We had a relatively good week last week, in spite of our rough start. Things steadily improved Tuesday - Thursday. But by Thursday afternoon, she was starting to break through the medicine again. She told her therapist that she wasn't going to talk about whether her brain was racing because then the therapist would be helping her and she doesn't need help! That's grandiose thinking for you. She has been on edge, but able to control herself from late Thursday afternoon until this afternoon. Then she lost it again and was threatening suicide. In a way, this turned into a positive thing (if your child threatening to kill themselves can ever be positive???). At one point during her meltdown, I asked her if she really meant what she was saying about wanting to die. She told me that yes, she did, so I was able to broach the subject of going to the hospital to get her some extra help. After the "storm" was over I was able to talk with her a little bit more and try to prepare her for the fact that this might become a reality in the near future. Hopefully she got the message that we are not mad at her and if we take her to the hospital it isn't because we don't love her. Instead if we have to admit her to the hospital it is because we do love her and want to protect her in the best way we know how. I don't know how much of that sinks in at this point in time, but at least if it does happen, she won't be completely blindsided by it.
I am not sure if that is what the doctor meant when she told me that our tolerance for this is too high? Should we have loaded her into the car and headed straight to the ER when she started talking about wanting to die? It is so hard to tell, because right now the storm is over and she is back to being relatively happy. Of course we will continue to watch her carefully tonight and see what happens.
Some possible good news on the lab work end of things... there is a therapist that can possibly help her work through the issues that she has with this. Unfortunately, he is in Atlanta and we will have to go once a week for probably 3 months or more to get her to the point where she is able to tolerate it. It will be well worth it in the long run, but will be challenging to say the least to try and fit that into the already hectic pace of life. Since it is going to take so long to work through these issues, I am assuming that we will need to have the dentist do the conscience sedation for the time being and hopefully that will also help her realize that it isn't as big a deal as her mind has made it into.
So, I guess for now, you could say that we are still in a holding pattern for the upcoming week. We have a doctor's appointment on Tuesday, which will hopefully go well. I am so thankful for friends and family and their words of encouragement to us. You all are blessing us in so many ways. I am continuing to pray for peace and stability for Mary, but trying to remember that His plans are best, no matter what the circumstances look like from our point of view.
I'm just starting to read your blog. A lot of it so far rings true for us too.
ReplyDeleteThis really resonated with me:
"Should we have loaded her into the car and headed straight to the ER when she started talking about wanting to die? It is so hard to tell, because right now the storm is over and she is back to being relatively happy."
It would be so much easier if perhaps a psychiatrist lived with us for a few days and saw the cycles and could make that decision.
Off to keep reading!
Kelly -- I am so glad to find a mother blogging about her child's mental illness from a christian perspective. Your faith wrapped up in each post brings me comfort as those are my prayers for my daughter, too. We don't have a diagnosis yet. Our psychologist and I talked about the possibility of bipolar disorder today, though. My sister is bipolar and it just breaks my heart to think about my daughter having to go through the pain my sister has. I will be visiting your blog often as we move toward a diagnosis and treatment (if necessary). Thank you for sharing you story. I will pray for your daughter and family.
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