Hanging on, thank you for replying.
Yes, I am upset. No, parents do NOT always know when their child is in danger. MANY people trust a doctor, I can think of several people on this board who very recently have said their doctors or professionals had things under control when others on this board questioned things such as medications, medication combinations and doses. Timerlady, you say this often.... I can, off the top of my head, think of 2 people on this very board who had children with dangerous medication levels this very week, here on this board, and the parents did not realize it. Hangining On, On call.I think you have been in those scary shoes before. I can think of many people in the time I have been coming here who had children they thought were ill in another form and later found out it was related to the medications.
I can also think of so many instances where people here complained the school or the doctor had a different version of something than the parent or child had. How often are the school notes different than what your recollection was?
When I said check your records, I did not mean check to see if you lost pills etc. I meant comb thru them carefully and see if they accurately and honestly portray the things you said to doctor, the things the records say the doctor did or did not do, the way the docs portray YOU in the records. Sometimes (plese notice I did NOT say "always") Sometimes the docs notes etc come out sounding VERY different than your memory will describe something.
Janna, MidwestMom, you guys both KNOW this happens, you have both been there done that.
Many of you have had kids get worse before they get better. Many of you have complained to docs your kids seems worse....and many of you have had a doctor say by phone "up the dose" - and I bet very often your Rx bottle does not reflect the docs verbal, by phone, change in dose.
I cannot even begin to count how many here have said "our family deserves a better life" we deserve less chaos, my kid won't go to bed at nite. My difficult child is driving us nuts.
If you go to some websites they advocate early intervention. Many push to get young kids diagnosis'ed becuz they say treatment is more effective if begun sooner rather than later. I bet if I go to the early childhood forum, I will find some threads where that has been said.
How many of you out there HAVE a history of older sibs or parents or aunts/uncles of your difficult children with a diagnosis of BiPolar (BP)? and then your youngest child shows signs and you get upset if the doctor dismisses the idea or wants to wait and see?
I know this story is a lot of he said-she said. and of course who do you think is going to prevail? The parents on disability, low income----------I can tell you right now, there is a huge stigma against parents on disability. I am disabled as is my husband........and I face that daily. It does not matter my husband was at one time highly intelligent, a US Marine for 11 years and in Nam 9 of those years......and then a top notch systems analyst for several years in the 80s. It does not matter I have a Realtors license, cosmetologist license, and I am a nurse. Noone wants to understand how the combat and agent orange really affected my husband or how my illness ate my bones and connective tissue. All people see is we are on disability, we are scum. We are seen as lazy. Nevermind in my scooter I go and lobby at state and federal level for better laws etc for military veterans and mentally handicapped kids. People see us not working and they automatically jump to negative conclusions and opinions. Those parents have no credibility from the start. The doctor has credibility simply becuz he is a doctor. Well, as a nurse, I can tell you there are less than perfect docs. Docs DO make mistakes. I can also tell you charts are often erroneous, or not kept properly. ANd sometimes they are so far from the truth it is not funny.
The media is also not always telling the truth, sometimes they do not KNOW the truth. SOmetimes they know the truth but they have their own ideas how they want things to be portrayed. I know a reporter sought me out to do an article on disabled kids and school, and asked me questions. WHen the story hit the paper, the things they quoted me as saying were not at ALL what I said. My husband and I were on TV at a funeral for a KIA young man locally....they interviewed us on camera. Later when we watched the footage, they had dubbed in different questions and then showed our answers. They did NOT show the questions they REALLY asked us. It changed what the whole story was about.
I have been in court a LOT recently. My difficult child was a victim and also star witness and the case dragged out almost 2 years. Every month I had to show up with her. we sat in court and watched countless cases go before the judge. Then add in that me and husband were victims of extreme vandalism.and we sat in court once a month for that case for a year, and then my easy child was a victim and for many months we have been sitting in court for THAT case as well. I can tell you that what gets said in court does not always match up with what the "real" story is. Things get left out, twisted, get a spin put on them..........
Yes, I am upset. People here were very quick to hang these parents with just the story that was in the paper. I can easily bet many people here who come tell us events related to their families would sound quite different in the media.
I have no idea if these parents were malicious or not. I was not there. My heart is very heavy with extreme sorrow and sadness that this little girl died. Obviously "the system" failed her. Many many of you have been in THOSE shoes, I know you have, you have typed those very words.
Maybe the parents were malicious and monsters. Maybe they were not very smart or bright and needed more help. But it scared me to read how quick some here are to judge those parents. Yet I read you support each other here all the time thru all kinds of situations, many of them that sound very similar to what it sounds like that family went thru.
If that mom had come here and posted, I can picture her saying my 4 yr old will not go to bed at nite. SHe is loud and hyperactive, argumentative...........I can imagine her saying my child is on these medications.......and I can imagine people telling her call psychiatrist, and her coming back and saying psychiatrist said I could give 1/2 more tablet of clonidine at bedtime. I can imagine many here saying detach...........ignore her..........if it is bedtime, close the door or whatever.
A lot of you have been in the shoes of being judged and criticized, accused of medicating your child for your own convenience. You know how difficult it is to have a difficult child.
So, thats why I am upset. I really have no way of knowing if this mom and dad are monsters or not, but must we be so quick to judge, so quick to point our finger?
Sure some here say they had to fight to get the medications for their kids, I understand that, been there done that.my oldest difficult child was a difficult child back when my local psychiatrists steadfastly outright refused to diagnosis a child with BiPolar (BP). I also have my son who has NO symptoms of anything difficult child at all, yet...........becuz of his cp and seizures, our WRAP and SASS people tried to convince our psychiatrist he was a difficult child..........and I had to fight to keep him OFF difficult child medications.
It takes warrior moms to parent these kids. It takes a lot of help and support. It often calls for us parents to research and study and learn so much..........but you know? some people do not have the abilities. Maybe they cannot afford computers to go online. Maybe they do not have a family support network, maybe the proper services did not fall into place for them or for their child. Maybe those parents did not have the IQ or cognitive ability. Maybe they did not have the financial means. Maybe they did not have a social network.
Sure, maybe they ARE monsters, but- we cannot just jump to that conclusion with the info in the article posted in this thread.
It makes me sad and scared to see how quick some of you were to jump to conclusions and be the judge and jury for these parents. Seems to me but for the grace of god go any of us here.
Yes a tragedy has occured. Yes these medications need to be used with extreme caution, and yes, bad things CAN happen. Even when you are careful.
If these parents did wrong, and did wrong with malicious intent, yes, I hope they fry. BUT if this was an accident due to ignorance or poor record keeping or whatever else...........man, my heart breaks into zillions of peices for these parents and the other children.
Hug your child today. Learn about the medications, the diagnosis, etc. Help prevent this from happening again, maybe to you.
ANd remember, all human beings are simply human beings and none of us are perfect. Children aren't, parents aren't, docs aren't...............and the systems aren't perfect either.
-covering professionals. The parents are the weakest link and will be sacrificed to appease the public. 
