The Accidental Advocate has an excellent post called Lessons of an Accidental Advocate. You really should read it. My favorite new phrase that I'm working on memorizing is, "It's not your fault. It's your challenge." Whenever I call Kitty's name she says, "What'd I do." When I tell her I need her to clean up a mess she made, or go back and do a chore correctly, or sometimes she just randomly assumes I'm upset with her, I get, "It's not my fault" or almost as often, "It's your fault (or Grandma's fault or Ponito's fault or whoever)."
We watched the movie Cool Runnings again the other day, which is based on a true story about the first Jamaican bobsled team. When the coach is asked why he cheated (and had his gold medals taken away) after already winning 2 gold medals, he said, "A gold medal is a wonderful thing. But if you're not enough without it, you're not enough with it."
The Land of the Loo Loos had a post about Abilify, and I learned it can cause an increase in appetite aka "the munchies." This is our "miracle drug" for Kitty, who is 5'5" and over 180lbs. Most of (but not all) of her weight is in her belly and breasts. This means she pretty much looks 7-8 months pregnant - all the time. She hates the 20 minutes of aerobics we do a day, but if you try to restrict her eating in any way she has a meltdown. One of the big triggers for last week's meltdown was definitely the fact that she had to fast that morning. Of course food is a big issue for Bear too and he's not on Abilify (although he is on Seroquel which has similar appetite effects). Today for lunch he had 6 sausages on buns!! And when Grandma and I commented, his response after snapping that it was what he wanted to eat and he didn't care if it was healthy, was to mumble, "well I offered it to everyone else and no one wanted it so I'm going to eat it." Honestly I let out a big sigh and ignored it. I like my head attached to my shoulders and am tired of it getting bitten off.
The Bipolar Child Newsletter - In Honor of Mothers and Fathers of Bipolar Children - This accurately describes most of what goes on in our home. It was like they were sitting in my house except since starting on meds, my kids rarely act out in public, and we've been very lucky that they are not hyper-sexualized (at least not that we're aware of).
4 comments:
Princess is on a very small dose of Abilify. She's not bipolar, but the psych recommended it to help with some of her behaviors. He warned us about the food thing, and it was definitely noticeable. We're pretty restrictive about when/where/what eating happens, but ours are younger. Complex carbs and protein help. When I added the option of a piece of fruit between every meal, it helped with *some* of her panic about food, but she still hovers during every food prep to make sure she is first and gets the biggest (or at least gets fed and doesn't get the smallest because I've done that sooooo many times. Or never). But even still, she's a "normal" weight, but just barely. I'll probably always have to keep a close eye.
The not my fault say has been a big part of my life this week to after reading the same post..... we have big food issues in our house to... they are due to food being with held from my step children in their early life.... but its not our fault its our challenge .... Im sticking with this and saying day in day out....
thanks for the links. I am just catching up on my reading as things have been so busy here! I hear you on the allergy issue too and I didi not know that about the meds, good to know thought.
When I was in rehab they gave us all a low dose of seroquel to help sleep (it was well below the threshold of treating bipolar, etc) because they couldn't take the chance of giving us something we could abuse. I stayed on it for about 2 years afterward and I gained a lot of weight. I finally had to switch to 5mg sinequan instead because it was affecting my health so poorly. It makes me frustrated to see that they recently came out with an extended release seroquel because I know it's so damaging to people as far as weight gain and cholesterol.
I have to say though, the low doses are excellent for sleep and I'm not worried about using it recreationally or becoming dependent.
Also, as I'm sure you understand, you shouldn't let another person's bad experience with a drug affect your decision to use said drug. Each of us is different and what doesn't help one of us could be a miracle for another.
(sorry that was so long)
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