When you have a bright toddler and a family history of both genius and mental illness.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Mental illness is largely gene-dependent, OP. If he develops an actual, diagnosable disorder, it won't be because you enrolled him in the "wrong" preschool.

However mental disorders also exist on a spectrum, and the threshold for a diagnosis is necessarily arbitrary. So it's true that fostering a healthy environment might lead to reduced symptoms if your child is predisposed to certain mental disorders.

By healthy environment, I mean nutrition, sleep and exercise. You need a health body and brain. A varied, colorful diet without too much processed and artificial foods is best. Sleep helps detoxify organs and store memories correctly in the brain. Exercise regulates metabolism and helps growth.

And then there is stress mitigation and a balanced approach to life - which is what you were trying to do with this preschool selection, I suppose. But at his age, it doesn't matter. What matters for stress is enough sleep, enough food and a stable home life where he has the same roof over his head most of the time and a family that doesn't yell or hit each other. I mean, the bar is lower than you think. Stress will come into play when he gets older and needs to balance good grades with extra-curriculars and volunteering.

You also need to consider that *resilience* is a better marker for success, whether it's academic, financial or mental wellbeing. Resilience is the capacity to bounce back from stressors. So you don't want to eliminate stress. You want to model and teach how to behave while anticipating, undergoing and recuperating from stress. This requires a lot of self-awareness from you, the parent.

- geneticist.

A family that doesn’t yell? Like the couple who never argues, right? Those never-argue seemingly happy couples who suddenly split when they can’t hold their feelings inside any longer. Who the hell has raised boys without yelling?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The preschool you select isn’t going to change his chances of developing mental illness unless it’s an abusive atmosphere.

I completely disagree. Preschool choice is vitally important with the child’s personality and intellect in mind.

Montessori or French preschool would have been a mistake for my perfectionist DD. She’s bright and serious. She needed free play and a warm, social atmosphere.

You seriously believe preschool is going to be the reason a person doesn’t have bipolar or schizophrenia?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The preschool you select isn’t going to change his chances of developing mental illness unless it’s an abusive atmosphere.

I completely disagree. Preschool choice is vitally important with the child’s personality and intellect in mind.

Montessori or French preschool would have been a mistake for my perfectionist DD. She’s bright and serious. She needed free play and a warm, social atmosphere.

You seriously believe preschool is going to be the reason a person doesn’t have bipolar or schizophrenia?

+1. My parents were terrific parents. My sister is bipolar because my grandma and uncle were bipolar and probably many before them when they didn't have a diagnosis for it. But she takes medication and sees a therapist and she's built a fine career and life.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Mental illness is largely gene-dependent, OP. If he develops an actual, diagnosable disorder, it won't be because you enrolled him in the "wrong" preschool.

However mental disorders also exist on a spectrum, and the threshold for a diagnosis is necessarily arbitrary. So it's true that fostering a healthy environment might lead to reduced symptoms if your child is predisposed to certain mental disorders.

By healthy environment, I mean nutrition, sleep and exercise. You need a health body and brain. A varied, colorful diet without too much processed and artificial foods is best. Sleep helps detoxify organs and store memories correctly in the brain. Exercise regulates metabolism and helps growth.

And then there is stress mitigation and a balanced approach to life - which is what you were trying to do with this preschool selection, I suppose. But at his age, it doesn't matter. What matters for stress is enough sleep, enough food and a stable home life where he has the same roof over his head most of the time and a family that doesn't yell or hit each other. I mean, the bar is lower than you think. Stress will come into play when he gets older and needs to balance good grades with extra-curriculars and volunteering.

You also need to consider that *resilience* is a better marker for success, whether it's academic, financial or mental wellbeing. Resilience is the capacity to bounce back from stressors. So you don't want to eliminate stress. You want to model and teach how to behave while anticipating, undergoing and recuperating from stress. This requires a lot of self-awareness from you, the parent.

- geneticist.

A family that doesn’t yell? Like the couple who never argues, right? Those never-argue seemingly happy couples who suddenly split when they can’t hold their feelings inside any longer. Who the hell has raised boys without yelling?

e
You can argue without yelling. I never yell. My boys can hear me fine.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The preschool you select isn’t going to change his chances of developing mental illness unless it’s an abusive atmosphere.

I completely disagree. Preschool choice is vitally important with the child’s personality and intellect in mind.

Montessori or French preschool would have been a mistake for my perfectionist DD. She’s bright and serious. She needed free play and a warm, social atmosphere.

You seriously believe preschool is going to be the reason a person doesn’t have bipolar or schizophrenia?

I don’t think that is what she’s saying at all. But choice of the preschool and school that is right for your child will make them more connected and less stress which is important in mental health both now and later.

[Anonymous]

I would try my best not to worry and enjoy the years you have now. I had similar worries because of a strong family history of mental illness, including schizophrenia. We put our sensitive, bright child in small, nurturing schools, provided therapy, gave him a caring upbringing, everything suggested. As it turns out, my son has severe mental health issues as a teen. It’s very hard. But I still love him very much and am grateful for the relatively not years of his childhood. You deal with what comes.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I would try my best not to worry and enjoy the years you have now. I had similar worries because of a strong family history of mental illness, including schizophrenia. We put our sensitive, bright child in small, nurturing schools, provided therapy, gave him a caring upbringing, everything suggested. As it turns out, my son has severe mental health issues as a teen. It’s very hard. But I still love him very much and am grateful for the relatively not years of his childhood. You deal with what comes.

Hugs, PP. Since you can’t prove a negative, all of your efforts were not in vain. You don’t know how much worse he could have been without your thoughtful intervention and choices.

[Anonymous]

I can relate to your post, OP.

We had children with our genes because this isn’t Gattaca.

You take the good with the bad, genetically. Lots of good, but one of our kids does have mental illness along with high IQ and high likability. The kid in question is now a young adult and pretty stable but we are a family who makes use of therapy and psych meds (currently antidepressants).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I would try my best not to worry and enjoy the years you have now. I had similar worries because of a strong family history of mental illness, including schizophrenia. We put our sensitive, bright child in small, nurturing schools, provided therapy, gave him a caring upbringing, everything suggested. As it turns out, my son has severe mental health issues as a teen. It’s very hard. But I still love him very much and am grateful for the relatively not years of his childhood. You deal with what comes.

*Relatively normal years of his childhood*

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I would try my best not to worry and enjoy the years you have now. I had similar worries because of a strong family history of mental illness, including schizophrenia. We put our sensitive, bright child in small, nurturing schools, provided therapy, gave him a caring upbringing, everything suggested. As it turns out, my son has severe mental health issues as a teen. It’s very hard. But I still love him very much and am grateful for the relatively not years of his childhood. You deal with what comes.

*Relatively normal years of his childhood*

There is something a little hurtful TBH about this post, as if families could stave off major depression or schizophrenia or their young adult child’s suicide by choosing a better preschool. You can’t. It’s a little like believing in the refrigerator mother theory of autism. I know that it’s probably more the blinders of being a parent of a baby or toddler, when you still believe that your child’s outcomes are under your control. In time you realize how little control you have, and you come to accept it.

The one piece of advice I was given by a psychiatrist is that if you have a family history of schizophrenia, avoid stimulants such as ADHD medicine.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Mental illness is largely gene-dependent, OP. If he develops an actual, diagnosable disorder, it won't be because you enrolled him in the "wrong" preschool.

However mental disorders also exist on a spectrum, and the threshold for a diagnosis is necessarily arbitrary. So it's true that fostering a healthy environment might lead to reduced symptoms if your child is predisposed to certain mental disorders.

By healthy environment, I mean nutrition, sleep and exercise. You need a health body and brain. A varied, colorful diet without too much processed and artificial foods is best. Sleep helps detoxify organs and store memories correctly in the brain. Exercise regulates metabolism and helps growth.

And then there is stress mitigation and a balanced approach to life - which is what you were trying to do with this preschool selection, I suppose. But at his age, it doesn't matter. What matters for stress is enough sleep, enough food and a stable home life where he has the same roof over his head most of the time and a family that doesn't yell or hit each other. I mean, the bar is lower than you think. Stress will come into play when he gets older and needs to balance good grades with extra-curriculars and volunteering.

You also need to consider that *resilience* is a better marker for success, whether it's academic, financial or mental wellbeing. Resilience is the capacity to bounce back from stressors. So you don't want to eliminate stress. You want to model and teach how to behave while anticipating, undergoing and recuperating from stress. This requires a lot of self-awareness from you, the parent.

- geneticist.

A family that doesn’t yell? Like the couple who never argues, right? Those never-argue seemingly happy couples who suddenly split when they can’t hold their feelings inside any longer. Who the hell has raised boys without yelling?

PP you replied to. I think you know that’s not what I mean. Occasional yelling is very different from daily verbal or other abuse.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I would try my best not to worry and enjoy the years you have now. I had similar worries because of a strong family history of mental illness, including schizophrenia. We put our sensitive, bright child in small, nurturing schools, provided therapy, gave him a caring upbringing, everything suggested. As it turns out, my son has severe mental health issues as a teen. It’s very hard. But I still love him very much and am grateful for the relatively not years of his childhood. You deal with what comes.

*Relatively normal years of his childhood*

There is something a little hurtful TBH about this post, as if families could stave off major depression or schizophrenia or their young adult child’s suicide by choosing a better preschool. You can’t. It’s a little like believing in the refrigerator mother theory of autism. I know that it’s probably more the blinders of being a parent of a baby or toddler, when you still believe that your child’s outcomes are under your control. In time you realize how little control you have, and you come to accept it.

The one piece of advice I was given by a psychiatrist is that if you have a family history of schizophrenia, avoid stimulants such as ADHD medicine.

NP here. I think you misunderstood the PP. they are saying that you CAN’T stave off major mental health issues. They tried many things to be proactive, but in the end, the mental health issues surfaced.
Though I do believe that steps a parent takes that are done with love and patience help the parent child bond, which can only help the child later.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I would try my best not to worry and enjoy the years you have now. I had similar worries because of a strong family history of mental illness, including schizophrenia. We put our sensitive, bright child in small, nurturing schools, provided therapy, gave him a caring upbringing, everything suggested. As it turns out, my son has severe mental health issues as a teen. It’s very hard. But I still love him very much and am grateful for the relatively not years of his childhood. You deal with what comes.

*Relatively normal years of his childhood*

There is something a little hurtful TBH about this post, as if families could stave off major depression or schizophrenia or their young adult child’s suicide by choosing a better preschool. You can’t. It’s a little like believing in the refrigerator mother theory of autism. I know that it’s probably more the blinders of being a parent of a baby or toddler, when you still believe that your child’s outcomes are under your control. In time you realize how little control you have, and you come to accept it.

The one piece of advice I was given by a psychiatrist is that if you have a family history of schizophrenia, avoid stimulants such as ADHD medicine.

I honestly don’t think that’s what parents are saying. But just like a predisposition to diabetes or cancer (or Alzheimer’s in my case) we want to do as much as we can to mitigate the predisposition.

Plus the right schools for your individual child depending on their personality, strengths and weaknesses is never a bad idea.

[Anonymous]

130 and 142 iq are not super high, maybe that’s in his favor?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I would try my best not to worry and enjoy the years you have now. I had similar worries because of a strong family history of mental illness, including schizophrenia. We put our sensitive, bright child in small, nurturing schools, provided therapy, gave him a caring upbringing, everything suggested. As it turns out, my son has severe mental health issues as a teen. It’s very hard. But I still love him very much and am grateful for the relatively not years of his childhood. You deal with what comes.

*Relatively normal years of his childhood*

There is something a little hurtful TBH about this post, as if families could stave off major depression or schizophrenia or their young adult child’s suicide by choosing a better preschool. You can’t. It’s a little like believing in the refrigerator mother theory of autism. I know that it’s probably more the blinders of being a parent of a baby or toddler, when you still believe that your child’s outcomes are under your control. In time you realize how little control you have, and you come to accept it.

The one piece of advice I was given by a psychiatrist is that if you have a family history of schizophrenia, avoid stimulants such as ADHD medicine.

NP here. I think you misunderstood the PP. they are saying that you CAN’T stave off major mental health issues. They tried many things to be proactive, but in the end, the mental health issues surfaced.
Though I do believe that steps a parent takes that are done with love and patience help the parent child bond, which can only help the child later.

Parental anxiety over whether it is the right school is going cancel that out.