Talk to me ........

Hello, As some of you know most of what my daughter and I have been
going through I want to share in hopes someone can enlighten me. It has
been just about 8 months now since she and the father of her baby split
up. I knew it was gonna be difficult for her to adjust and accept this.
Back in October she went haywire, calling him saying she didn't want to
live , she had even taken a bottle of Advil one night and called who
she thought was him , but it was his dad(paternal grandfather) said "I
took a bottle of pills goodbye" and hung up the phone. He of course
called the house back and woke me up and told me what happened. After
that The kids continued to call eachother and harrass eachother and it
eventually reached a point where she threatened to take the baby to
California and they would never see her.Then they of course went into
the emergency custody thing two weeks after she applied for
support.Using her mental health and the babies safety as the reason and
I really don't blame them for being concerned although I talked often
to the paternal grandfather and assured him I would never allow such a
thing to happen and I myself would hunt her down should that ever
happen. I also told him it was lashing out that she was doing and I
felt it was not something she would actually attempt.

That said.....we had put into place therapy and a new P-doc to start
new meds and try to reel my daughter in. The new doc felt she was not
being treated correctly and felt bipolar was not her condition. He
feels she is ADHD and severly depressed. Finally a month ago or so she
started a new med Strattera for the ADSHD and at first I thought it was
a miracle ! Lately, the past 3 days all hell has broke lose once again.
She has been avoiding the baby , angry outbursts at me if I question
her. Last night we went round and round and once I felt she was o.k.
enough and went to bed I went to bed.this morning I woke up to this
e-mail from her, I will give a little space before it to warn that the
language is not nice. The spelling is due to her learning disabilities.
She is 17 yrs. old. I am at a loss . As I read this I couild barely see
it through the tears streaming down my face . I just don't know how to
help her anymore ? What do you think ?








mom

you think i want my life this way you think i want to
hate waken up in the morning to hate bein here to hate my life i should
be happy i should be ok wit this **** hole of a life but im not i cant
smile and mean it anymore i cant be happy and at times the only way i
am is if im sleepin and not consions to this world jimmys gone out of
mylife and out of jaimes and its my falt
jaime will have to bounce back and forth wether she lives with me or
him and its my falt iv cause this much **** in her life so yeah i have
backed off cause god only knows what i will **** up for her next im
stuck in this town for the next at least 18years wich i sure as hell
dont want she has to go to school with the ****ed up kids in bangor
because of me i have to live the rest of my life alone and unhappy
because i ****ed up me and jimmy and hes the only one that made me
happy hes the one that change my life around and no one will ever do
that for me ever again

this is my life misareabule and alone because i can never be happy
with out him and i wont be
and i will have to live with that till i die and only god knows if i
will have to even affter that i want to disaper i dont want to be here
not like this not always thinkin what is jimmy doin is he happy dose he
think of me dose he cry when he dose dose he wish things never went
this way dose he love me did he ever love me when i talked to him on
the net i asked him if he ever did love me and he said he thought he
did but he didn't so two years of my life was a lie and i cant live
with that i want him to hurt like he hurt me
i want him to cry i want him to feel like his life is over and this is
what will distro anything i have worked for my love and my hate for him
and what he has done to me

what he has done

"Bev" wrote in message
ups.com...

snip the background stuff


That said.....we had put into place therapy and a new P-doc to start
new meds and try to reel my daughter in. The new doc felt she was not
being treated correctly and felt bipolar was not her condition. He
feels she is ADHD and severly depressed. Finally a month ago or so she
started a new med Strattera for the ADSHD and at first I thought it was
a miracle !


Have you done any research on the medication yet? Here's a link that is
kind of interesting, and provides many more links in context within the
page. http://www.crazymeds.org/strattera.html

It is now becoming understood that pretty much the only anti-depressant that
is succussful in teens is Prozac. Strattera is new and without long term
studies available so who knows.


Lately, the past 3 days all hell has broke lose once again.

Your daughter's pdoc will need to know this, make an appointment for her to
visit ASAP as in RFN. It takes time and patience for a new med to work,
sometimes even as long as 2 months before you can see any benefits. This
behaviour could be a side effect from the medication, or, it could be
symptomatic and only now manifesting as part of the brain chemicals are
being impacted. What if perfectly clear is that for 3 days now your
daughter is very ill and needs her doctor. Make the call Bev!!

snipping again for a bit of privacy's sake.....

The poor girl, my heart is breaking for her.

I'm at my computer Bev,

Lisa

Hi, Bev.

I'm so sorry you're all having such a hard time.

The first thing that occurs to me is: is she taking her meds? They
often stop, you know. They stop because they feel so much better that
they think they don't need them. And they stop because they *hate*
having to take meds. It feels as if there's something inherently bad
about taking meds for mental health issues, a view which society
reinforces vigorously. That's one reason I get very, very disturbed
when I see people using mental health for purposes of ridicule; that
societal attitude causes excruciating damage to young people,
especially.

Anyway. I know that it's very, very common, especially with a helpful
drug, for kids to experiment with going off. And they'll lie about it.
The only way to be sure is to make 'em take it in front of you and
watch them swallow. I didn't do that, myself, but instead kept open
and supportive and she eventually owned up when she'd gone off her
meds. You can also count them, but that's not foolproof, 'cause if
they know they'll flush 'em and then you'll be really confused. So
probably I'd wait for a calm moment. I'd sympathise with her feelings
of loss and rejection, validate that they're understandable and
legitimate feelings, mention that although you know that they feel
eternal, they really will subside, times really will get better. Then
I'd ask if she might've forgotten her meds for a bit. Try to be very
non threatening and non accusatory. Let her know that you know it's
frustrating to need them and it's not surprising if she's
experimenting with going off of them.

Another thing I'll mention is that for us, one way that I first could
tell that recovery was underway, however slowly, was not the degree of
awfulness of the 'episodes' of distress, but rather, the distance
between them. At first, the really rough patches were separated by
hours or at best, a few days. Gradually, that became weeks. It was a
couple of weeks or more before I realized how much farther apart the
problems were coming. So try to think through - you had a good patch -
is this episode further away from the last one than they've been, or
are they closer together, or what? That can tell you a lot.

With respect to the suicidal behaviour, I know what a line it is to
walk with that one. On the one hand, I personally have clear and
direct experience with successful suicide in a close relative, so I'm
definitely not inclined to underestimate the potential for completion.
Especially with teenagers, who are impulsive, it's important to stay
very alert. On the other hand, I know how you don't want to buy into
suicide gestures and talk as strategies for getting support and
sympathy. My tightrope act on that one involved making a pact with her
around both of us promising to talk to each other immediately if
either of us was to feel like suicide (I wasn't in that place, but I
felt the reciprocity mattered). Then, when she said she was suicidal,
I would ask her very matter of factly whether she needed me to be with
her for her safety. She seemed pretty able to assess that. I would
also, then, debrief her on...specifically, what would you like to
change? What are the steps we can take together towards that change? I
would remind her that she had all the time in the world to make
changes in her life, that although they wouldn't happen overnight I
would help and she could do it, and that all that had to happen was
one step towards one change at a time. The goal here was to empower
her in a healthier way, and get her to see that she could take control
over her life one piece at a time. I tried very hard to avoid
promoting victimhood, even though she quite legitimately *was* a
victim of many things on many occasions, because I wanted to teach her
that whatever happened *to* her, she could still call her own shots
with respect to how she responds to life events.

I knew she was buying in when I heard from a parent of a student that
she had explained this in detail to him in response to his complaints
about his homework. :-)

With respecdt to her self-blame, try to give her the concept that
looking backwards at our mistakes is useful only insofar as it helps
us decide what to do and what not to do in the future. You want her to
understand that it's not only ok, it's a *good* thing to learn the
lesson and then move on. After you've learned the lesson, guilt
becomes crippling and counterproductive rather than helpful. Tell her
that she can safely give up guilt every time she takes a step in the
forward direction to make things better.

Looking at her overall written expression, I'd be fascinated to see
what her psychoeducational evaluation says about the specifics of her
learning difficulties. There's no question at all that she was at very
high risk to begin with, of developing depression and acting out,
given the evidence with respect to LD. She can't have had it easy in
school, or out of it.She has to have had a brutal time with peers. She
deserves some affirmation for having stuck it out as long and as well
as she did. School is a very unkind place for kids with the type of
difficulty her writing suggests.

Anyway, take heart. When you're in it it feels as if it will never
end, and you can't imagine how they can go from being so very sick, to
health. But they can. Mine has. She will graduate this June, she's
working three to five days a week at a coffee bar, she's got an
absolutely delightful, sensible, and healthy boyfriend and she's
making good, sensible decisions about her future. We haven't had her
'go off' in such a long time now, I can't remember the last time. And
never without a clear catalyst, any more. She also recognises the need
for her medication (Paxil) and stays on it responsibly, on her own.
Hasn't messed that up in ages and ages either. So try to keep focused
on the hope that there very genuinely is. I can remember thinking it
would never end; she would never be well. I don't know when I began to
believe she could, and WOULD, really, truly, be healthy again, but
now, I know it for sure. It can happen for you too. Go slowly, hang in
there, support her, love her when she's most unloveable, keep her baby
safe and healthy, and remind yourself every day that what you're doing
can and will make a difference. The kids who make it are always the
ones whose parents stuck with the program. The parents don't have to
get everything right. They just have to be there, and show that they
care, and do their best.

Good luck to you all.

Cele

On 8 Mar 2005 04:08:31 -0800, "Bev" wrote:

Hello, As some of you know most of what my daughter and I have been
going through I want to share in hopes someone can enlighten me. It has
been just about 8 months now since she and the father of her baby split
up. I knew it was gonna be difficult for her to adjust and accept this.
Back in October she went haywire, calling him saying she didn't want to
live , she had even taken a bottle of Advil one night and called who
she thought was him , but it was his dad(paternal grandfather) said "I
took a bottle of pills goodbye" and hung up the phone. He of course
called the house back and woke me up and told me what happened. After
that The kids continued to call eachother and harrass eachother and it
eventually reached a point where she threatened to take the baby to
California and they would never see her.Then they of course went into
the emergency custody thing two weeks after she applied for
support.Using her mental health and the babies safety as the reason and
I really don't blame them for being concerned although I talked often
to the paternal grandfather and assured him I would never allow such a
thing to happen and I myself would hunt her down should that ever
happen. I also told him it was lashing out that she was doing and I
felt it was not something she would actually attempt.

That said.....we had put into place therapy and a new P-doc to start
new meds and try to reel my daughter in. The new doc felt she was not
being treated correctly and felt bipolar was not her condition. He
feels she is ADHD and severly depressed. Finally a month ago or so she
started a new med Strattera for the ADSHD and at first I thought it was
a miracle ! Lately, the past 3 days all hell has broke lose once again.
She has been avoiding the baby , angry outbursts at me if I question
her. Last night we went round and round and once I felt she was o.k.
enough and went to bed I went to bed.this morning I woke up to this
e-mail from her, I will give a little space before it to warn that the
language is not nice. The spelling is due to her learning disabilities.
She is 17 yrs. old. I am at a loss . As I read this I couild barely see
it through the tears streaming down my face . I just don't know how to
help her anymore ? What do you think ?








mom

you think i want my life this way you think i want to
hate waken up in the morning to hate bein here to hate my life i should
be happy i should be ok wit this **** hole of a life but im not i cant
smile and mean it anymore i cant be happy and at times the only way i
am is if im sleepin and not consions to this world jimmys gone out of
mylife and out of jaimes and its my falt
jaime will have to bounce back and forth wether she lives with me or
him and its my falt iv cause this much **** in her life so yeah i have
backed off cause god only knows what i will **** up for her next im
stuck in this town for the next at least 18years wich i sure as hell
dont want she has to go to school with the ****ed up kids in bangor
because of me i have to live the rest of my life alone and unhappy
because i ****ed up me and jimmy and hes the only one that made me
happy hes the one that change my life around and no one will ever do
that for me ever again

this is my life misareabule and alone because i can never be happy
with out him and i wont be
and i will have to live with that till i die and only god knows if i
will have to even affter that i want to disaper i dont want to be here
not like this not always thinkin what is jimmy doin is he happy dose he
think of me dose he cry when he dose dose he wish things never went
this way dose he love me did he ever love me when i talked to him on
the net i asked him if he ever did love me and he said he thought he
did but he didn't so two years of my life was a lie and i cant live
with that i want him to hurt like he hurt me
i want him to cry i want him to feel like his life is over and this is
what will distro anything i have worked for my love and my hate for him
and what he has done to me

what he has done

On Tue, 8 Mar 2005 09:27:28 -0500, "Lisa" wrote:


"Bev" wrote in message
oups.com...

snip the background stuff


That said.....we had put into place therapy and a new P-doc to start
new meds and try to reel my daughter in. The new doc felt she was not
being treated correctly and felt bipolar was not her condition. He
feels she is ADHD and severly depressed. Finally a month ago or so she
started a new med Strattera for the ADSHD and at first I thought it was
a miracle !


Have you done any research on the medication yet? Here's a link that is
kind of interesting, and provides many more links in context within the
page. http://www.crazymeds.org/strattera.html

It is now becoming understood that pretty much the only anti-depressant that
is succussful in teens is Prozac. Strattera is new and without long term
studies available so who knows.

Gotta be a bit careful with sweeping statements like that, Lisa. Paxil
and Zoloft were both tried on my teen from 13 to the present. Zoloft
wasn't especially useful; Paxil was outstandingly so. It depends on
quite a lot of things, including whether there're comorbid conditions,
exacerbating factors, etc. etc. In this case, both of those are
present.

Lately, the past 3 days all hell has broke lose once again.

Your daughter's pdoc will need to know this, make an appointment for her to
visit ASAP as in RFN.

Excellent advice. Wish I'd thought to say that. I was always deeply
frustrated by how long it took to get in. Fastest thing was emerg, but
that's not the healthiest thing, by a long mile.

It takes time and patience for a new med to work,
sometimes even as long as 2 months before you can see any benefits. This
behaviour could be a side effect from the medication, or, it could be
symptomatic and only now manifesting as part of the brain chemicals are
being impacted. What if perfectly clear is that for 3 days now your
daughter is very ill and needs her doctor. Make the call Bev!!

Agreed on all fronts. I do think there's a very real possibility, too,
that she's gone off her meds.

snipping again for a bit of privacy's sake.....

The poor girl, my heart is breaking for her.

I'm at my computer Bev,

Lisa
Me too. ICQ #1235207. If I can be of any help, I'm happy to talk.

Cele

Hi....I have read your replies Lisa and Cele, thank you both so very
much.
It has been a terribly tiring day today . I haven't been online since
earlier when I made this post. I spent the day running around in a snow
storm getting a car on the road for us. Then we had mobil therapy this
evening with the behavioral specialist. S was very attentive to talking
some of her feelings out and even shared some of her poetry with E (the
therapist) We have scheduled an appt. to look at meds again, it did
dawn on me that a week ago he did up the dose of Strattera to 50 mg.!
Maybe this has been a reason for the sudden turn around. I do give her
her meds and watch the swallow, due to so many problems in the past
with her compliance and her suicidal actions in the past. I can't leave
anything out for fear. I really have to hit the hay ..I work in the
a.m. S woke up today pleasant.....later in the afternoon she had a
meltdown and cried hysterically for about 5 minutes , I held her and
talked her back and the rest of the day has been o.k. I will re read
the posts again tomorrow hopefully, there is so much useful advice and
my brain is fried right now , need sleep, thanks again, I'll be in
touch Bev

"Bev" wrote in message
ups.com...snip
for brevity...

Bev,
I am so sorry that you all are going through this tough time. Please keep
the doc abreast of these outburst. Also, are her hormones back to normal?
Please keep us informed.
V

"Cele" wrote in message
...
On Tue, 8 Mar 2005 09:27:28 -0500, "Lisa" wrote:

It is now becoming understood that pretty much the only anti-depressant
that
is succussful in teens is Prozac. Strattera is new and without long term
studies available so who knows.
Lisa


Gotta be a bit careful with sweeping statements like that, Lisa. Paxil
and Zoloft were both tried on my teen from 13 to the present. Zoloft
wasn't especially useful; Paxil was outstandingly so. It depends on
quite a lot of things, including whether there're comorbid conditions,
exacerbating factors, etc. etc. In this case, both of those are
present.


Cele

Perhaps what I should have said is safest instead of successful with respect
to teens and anti-depressants. I may have sounded like I was making a
sweeping statement, however, the statement was drawn from medical warnings
issued and reported in the news. Have you read any of it?

Lisa

"Bev" wrote in message
ps.com...

Hi....I have read your replies Lisa and Cele, thank you both so very
much.

hey, no charge

Then we had mobil therapy this
evening with the behavioral specialist.

Talk about good timing!

S was very attentive to talking
some of her feelings out and even shared some of her poetry with E (the
therapist) We have scheduled an appt. to look at meds again, it did
dawn on me that a week ago he did up the dose of Strattera to 50 mg.!

Keep a close eye on things, every day will be a different day for her. At
17 she is still developing neurologically coupled with medication attempting
to chemically compensate so , oy, it's tough on her. Try to be prepared for
the next appointment by keeping track of mood swings and meltdowns.
Actually, S may even find this helpful in that this will begin to show her
that she is stabalizing slowly over time.

S woke up today pleasant.....later in the afternoon she had a
meltdown and cried hysterically for about 5 minutes ,

It takes alot more than people really get to make it though the day when
you're sick. By the afternoon, she was quite likely tapped and all the
excess needed to leak .

I held her and
talked her back and the rest of the day has been o.k.

You sweetheart. That's pretty much the only thing to do when she leaks, and
exactly the right thing to do. My husband is pretty good at it too :

I will re read
the posts again tomorrow hopefully, there is so much useful advice and
my brain is fried right now , need sleep, thanks again, I'll be in
touch Bev


Hope that you were able to get some rest. Put some lavendar essense on your
daughter's pillow and see how that helps her, and you for that matter!!

Lisa

Lisa wrote:
"Bev" wrote in message
ups.com...

snip the background stuff


That said.....we had put into place therapy and a new P-doc to
start
new meds and try to reel my daughter in. The new doc felt she was
not
being treated correctly and felt bipolar was not her condition. He
feels she is ADHD and severly depressed. Finally a month ago or so
she
started a new med Strattera for the ADSHD and at first I thought it
was
a miracle !


Have you done any research on the medication yet? Here's a link that
is
kind of interesting, and provides many more links in context within
the
page. http://www.crazymeds.org/strattera.html


I checked this site out.....interesting especially since the author is
actually using Strattera and other meds as well , who would know better
!



It is now becoming understood that pretty much the only
anti-depressant that
is succussful in teens is Prozac. Strattera is new and without long
term
studies available so who knows.


Yeah I heard from another "friend of a friend" that her cousin was put
on Strattera and was having violent outbursts.


Lately, the past 3 days all hell has broke lose once again.

Your daughter's pdoc will need to know this, make an appointment for
her to
visit ASAP as in RFN. It takes time and patience for a new med to
work,
sometimes even as long as 2 months before you can see any benefits.
This
behaviour could be a side effect from the medication, or, it could be
symptomatic and only now manifesting as part of the brain chemicals
are
being impacted. What if perfectly clear is that for 3 days now your
daughter is very ill and needs her doctor. Make the call Bev!!


Call was made RFN! The doc did see us and we discussed what was
going on and even more came out than I knew. Apparently it makes my
daughter absolutely angry to no end that the babies father does not
spend time with her on his Days he has her. I as well as the doctor
expressed to her that for the babies sake she needs to find a place for
those feelings that are safe. He will see what his current behavior
does in time. I hope he can see sooner than later that this baby needs
his time above all else. I also said to her it was very important that
if he is not spending the time how important her time spent with the
baby is to the child. We agreed to give the meds some more time and if
things are not improving to call him, otherwise, our next visit is
scheduled for the end of March.


snipping again for a bit of privacy's sake.....

The poor girl, my heart is breaking for her.

I'm at my computer Bev,

Lisa

Thanks Lisa...I hit and ran with this post .....finding time to respond
is difficult at times...I manage to read more than respond probably
because I can read oh so much faster than I can hunt and peck these
keys LOL!
I do benefit greatly from the advice I read ! S has been much better
since the talk therapy from the therapist , P-doc and myself fingers
crossed
Bev

Cele, Sorry late in responding. S is doing better after a bit of
intervention. She takes those meds for sure, I have to hand feed them
at this point. One of these days I'll venture into to figuring out ICQ,
in the meantime I am clueless LOL!
Bev

P.S. I also need to remember to educate myself a bit more on using
google, I think I should of copied the post I responded to before I
typed this and now I will just send this one cause going back to fix
this one will be a disaster