Reply to Resources for dads supporting depressed teen?

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I strongly recommend your husband (and you) take the NAMI Basics class. It offers a good foundation of information about mental health disorders, as well as info about effective communication, what various providers do, various kinds of therapy, legal and educational issues, etc.  It's often better if this information comes from a reliable 3rd party with no treatment interest in your child.  It can give you an agreed upon factual foundation to talk about how to handle issues.

Also look at PEP parenting classes for an alternative to the authoritarian parenting style, which IMO is not helpful and in fact counterproductive with children with mental illness.  Or maybe you think Dr. Dan's parenting is working for you.  YMMV on parenting style that works for any individual kid.

Also, TBH, I think having a therapist lined up that you and he can jointly talk to when you have issues about how to help your kid can be helpful.

Do you have a 504 or IEP for your DC?  School can be a big source of anxiety and depression, even at quite a young age.

Finally, you said he "doesn't tolerate" medication.  There are many, many medications and kids change a lot as they grow.  Work with a psychiatrist who is willing to systematically try different classes of medication and different way s to take them -- immediate release, extended release, in the morning, in the evening, in combo with another med, whatever.  It can take a lot of experimentation to find a helpful medication plan, and then, with kids, boom -- they grow and you might have to tweak or start over.  Many people can not recover from depression without meds or just with talk therapy.  (Not to diminish talk therapy, it has a very useful role, but for a significant number of people it is not enough by itself.)[/quote]

Thanks for the NAMI reference- I had taken that years ago and forgotten about it.

We have a good psychiatrist and have been trialing different medication types/ dosages etc for 2 years now.

And school has not been helpful as he is not having academic difficulties, he just has a 504. But the social anxiety from school is a huge part of this.

It’s all just sad and hard.[/quote]

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