About our Daughter

I am mother to four wonderful daughters, ages 17, 19, 21, and 23, and wife to the greatest husband on earth. God has given us a special child to raise one who was diagnosed with early-onset bipolar disorder at the age of seven, though she showed signs of it from the age of fifteen months. She also has ADHD, Sensory Integration Disorder (sensory seeking), Dyslexia, and Non-Verbal Learning Disorder-NOS, all typical comorbidities for a bipolar child. In spite of the trials, she enjoys lacrosse, running (finished her first marathon in October of 2014!), and reading and writing her own books. I will share with you the many joys and sorrows we have faced and will face in the future with the hope that you may find better understanding about this mental illness caused by both chemical and structural abnormalities in the brain. I desire that you will be encouraged by this blog if you are also dealing with a bipolar child. Thank you for reading and sharing in our journey.

How Did You Know She Was Bipolar So Young?

I wrote a long explanation of how we came to this bipolar diagnosis in a child so young under my post of March 19th of 2009. If your child or a child you know bears similarities, please seek out a good psychiatrist and don't wait for "things to get better." Often they will simply get worse, and the longer a child is unmedicated, the more damage their brain can accrue. Early diagnoses and treatment are key to providing these children with a chance at a successful life later as a teen and an adult.
Never change, start or stop a medication without the approval of your child's physician!

Sunday, September 19, 2010

Preemptive Dosing

With the approach of the end of September, I can tell that Caroline is beginning to swing up little by little. She is much too focused right now on her book and on practicing wall-ball for hours every day. So we have increased her Seroquel (with the doc's permission of course) by 50 mg again, up to 500mg. Already she is acting more "normal." I want to do everything I can to stay several steps ahead of the fall swing. She is doing so well with homeschooling right now, and with the supplementary classes she is taking, which are World History, Writing, and Spanish II.

I am pretty stressed out today. Working part time in the afternoons and early evenings several days a week after homeschooling in the morning is stretching me thin. My house keeps getting dirtier. As soon as my husband gets a job, I hope to scale back my hours to one or two days a week for a couple of hours. My house needs me and so do my kids! I don't know how you working moms and single moms do it!

3 comments:

Anna said...

We juggle and juggle but always feel behind in the housework unless we ready fly lady. It is a great inspirational website to get you organized at home. It is like a teacher's manual for homemakers and it works just fine.

Good luck,
Anna

Megan said...

I am familiar with Fly Lady but have never used it. Guess it is time to start!

marythemom said...

I use my kids as slave labor (it's true, just ask them!).

Mary in TX