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!

Tuesday, September 21, 2010

Undiagnosed Diseases Program at NIH

If you have a child whom the docs are struggling to correctly diagnose, who seems to have not only psychiatric but severe neurological problems, and isn't responding to any medications at all, you might be interested in this program. They only accept referrals from other doctors who are baffled by a mystery case. Usually bipolar disorder in children is pretty recognizable, so this would be for a child who has neurological issues that your own pediatric neurologist(s) can't figure out after many tests. Sometimes bipolar- symptoms can be caused by other brain abnormalities. Looking back on our own experience, I think that any psychiatrist who has a child brought to them with bipolar symptoms should ask for a neurological work up before concluding they have a mental illness. You would just hate to miss something like that! Just thought I would pass this on.
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