http://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/15/us/15b...nd&emc=rss
AS wasn't involved here, but I just thought y'all would like to know about this one. Basically, a little girl got dx'ed while incredibly young and the parents turned to pills, and look what happened. Though AS wasn't mentioned, it could be a sign of things to come as people continue to think pills will do everything, even raise their kids for them.
Ask me about the forum where I found that article.
Three drugs is a bit extreme. The child looking 'sleepy and druggy' should have been a huge "oh no" flag right there. Nah, the parents just went with what some stupid quak said anyway. 'sigh'
4 year old children are SUPPOSED TO BE hyperactive and psychotic....
"our child doesn't act the way we want it to. PUMP IT FULL OF CHEMICALS TO MAKE IT OBEY!!"
4 year old children are SUPPOSED TO BE hyperactive and psychotic....
"our child doesn't act the way we want it to. PUMP IT FULL OF CHEMICALS TO MAKE IT OBEY!!"
I hate the fact that there are some parents that think that way.
Some people just aren't fit to be parents and some others who are struggling get the wrong kinds of "help". It's a shame somebody couldn't have told them it is normal for four year olds to be very active, asking lots of questions and getting into everything.
Three drugs? For a two year old? I can understand one; but that is just too much. I took that exact same combination; and I--as an adult taking small doses--was constantly tired. I can't imagine what effect it would have on a 2-4-year-old child.
Additionally, if they were medicating, why weren't they doing something about the ADHD first? ADHD hyperactivity can easily make bipolar manias worse; and if they'd worried about the ADHD first, they would've understood to a better degree exactly how bad her bipolar was.
When a child "looks drugged", that is a problem because it interferes with learning during a formative period in the child's life. It can in fact permanently lower IQ, among other things. The drugs were probably doing as much damage as untreated bipolar/ADHD would have done.
Bipolar disorder does have to be medicated. Both depression and mania are dangerous, and both will interfere with learning and personality development. But to medicate to the point that the child is unable to think straight just defeats the purpose you had in medicating to begin with.
Drugs are not a panacea, and this psychologist should have understood that.
Additionally, parents who murder children should automatically receive the death penalty. Just sayin'.
It's probably possible; but it's got to be really hard to distinguish between that and normal two-year-old ups and downs. There's no way you can correctly diagnose it until the kid is older and you've had a chance to interview him. A two-year-old can't talk about feelings the way an eight-year-old can, and subjective feelings of elation or despair are so diagnostic when it comes to bipolar that I really think you can't determine whether it's bipolar or something else until the child is old enough to articulate what s/he is feeling.
I can see ADHD in a two-year-old; but not bipolar.
*facedesk* Stupid people need to be sterilized. How could any human being put a child that age on those medications?
And this case will probably become a banner for the all-medications-are-evil crowd. Grr, things are not that black and white.
<frustrated hugs>
Athie
I seriously doubt such a young child could have bipolar disorder. ADD or ADHD yes, but not bipolar.
I just thought I'd mention that the site through which I found this article is what's known as a "shock site". (Kind of like
News of the Weird but much more bizarre.) It has a link to the article and then a forum for users to discuss it, but after that all similarity ends. It is NASTY. So nasty, even some of the usernames are dirty. It is NOT for anyone who is easily offended or easily grossed-out. It's one of my favorite sites, and I'm NOT as nice there as I am here.
I'm reluctant to post a link to it because there are kids here and I don't want them following it. I'd rather let a moderator here tell me whether or not it's appropriate. The only reason I mention this is that sometimes that site has links to autism-related articles (e.g. the guy in the UK who got pushed down an escalator, and the kid who wandered away from a picnic and was later found climbing up the side of a storage tank), and when that happens, there is usually at least one reference to Asperger's. Since it's a nasty shock site, you can imagine what kinds of things are said there. Its users insult and belittle each other all the time, and try to see who can be the most shocking. I think it would be good if at least a few people from here (adults, please) got familiar with that site so that next time they have an autism thread and somebody says something bad about AS, that user will get a nice little response, or even several nice little responses.
At the very least, it's good for finding articles and then (as I did with this one about the OD'ed four-year-old) posting a link here to the same article here, so that there can be a separate, clean discussion here.
I knew that mind-altering drugs were a bad idea.
I also call BS on the bipolar issue, as that doesn't show up until adolescence at the earliest. Even then, some people shouldn't have children, especially if they're going to drug them to keep them quiet. I just hope that one or both of them get sterilized.
LOL, it's more like "get rid of the parents".
Seriously, people shouldn't have kids until they know what they're getting into. Not that you can actually enforce that, but hey, I can dream.
Recently, I heard of parents killing their very young child by putting her on sedation medication. It was an OD.
"Rebecca's uncle, James McGonnell, and his girlfriend, Kelly Williams, who lived with the Rileys, told police that the Rileys would put their kids to bed as early as 5 p.m. Rebecca, they said, often slept through the day and got up only to eat."
That has got to be one of the most disturbing paragraphs right there. If this unkle knew anything about anti-child development abuse was going on the whole time, he is a coward and an accomplice because he has done nothing to stop it has he?
The state
jail might have felt better than home to the kids, if they weren't alowed to ever laugh, cry, or play. Sad.. I hope the children are getting proper care somewhere.