5 1/2 year old daughter Bipolar?

[mindersmomof2]

Hi, I'm a mother of a 5 year old, 6 in November. We have had a hard 3 years with her! What a roller coaster!!  We started with counselors and phsyc. at 3. She has always been abnormally hyper, if we say no she has rages!  She fights and hits kids at our park daily.  She has scratched other kids that she doesn't even know.  When we tell her time-out she will scream, yell and throw things for an hour, sometimes longer.  She has thrown things at me from the top of the stairs. She has never "Played" with toys, she messes up anything in her path, she paces around our house. She plays outside as long as we let her. She is so active. My mom babysat her and couldn't handle it anymore after a week.  So I had to quit my job and stay home again. She brought my mom down physically and mentally. She is doing the same to me. They always said she is too young for a diagnosis.  Finally at 5 we found a doctor that cares and said she thinks she most likely has Bi-polar disorder, and maybe ADHD. They put her on respidol, what a miracle, at first, also they put her on strattara.  But now 5 months later it all has gotten just as bad again.  The only thing confusing me and her dad is she is perfect at school. She has been there for 2 months and she has  a male teacher, which I wonder if this helps her stay good, she is scared to do anything wrong!!!! She has periods of staying up all night. She goes to bed at 8 pm but wakes up around 1am and is up all night. She gets really weird the day before, laughing about everything, hurting her sister, discipline is just funny, everything is funny to her.  Her doctor said she can't be up-ed anymore on rispodol for her age but it's not working anymore. We have followed all discipline methods, she is a very sweet girl otherwise. We have been through so much, we thought we finally had some help, but now we don't know because she is doing so well in Kindergarten. We have tried a few ADHD stimulants, those made everything worse, she has even been hospitalized in physc. hospital.  Please help us , we don't know if she is being naughty or if she truly has bi-polar. Thanks Desperate Mom!!!!!!!!!!

[mindersmomof2]

Your comment was an eye opener!! It's true, that no matter what the boy was doing, she should have kept her hands to her self.  Everyday I tell her "Remember, if someone is doing something wrong, or trying to make you mad, ignore it." She has not been in trouble since. Another question. I have tried to be the best mom possible. But she seems to have so much disrespect for me. She straightens up MOST of the time for her Dad, but is so much more naughty around me. I have been a stay at home Mom her whole life, could this be it? I am going nuts with everything! It has all got so much worse.  No meds still, bit we go back to her Physc. next week.  I can get really mad at her. She sasses me and gives me dirty looks all the time. Her attitude has gotten so horrible. Some of the things she says to me!

[Rozanna]

This is my honest opinion:  

Sound like your daughter has ODD rather than BP.

I ‘am sorry but I don’t think its extreme she should be punished for her
Actions. No matter what anyone does or says that doesn’t give anyone the
Right to put their hand on others.

Just think what her punishment would be if she were 18 years old.

About a month ago my son who is 7 years old got suspended for head butting his principal (while they were restraining him). He was suspended for a week. I made the week where he was suspended as bad for him as possible.

The key to help your child is not to make excuses for her behavior (maybe the little boy was bothering her) still she shouldn’t of hit him or do anything physical to him, she should have told an adult.  I have learned that these problems will only get worse as our children get bigger. If I had a dime for every time I made excuses for my son I would be rich. But I have learned that in the long run kids need to learn from their mistakes. And even though its really tough for us to except that our child did something that wasn’t nice we can’t keep blaming others for our children’s actions because soon she will figure out that whatever she does she can blame it on others and won’t get into trouble.

If I were in the spot that you are in having to pay for a child’s glasses I would give her some chores so she will get the concept that you have to pay for things that you break. Show her all the money that its going to take to replace the other child’s glasses tell her that would of bought some really neat toys, or that the money mom and dad had to dish out on glasses will take away from what you could of bought her for Christmas I know that kinda sounds mean but you really want her to understand that what she did wasn’t good.  

              Hope this helps Rozanna

[mindersmomof2]

Well, my child had her first happening at school. She was on the bus and ripped glasses off a boys face, and broke them. This boy is something else though. He has done so many mean things to her. We had a big talk with her and told her no matter what someone else is doing we need to control our anger!  So now we have to pay to replace his glasses. The principal called us and said tomorrow at school she will call Kaylee into the office and talk to her, and she will talk to her teacher about it. She has been written up and she has to sit in the front of the bus now. Isn't this a little extreme? I can't believe this all for one incident like she is labeled as a bad child now. HELP?

[Mandy0079]

This sounds like ODD to me...  I have a BiPolar/ ADHD child.  

[Rozanna]

I’m glad to hear Kaylee is doing better.  See the whole reward chart never worked for
Micah, but I’m glad its working for you’ all. Good luck and I wish you and your daughter all the best.. Rozanna

[mindersmomof2]

Kaylee is still off all med. I have been so though with her now for a month. Time out on the bottom step for sassing, spitting, hitting, being mean to her sister, fighting with kids outside, and anything else she know is wrong. I make her sit for 5 minuets of quite time. She can go for a half hour of this but she knows she has to sit until 5 minuets of quietness.  I have been doing a reward system too. When she does something nice she gets a fake flower in her flower pot that I let her decorate herself. When she reaches 8, she gets to pick a prize out of a bowl. Which is: picking out a movie, staying up an extra 1/2 hour, outside time, just me and her go somewhere alone, go to the play land at the mall and play, and going to the park and play. It has gave her an incentive to be good. I constantly make a big deal when she is being good "Oh Kaylee, I'm so proud of you! Your playing so nice" It seems to be working but she is something else still!  I still swear something is wrong. Some days I lock myself in our laundry room and cry! It is so hard.