atwittsend

New Member
i need help here i have a 5 1/2 year old and she is out of control, a dr has dignosed her with P.T.S.D. i think she is more A.D.H.D. and O.D.D. but the doctors wont listen to me. she is out of control at home she yells, screams, kicks, hits the whole 9 yards. i really am at the point where i dont know what to do any more shes seen 3 different counselors and none have seemed to help at all. the dr said "no, I don't think shes O.D.D." but it runs in our family and so does A.D.H.D./A.D.D. the doctors just refuse to listen to me. her pediatrician had at one point put her on clondine for sleeping issues but i took her off about 2 months ago after her toncles and adenoids surgery and shes sleeping a lot better with the aide of melatonin 5mg. at night.
 

buddy

New Member
My son needs the clonidine for control over rages. Is she worse since off the clonidine? Maybe she needs tiny amounts during the day?
Anyway, LOL, doing this backwards ....hello! Wanted to say sorry this is so hard...finding a diagnosis should not be so tough. Have you tried what I'm going to start calling the holy trinity of evaluations lately ...haha.....a neuropsychology evaluation. and an Occupational Therapist (OT) and Speech Language Pathologist (SLP)/auditory processing evaluation? The neuropsychologist looks more broadly at all issues ..mental health,neuro , life circumstances, etc.... Their job is to look at our brain (and any possible history that can affect it ) and behaviors, skills, etc....and see how they are connected. It is a long evaluation and usually very helpful. It can take a long time to get in and while waiting you often can get an Occupational Therapist (OT) evaluation to look for subtle sources of her upsets like motor planning problems, sensory integration problems etc. Also get a speech -lang evaluation to check for language or auditory processing problems. Speech Language Pathologist (SLP) may refer to an Audiologist who specializes in hidden hearing problems where people can hear sounds fine but the brain does not understand what it hears. This can happen with vision too and the Occupational Therapist (OT) can help sort out if thats an issue.
If you've already done that ....????

Have you had any school evaluations? Early childhood evaluations are free and in some areas offer amazing services. It's legally required to be available everywhere ....but obviously some school districts do better than others.

I'm on my phone so can't remember if you're a new member so if you are not new and I've said this before I'm sorry ...(blusing ).

One thing I can say for sure though. You are not alone. I for one know how hard it is to live with that. And how awful it is to see your child not be able to have a happy carefree childhood. Hugs ...
 

keista

New Member
Welcome!

Personally, I LOVE your psychiatrist for not dxing ODD. I'm sure she fits the criteria to a T. Thing is, the criteria require you to rule out other stuff first, and if other stuff (bipolar, Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD), ect) ins NOT ruled out, well, guess what these disorders can cause? ODD-like symptoms. in my opinion and experience, true ODD is VERY RARE. Those symptoms are usually caused by something else.

While PTSD is entirely possible in a 5 1/2, I always find this odd as a primary diagnosis for a young child. Since you don't agree with it, I'm guessing she hasn't experienced any serious trauma, or has she?

I like Buddy's "holy trinity of evaluations". neuropsychologist is the hardest evaluation to find/get and to get covered by insurance. A psychologist who specializes in evaluations may be your next best bet. DD1 had her's done by a woman who usually does does the evaluations for school districts.

Why stop the clonodine? In addition to sleep issues, it's used for ADHD. Did it not help for the symptoms you see in her?
 

atwittsend

New Member
Welcome!

Personally, I LOVE your psychiatrist for not dxing ODD. I'm sure she fits the criteria to a T. Thing is, the criteria require you to rule out other stuff first, and if other stuff (bipolar, Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD), ect) ins NOT ruled out, well, guess what these disorders can cause? ODD-like symptoms. in my opinion and experience, true ODD is VERY RARE. Those symptoms are usually caused by something else.

While PTSD is entirely possible in a 5 1/2, I always find this odd as a primary diagnosis for a young child. Since you don't agree with it, I'm guessing she hasn't experienced any serious trauma, or has she?

I like Buddy's "holy trinity of evaluations". neuropsychologist is the hardest evaluation to find/get and to get covered by insurance. A psychologist who specializes in evaluations may be your next best bet. DD1 had her's done by a woman who usually does does the evaluations for school districts.

Why stop the clonodine? In addition to sleep issues, it's used for ADHD. Did it not help for the symptoms you see in her?

well ODD runs in the family my sister was diagnosed with it when she was 15 and is now 29. my mom sees everything but only worse in my 5 year old daughter that she went thru with my sister. Bipolar does run in the family along with a little bit of autism. a physicist diagnosed her with the P.T.S.D. while it was still a doctor it was through video conference due to the fact that i live in a small town and the closest child physicist is about 3 hrs. away. when she was 2 1/2-3 she was being sexually molested without my knowledge, by my other daughters father i had left him and left state due to safety reason for me and my daughters lives when i had found out i was 2 weeks away from having my now 2 year old. i had called the abuse hotline and they didn't do nothing then the reoccurring night mares returned i have realized this happens when there is any life changing events (grandma and uncle coming to live with us, school starting, exc.) then her 2nd counselor called the hotline and they came out only to order a "safe exam/interview" to come back saying yes he did do it but cause of her age we cant do nothing about it. i stoped the clondine for 2 reason after her being on it her body became immune to the medication even with the doctors uping the dosage on it went from .01-.02 at .01 shed wake up in middle of night was losing sleep causing her to miss school (head start/pre-school) when she was taking the .02 she began sleep walking and still would wake up come to find out due to her toncles and adenoids she was losing oxygen while she was sleeping causing her to wake up in middle of night, after the surgery she is sleeping fine with a lil help from melatonin when needed. the clondine also effected her blood pressure if given in morning or middle of the day shed have no energy at all and looked pale.
 

atwittsend

New Member
My son needs the clonidine for control over rages. Is she worse since off the clonidine? Maybe she needs tiny amounts during the day?
Anyway, LOL, doing this backwards ....hello! Wanted to say sorry this is so hard...finding a diagnosis should not be so tough. Have you tried what I'm going to start calling the holy trinity of evaluations lately ...haha.....a neuropsychology evaluation. and an Occupational Therapist (OT) and Speech Language Pathologist (SLP)/auditory processing evaluation? The neuropsychologist looks more broadly at all issues ..mental health,neuro , life circumstances, etc.... Their job is to look at our brain (and any possible history that can affect it ) and behaviors, skills, etc....and see how they are connected. It is a long evaluation and usually very helpful. It can take a long time to get in and while waiting you often can get an Occupational Therapist (OT) evaluation to look for subtle sources of her upsets like motor planning problems, sensory integration problems etc. Also get a speech -lang evaluation to check for language or auditory processing problems. Speech Language Pathologist (SLP) may refer to an Audiologist who specializes in hidden hearing problems where people can hear sounds fine but the brain does not understand what it hears. This can happen with vision too and the Occupational Therapist (OT) can help sort out if thats an issue.
If you've already done that ....????

Have you had any school evaluations? Early childhood evaluations are free and in some areas offer amazing services. It's legally required to be available everywhere ....but obviously some school districts do better than others.

I'm on my phone so can't remember if you're a new member so if you are not new and I've said this before I'm sorry ...(blusing ).

One thing I can say for sure though. You are not alone. I for one know how hard it is to live with that. And how awful it is to see your child not be able to have a happy carefree childhood. Hugs ...

yes i am new i joined last night lol, the clondine was only prescribed to her for sleep issues nothing else,while she is 5 1/2 she has not had any school evulations she starts kindergarten on aug. 16 this year, she is a very smart child and knows how to push all the right buttons to get her own way. the school said they can tell just from her registration that shes A.D.H.D. and to try to get her dignosed and put on some kind of medication to help her in school next year. i am wanting to go the natural herb way if she does need any medication, not only for her but for myself as well ( i am bipolar manic depression, have crying spells, severe depression, anxiety attacks, sleeplessness, racing mind. just got on disability after fighting 3 years. its not easy by far for me to handle her fits when I'm having a episode of my own).
 

DammitJanet

Well-Known Member
woah...slow the train down! Welcome to the board by the way and I am so sorry you had to find us.

If your darling little girl was molested at that young age then it is entirely likely she is suffering from PTSD and not ODD. Your family history and genetic tree may give her the genes to inherit bipolar or ADHD but that doesnt mean that she has it right now. The school cannot tell you that she obviously has it and that you have to go get it diagnosed and have her put on medication. That is patently illegal. They can offer to evaluate her for an IEP for special education but they are not doctors and cannot diagnose. Special Education has nothing to do with being smart. Gifted students are also in Special Education.

I get the feeling you live in a small town if you have to teleconference to a psychiatrist. Is there anyway you can call and get put on the list to have your daughter seen at a Children's hospital in a bigger city and then just go there for one or two days and see if you could stay at a Ronald McDonald house? Or even manage to pull the money for a motel out of the budget somehow. If you could get a good working diagnosis for her right now then maybe whoever is handling her care now could continue with that information.

Also if nothing else, do you have access to somewhere that offers some sort of play therapy for a child that young? Normal therapy doesnt work well in my experience. Play therapy can get through to them better. I do believe PTSD could cause many of the same issues you are seeing because I have also dealt with that for years and I was abused at around 3/4. Kids that age act out with anger, inattention and all sorts of ways because they have no other ways of being able to voice what happened.
 
T

TeDo

Guest
Amen Janet. That has been my experience with difficult child 1 as well. The molestation could explain a lot as well as the possibility of bipolar, ADHD, Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD), and general anxiety. difficult child 1 also suffered greatly at the hands of the school (he's an A honor roll student) because he was initially given an ODD diagnosis and the "answer" to that was to "show them who's boss" to a kid that already knows that.
 
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Liahona

Guest
Welcome. Congratulations on getting disability.

My son started being abused at age 4. He immediately started raging. Hours of tantrumming at a severity I had never seen before in a child. Along with the abuse he has other issues like Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD) and anxiety. Just because your daughter has been abused (and probably has PTSD) doesn't mean there isn't other issues as well. Though treating the abuse will make the other issues much easier to deal with.

You daughter has some very good things going for her. First is that you know what happened. Second is you. You are willing to get help for her and are dealing with your own issues. You did a great job figuring out her sleep problem and fixing it.

One thing I've had to learn, because no diagnosis really fits difficult child 1, is to not dwell to much on the labels and focus on what I felt was the best treatment. I didn't care if they called him a pink elephant as long as he got what I thought he need for treatment. He needs therapy, medications, family therapy, social skills training, IEP.

difficult child 1 had play therapy for a few months and it was a very good thing for him. (Unfortunately we had to move away from that therapist.) He also would draw pictures. (This is how we found out he remember the abuse my x put me through even though difficult child 1 was only 4 months old at the time of the abuse.) He would draw for the therapist in therapy and he'd draw what he felt he was being punished for when we put him in time out. It was a good way for him to open up and start talking about his emotions.

Please don't feel that you have to do everything we suggest. They are just suggestions and we're just trying to be helpful. We've been with raging, out of control kids, and fighting with doctors to get the right treatments. Some of us also have our own issues as well. Mine is PTSD and depression and it can really affect how well I react to my kids too. In fact, I'm having a bad PTSD day and the kids get to do lots of games today just to keep them happy and quiet.
 

BusynMember

Well-Known Member
I'm with Janet and the others. Educators are not good diagnosticians and should keep their opinions to themselves. Being molested (and who really knows how badly?) is serious. in my opinion she should go for counseling to somebody who specializes in sexual abuse. My two youngest kids were sexually abused and we found that most therapists don't know a lot about how to help, but there are some who do and they are the ones you should look for, even if you have to travel a little to get to one.

You have a lot in your genepool and God only knows what her biological father has in HIS genepool, but right now everything is probably much worse because of that abuse. And a pill won't take away the pain of the abuse.

by the way, are you positive that your other daughter wasn't also being abused by her father? She should probably see the same kind of therapist to make sure.

Welcome to the board :)...but so sorry you have to be here.
 

atwittsend

New Member
thank you all for the welcome. i looked online all day today and requested information for a Children's hospital that has several pediatric psychiatric. Dr's. in St. Louis (the closest one) and i am positive that my almost 2 year old was not molested as i had left him Jan. of 2010 she was born July 2010 i was out of state when she was born the only way hes ever seen her is thru video chat via yahoo messenger and a text message from me. he now has a lawyer for child support (shes on state medicaid so the state is required to go after child support)
 

InsaneCdn

Well-Known Member
This is an echo-post, but... given the history? The PTSD diagnosis is probably totally correct... but not necessarily complete. That is... other things MAY also be part of the picture, but the PTSD is probably driving most of the behavior and/or making behaviours from other dxes much worse.

ADHD runs VERY strongly in families, so if it exists in the family tree, just keep an eye out for it. It's actually harder to catch ADD than classical ADHD (the hyper get to be kind of obvious... the daydreamer doesn't get noticed so much). But... it usually doesn't really affect school until at least 2nd or 3rd grade. (They told me mine were exceptions... but knowing what I know now, the ADHD diagnosis for K1 would not have been given in so early if we had caught the Auditory Processing Disorders (APD) soon enough.)
 

atwittsend

New Member
going to get a full psyc evl on her as soon as they have a opening i have to call back thursday or friday to get a apt. in the mean time i got papers in the mail today for visation for my youngest daughter and her father (the one who sexually molested my 5 year old) ive been on the phone with it since i got it, calling different people trying to figure out what to do from here i have a apt. with a lawyer wednesday, and someone from dfs is supposed to call me back tomorrow to try and get the records from her S.A.F.E. Interview to show the judege (if it goes to court) what he did to my other daughter and he may do the same thing to his own daughter. if not then my lawyer can petion the courts for those records. *sigh* so much stress hopefully i will know something by my birthday (in 3 days)
 
L

Liahona

Guest
Oh my word. The nerve of that (insert swear word). I hope you have enough evidence to send him to jail. If you do make sure to call the DA in his state. Lets see him try to fight a civil and criminal case at the same time. The prospect of being a pedophile in prison should be enough to scare him into leaving her alone. (Probably won't but it should be.)
 

atwittsend

New Member
yea i hope so but only thing is she was 3 and reported it 2 times but came back unsubstantial both times due to lack of edvenice or cause of her age. he denies it 100% so im basically screwed but im going to do what i can to keep him from her. more then that his grandmother threatened my and the baby while i was still pregnant with her told me id be dead more or less if i named my 2 year old Howard (its a family name for me)
 
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