I have exhausted all of the options, last night in cries of despair, the dreaded words that I hadnt heard in nearly a year, "I want to kill myself, just kill me please, please kill me", his dx adhd, with bipolar traits since you cant dx a 7 yr old as bipolar, but considering he has(d)2 parents with bipolar odds stand pretty well that he too has this dreaded disease, his dr really wants him on the Lithium as his moods and behaior are completely unstable, hes hypersexual, rageful, anxious, fits of tears and panic non stop movement, getting in trouble in school, ... and know as I type hes starting to have a fit so I must sign off...encouragement...advice on blood draws, I cant beleieve this is happening.
zacks mom
3 comments:
So sorry you're going through this. With the right meds, his life is going to improve drastically! Rages like the ones you are seeing will become extremely rare along with the desire to kill himself.
I know the needles are a problem, we have the same situation with our son, he even beat up my husband and kicked his Dad's head while Dad drove the car on the way to the blood draws. So we revamped how we did blood draws. Since I am on my way out the door, I don't have time to write the entire thing here, but here is a link to a post I made about out blood draw changes.
http://mysonhas2brains.blogspot.com/2010/09/surviving-blood-needles.html
I will also add that once my son started Lithium, he wasn't as intense and this helped with the blood draws too. After having a few blood draws with the Ativan (which we didn't like because of the mood changes as it wore off) we were able to stop using the Ativan altogether because my son now had experience that blood draws were not as bad as he thought them to be.
For someone that had to be dragged into the hospital and held down for blood work, he now walks in smiling, sits perfect for the doctor and earns $5 at the end. We have overcome his fears of the blood draw as long as all the rituals are in place: ELMA cream to numb the arm, relaxing music on headphones, mom gives a hand massage on the opposite hand during the blood draw and a reward at the end. The more we do this, the better he gets, now he is more excited about the $5 and gets excited to hear he has another blood draw. Believe me, this is no lie, he has completely changed thanks to these therapeutic steps as well as the Lithium helping his moods overall.
Blood draws ... I mentioned it to my husband a few days before it had to be done and my son heard.... oh the screaming and crying began. Its always hard.
We bribe with a mcdonalds breakfast. That helpds.
As for the actual drawing of the blood... We go to the lab and take along a few of his comfort toys his horse and douberman stuffed animals that are half my sons size. I two massage his arm and he using deep breathing techniques he learned while inpatient treatment. And as he does the deep breathing i use a relaxation technique where you talk about a relaxing place...we imagine hes at the beach on a warm sunny day. It has worked for us. It really does get better we are finally getting there but I was so resistant to it.
Tara: I wish I had some answers with the meds. I know he has been on a few with some pretty drastic side effects. I know you just want your son back but Zach is wise beyond his years. He's been through so much and he remembers a lot of what happened even at young ages. He was even skeptic at the funeral of things. He seemed to clue into they aren't saying everything. Some kids are like this. I think and only my ba psych opinion that a combo of an excellent child psych and therapist combo will help Zach work through things and structure, love , and patiance on the home front will help.
Blood draws: Let him feel in control of what is happening to his body. If you have to get lab work done do it the same time as him. Discuss before you go the steps that will occur. I would say if you want you can lay back in the chair or sit with mom right next to you holding your hand. Tell him that he can ask that they use a butterfly needle which they use anyways for kids. Our lab has those stress balls to squeeze. Walk him through the steps before you go and give him some choice. I actually saw two kids 4,6 that were going to get blood drawn after me and invited them in to show how it was going to be done. I talked the 4 year old through what they were doing to me. The lab people later told me they wished I'd stayed to help out. Afterwards take him out for a treat. Our lab always has bags with apple juice and granola bar for all the fasting peeps. I used to take them to feed to hungry students after school while tutoring. Good luck.
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