him that they use to.  We usually only have to tweak his meds about once a year.  The meds only made him slow down and seem depressed the first day after that he adjusted just fine, no mood swings or anything.