Is it possible that my 8 year old could have bipolar

[hell1971]

Hi My 8 year old girl has always been a difficult child since birth, until she was three we were told she had milk and soya intolerance, she used to cry for hours and clench her tummy, her mood seem to run in cycles, good one week, terrible the next, eventually at three when her tantrums were hours long and she constantly complained of tummy ache neck ache shoulder ache and she got very upset and scared all the time she was diagnosed with sensory issues with an GAD anxiety disorder, yes she suffers from anxiety but only when she is going through a bad period, now 8 and still we have periods of very low mood she complains of symptomatic complaints, withdraws from friends, doesnt want to go to school ect.. then she can cope better and starts doing normal kid stuff but is still very contrary, one minute happy next having a 1-3 hour meltdown, she is irritable, tired and very aggressive to her siblings. During her really bad times since she was five she has expressed that she wants to die and says she wants to kill herself, She is being assessed again and they have said its not typical behaviour for anxiety, she is having an eeg. She is an A student and she has very little problems at school ect.. sadness and not wanting to join in but thats all. we have been reassured that they are going to investigate everything this time as like us they feel it has gone on too long. We have three other children who do not suffer like her. As parents we find it hard to understand and manage her whilst ensuring the other children dont become overwhelmed by the situation, we have been told that they will also do some work with the younger sibling as she is most effected, they have put it to a board and have said they have further assesments to do. I think she is baffling them also, when they do an assesment they expect her to respond in a certain way and she doesnt do what they expect so they arnt saying much at this point and I feel helpless. I feel that she has waited long enough to grow out of it and I am concerned what impact this will have on her long term. She is a very lovable child with an outstanding forward thinking intelligence, I think sometimes this is some of the problem, she doesnt have the emotional maturity to cope with her thoughts, she describes her worries as heaps of moving bugs in her head and she knows what some of them are but not all of them, she also has hullucinations when she is really overwhelmed but we are unsure if these are a coping/justifying method for behaviour or she really does think she sees scarey people. Does anyone have any possible theories as I have looked at all childhood disorders and no one fits. Thank you

[jeternut]

I am reading your story and feel like I am reading about my son. He is going to be turning 9 next week. He has been diagnosed with bipolar disorder. When he was two I started noticing things about him that just didn't seem right but everyone kept saying that it was the terrible two's. He would bang his head on the floor, window, hit himself, bite himself, attack me, and his brother when he was born. He would be fine one minute and then explode for what seemed like forever. He was kicked out of preschool and I have had him in many different programs. Unfortunetly he also had to deal with me being in and out of the hospital because i also have Adhesion Related Disorder so my organs constantly get stuck together. I have just had my 11th surgery in June.
My husband and I (now ex husband) finally agreed to put him on medication. That was a process in finding the right one. It took me having to admit him to the hospital because at the time he was going after me and my younger son. He would talk alot about wanting to die and would even try and lay down in parking lots. He put his hand through glass windows and toward the end I would have to lock myself in the bathroom so he would not attack me and my younger son.
He is now on abilify and I have to say he is doing very well. I do have some issues with him but he is sooooooooooo much better.
I myself have just been diagnosed with Bipolar II about 2 months ago and am trying to deal with that as well. It has been a struggle but I am not giving up.

[hell1971]

Thank you I will, I also found the "explosive child" to be a great book and it turned my thinking completley around, it covers all kids with OCD to ADHD ect..
It makes you understand they are not doing it on purpose, once I accepted that, things got heaps better.

[therese83]

I know it is hard, but it sounds she is with the right family and you are trying a lot to help her.


The book

"transforming the difficult child, the nurtured heart approach"  By Howard Glasser

Google it - there is a website. I've forgotten the details, things have got so good.

It helped to turn things around for us.

[hell1971]

Thanks for that, throw anything out there I will look at anything to find an answer..

Your BP must be quite disabling for you to say that if you had known, when I found out I was pregnant with my forth child I decided I would have all the test because I was finding my now 8 yr old so hard and I could not imagine how I would cope if anything was wrong with the next one so I can sort of understand, obviously now even though they have been the hardest years of my life I wouldnt change anything and what ever they say is the problem I am sort of prepared I just find it really hard when she is so depressed and sad and says stuff like ' why am I so different from everyone else, I wish I wasnt me, I want to die, will you always love me, why do you love me' , thats the pain I would really like to take away from her

[shortcircuited]

Hopefully you will be able to narrow things down a bit.  Seizure meds are often used for bipolar disorder, so if she has a combination of things, maybe you will get lucky not to need a million different medications.

I'm just throwing this out there, but you don't think she might have chemical sensitivities, do you?  Cleaning products, etc.?

Bipolar in children is often violent and aggressive, not as easy to diagnose as in adults, not that it's always easy--often it's misdiagnosed in general.  Every bipolar child I've known has been quite different from the other children with it and the typical adult with it.  That being said, some people want to make bipolar disorder an umbrella diagnosis, so keep educating yourself--you know your child better than anyone else.  

I'm sorry this is painful for you.  I know what it is like as a mom with a little one who can't tell you what the problem is when ill.  Also, I look at my kids now as they get older for signs of bipolar.  If I'd known I was prone to bipolar, I would never have had biological children for fear of increasing the chance of my children developing it.

Best of luck.

[hell1971]

Thanks for responding

Yes we have been told many years ago around 4years old when she was diagnosed with Generalised Anxiety Disorder that she has some Autistic tendancies, some OCD tendancies, they explained mental disorders as a big umbrella and that she may display some behaviours seen in some disorders but that doesnt mean she has them, she saw an occupational therapist at this time to be evaluated for Sensory Intergrated Dysfunction, this is also common with Autistic children and they concluded although she has some sensory issues they should be treated as tendancies only and that Autism or SID was not the issue and GAD anxiety fitted better, obviously now they have changed and dont think GAD is correct and think the sensory issues and anxiety are mear symptoms of something else, but what they are not saying. They are doing an EEG to discount epilepsy all though I think this is a long shot as I am sure the amount of times she has seen specialists that someone would have picked up on that by now. We are just sitting and waiting for them to exhaust all avenues and then hopefully come up with a conclusion, all I know is that they seem a little concerned and the pressure has definatley gone up, they want to come to the house but the phsycologist wants the phsyciatrist to come also, Im not sure what they think they are going to find but I guess they just want to check us out at home and see her enviroment is not a factor. The phsyciatrist has said he has several things he thinks it could be, he wants to discount and doesnt think its fair to discuss them with us until he has done all the assesments, they also put it to a board of specialists and all we were told after that is they have a few more assesments to do, as I have said before she then responds in a different way to the way they expect and I think they are a little stumped. I have to have hope that they will find the reason as she can not carry on like this, it cant be good for anyone to have these rapid changing emotions and abilities let alone a little girl, honestly I would say over half her time is full of negative feelings in some form and as a parent I just hate seeing her like it.