We kept our son home from school on Monday because he was aggressive and non-functional. He was having tantrums and screaming and hitting. I sustained some bruising and scratches in one of his blinded-by-rage attacks. His anger was towards that teaching aide who told him of mortality. The teaching aide spoke to him about this several months ago but in his drug-free state it became a target of obsession.
In an effort to relax him (Sunday at 4am), I gave him a very low dosage (25mg) of Seroquel (an anti-psychotic we had in our substantial collection of pharmacological paraphernalia) mostly to get its side effect (sleepiness). It helped him sleep. I told our psychiatrist what I did, expecting a stern rebuke. He said it was the right thing to do and said to continue (I'm putting up my "Doctor" shingle, right now)
My son is now very passive and not having tantrums or acting aggressively towards others or his things or himself. He is back at school but not engaged. The Seroquel is no longer assisting in his sleep as far as I can tell. He is mostly awake all night, pacing and talking to himself. No screaming, no hitting. During the day he talks to himself. His talk consists of repeating the phrases his aide told him over and over again but without the angry outbursts. So the Seroquel has taken the anger out of his obsessive perseveration but has not broken that habit. He responds to commands but will not engage in conversation. He hasn't broken his obsessive patter for several days to initiate any conversation.
We are in a bad place. The good news is that things are not getting worse.
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