Children on the Autism Spectrum and "Medication Phobia"
"Our daughter (autistic) is suppose to take 2 meds everyday, but always has a meltdown whenever we try to give them to her. She is so afraid of the side effects that she can’t put her anxiety aside long enough to take them. Is this common? What can we do? She has to take these two prescriptions according to the doc." While lack of awareness by parents and their Asperger’s (high-functioning autistic) child of adverse drug reactions can have serious consequences, having a phobia of medications can also have serious harmful effects on the child’s health (e.g., problems with medication compliance, refusal of necessary drug intervention, etc.). Medication phobia can also present in moms and dads who are concerned about giving medications to their youngster, fearing that the medications will do more harm than good. Fears of taking medication is prevalent in children who have experienced unpleasant withdrawal effects from psychotropic drugs. Also, medication phobia can be t