Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:Take this with a grain of salt as I have two neurotypical teens.
If your daughter had a physical illness and all your home remedies weren't curing that physical illness, wouldn't your next step be to take her to the doctor and get a medication to alleviate the symptoms/make it better?
Couldn't the same be said of a mental illness such as anxiety? If your daughter was physically sick and no homeopathic treatments were working, it would be common sense to give her medicine. Why the hesitation when treating a mental illness?
Good luck.
Because physical ailments and mental ailments are not the same.
There is not agreement in medical science that psychotropic meds are the best or most appropriate answer for all mental health issues. And it is generally agreed that if one can effectively treat depression symptoms with a shower, a walk outside, or throwing oneself into service acts that benefit others, then you try that first rather than hop into a daily regimine of happy pills or mood stabilizers that numb or stimulate a part of your brain and come with a plethora of moderate to sever side effects.
OP is right to exercise caution.
For years parents were advised to hop on the Ritalin train to get little boys to be calmer and more classroom compliant. It worked.
But there are a large percentage of those kids who are now adukts saying that they didn’t actually experience LIVING as a child. No highs or lows.
Just numbness.
It fixed the problem at hand, but at what cost.
Again, OP is right to be cautious about meds.
I would make sure you exhaust all other avenues of adapting and coping and cognitive behavioral therapy before getting your kid psychologically dependent on a drug to alter her universe.