Autism Alert Card

Tramadol is an opioid based pain killer that is why it has the calming effect and makes you feel sick, it works somewhere along the lines of I'm still in pain but I don't care anymore! I'm supposed to take it for my back but can't handle the sick feeling. 

I didn't take them because I felt sick. I took them because I was on the verge of a very serious breakdown and I couldn't handle a baby screaming and crying anymore. Consistent overload and then I get very aggressive. 

If anything they helped me see what problems I was experiencing and having to deal with. It actually really gave me insight in how I function.

For example I hadn't realized I really need to stick to a time schedule to feel slightly alright. And that I get stuck in negative thoughts a lot and they don't stop.

I stopped both meds after sux weeks (first one, then tried the other), and it helped me progress.

Someone told me that when children are diagnosed at an early age, learning a musical instrument can actually help the brain with the dyslexia issues. Apparently it is the same side or area of the brain that is used.

OMG good for her!!!

Dyslexia is treated so much better these days!

They also tell you that it is a trial and error system because some work for some, not for others.

I told the psychiatrist that was like testing and I felt like a guinea pig.

That is what they say when they give you those meds. 'These are in itself not for autism (cause nothing is really) but thisbmedication works on some of the problems you are experiecing due to your autism. And they were right except for me getting way too many other side effects :-)

I guess the Diazepam has an effect for you like the Tramadol has for me. My mother was highly addicted to Diazepam so I tend to avoid that one.

But I can see how it might be useful as I get quick overloads when nervous abd stressed out.

i know exactly what you mean tom i feel the same way

I have a dyslexic work colleague.  We have found some common ground with our school experiences.  He, I can tell - I know the signs because I show them myself - is damaged by those experiences.  Very bright and capable, but racked with insecurity and always saying 'I'm no good at anything.'  Like life has conditioned him to think that way.  It makes me so f u c k i n g angry.

you are most definitely right my mother is dyslexic and left handed she didn't do well at school was forced to write with her right hand when she was 65 she went to university and got a first in literature and design

I often think about 'A Clockwork Orange', and how science is used to 'correct' a sociopath - which results in robbing him of his essential personality and humanity.

I feel the same way.  That the medical establishment - the establishment generally - is trying to 'correct' us in order to make us fit in more.  This, of course, does us tremendous damage.  Like forcing a homosexual to deny their sexuality and have a heterosexual relationship.  Or rapping the knuckles of a left-handed person (as used to happen) to coerce them into using their right hand.

And how many dyslexic and dyspraxic people have been damaged by being condemned as stupid and clumsy?

If anything, I'd give meds to NTs to help them, perhaps, to experience what life is like for us.  Something that makes them blind to social communication.  Something that makes them feel anxious and alienated.  Meds, to me, are given to sick people to help them feel better.  But I'm not sick.  I'm just differently-wired from the majority.  That doesn't make me wrong.  It's what I said earlier: how disability - and sickness, if you like - is socially-constructed.

I have to say that I feel these meds are given to us to 'cosh' us into conforming in some way.  I really don't feel that the pharmacological approach is right for me. I don't want anything to make me feel better about not being able to fit in with the NTs.  I want them to accept me for who I am.  Which isn't a criticism at all of anyone who feels the need to take meds.  I can quite understand it with the way society makes us feel about ourselves.  It's always a battle.

thats what i was meaning tom re the comment "autism meds" i was just curious as to what they were as autism isn't something you can take meds for its the side issues that meds are generally prescribed for like olanzapine rittinol etc

i wasn't trying to be funny just curious in as much as what other people are prescribed that's all was just stating what i know about those meds and if you were told something different

That's interesting.  I work for an autism charity in the UK.  All of our service users have associated learning disabilities.  But very few are on meds apart from Epilim, or Diazepam as a PRN.  I attended a workshop, hosted by our behavioural support team, for newly-diagnosed Aspies.  It was refreshing to hear them say that they didn't think things like anti-depressants were very effective for people with autism, because they're formulated for a neurological template that we don't have.  But I guess it's whatever works for people.  I take no meds now - except occasional Diazepam if I'm under extreme stress.  Anti-depressants never worked for me.  I've never tried Risperidone or anything else.

The tramadol wasn't meant for autism but it has a calming effect for me (as I said above), and I said it was a painkiller.

The other two ARE prescribed for autism where I live. If you don't agree, go talk to the Autism Psychiatric Centre and the psychiatrist.

In the Netherlands these are normal autism meds.

do you mean phenobarbitone i was on that for 2 years when i was younger due to having fits ?

risperidone is an anti psychotic sertraliine is an anti depressant and tramadol is a very strong pain killer none are what i would call autism meds apart from risperidone which is more of a mood stabilizer

The only thing that works so far - a little bit - is Tramadol but it is originally a painkiller. I took it as a painkiller but it had a calming effect.

I can only take very little because I get oversensitive to it otherwise.