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, July 22, 2012

Adjusting

We are all adjusting to life in this amazingly beautiful state of Colorado.  We have been here almost a month now.  The fires are gone and the mountains are so clear every day right from our backyard.

Caroline loves it here.  She is excited about the start of school in a few short weeks.  Already she has met some lacrosse buddies to throw the ball around at the high school just a few minutes away.  Not scrimmage, just non-contact drills.  My other two that are here are slowly getting used to living here as well.  We have thrown ourselves into church, youth group, ballet, art camp, math tutoring etc. to try to fill up their days so that aren't missing their old life as much.

We still need to find a new psychiatrist and psychologist.  So hard to know who is good and who isn't! Wish we could have taken our old docs with us!!

I will write more when school starts.  Thanks for reading and commenting!

1 comment:

Bani said...

good to hear you are adjusting. and caroline is too.

My son is back home from residential.. so we are all adjusting to having him back home. we have to have strict structure with him and my other 3 are not used to it...they are all in summer mode.

So its been a bit rough.