The Dangers of Drugging Children...

I happened to catch the following show on 60 minutes a few weeks ago:

On Dec. 13, 2006, police responded to a 911 call and found a little girl lying dead on the floor next to her parents' bed. The autopsy revealed that she had died from an overdose of psychiatric drugs. Rebecca Riley was being treated for bipolar disorder, or manic depression, even though she was just four years old. If that sounds unusual to you, it's not.

As Katie Couric reports, until recently the disorder was believed to emerge only in adults. Now, it is estimated that there are nearly one million children diagnosed as bipolar, making it more common than autism and diabetes combined. And to treat it, doctors are administering some medications that have yet to be approved for children. In the case of Rebecca Riley, that cocktail of medications proved fatal and now her parents have been charged with her murder. Here's a transcript of a 60 minutes show with Katie Couric about overdiagnosis of bipolar disorder in children. It features an interview with a mother who is currently awaiting trial after her 5 year old daughter died from a combination of drugs used to treat bipolar adults.

Go here to see the transcript.

I do believe the mother over mediated her child, but why were these powerful drugs in her hands, and prescribed for a 5 year old, no less? If you watch the video, pay close attention to the the checklist they use to diagnose children with bipolar disorder. Things like "mood swings" and "craves sweets..." What 2 year old doesn't fit the criteria?

Here's another article from the LA times that I heard about on a local radio station:

Bipolar Disorder in Youths May be Over-diagnosed

A new study says a fortyfold increase can be partly attributed to doctors mislabeling children and teens with the illness.

By Denise Gellene, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer September 4, 2007

The diagnosis of bipolar disorder in children and adolescents has risen fortyfold since 1994, according to a study released Monday. But researchers partly attributed the dramatic rise to doctors over-diagnosing the serious psychiatric disorder.

The report in the journal Archives of General Psychiatry said bipolar disorder was found in 1,003 of every 100,000 office visits from children and adolescents in 2002-03, compared with 25 of 100,000 office visits in 1994-95.

The diagnosis of bipolar disorder among adults increased twofold during the same period, researchers said.

The study didn't investigate the reasons for the sudden rise in bipolar cases among children and adolescents. A book published in 2000, "The Bipolar Child," made the controversial assertion that one-third to one-half of children with depression had bipolar disorder.

Dr. Mark Olfson, a psychiatrist at Columbia University's College of Physicians and Surgeons and senior author of the latest study, said part of the increase was attributable to an under-diagnosis of bipolar disorder in the past.

But Olfson said another reason was the mislabeling of children and adolescents with aggressive or irritable behaviors as bipolar, an illness that is treated with powerful psychotropic medications, many of which have not been tested in children.

Dr. Thomas R. Insel, director of the National Institute of Mental Health, which funded the study, called the increase in bipolar diagnoses worrisome.

"The way the label is being used is probably a little exuberant -- not fitting with the strict definition of the illness," Insel said. The disorder "is probably not as common as the very high rates we're seeing."

Read the article in its entirety here.

I find it sad what we are doing to children in the name of early intervention and treatment. The same psychiatrists who have sold us on their faulty, humanistic parenting methods are now lining their pockets and those of the pharmaceutical companies by convincing us to drug our children. Again I say it's nothing short of child abuse.

As a man thinketh...

Lately I've been asking the Lord for wisdom to raise my oldest. I remember telling J we only have 11 years to get Drew ready for the world and I feared the sharks would eat him alive. The Lord answered my prayers during a seminar we attended last night in which Dr. Robert Rohm explained the DISC personality types.

• D's are dominant, and want to lead and be productive. (Let's get the job done!)


• I's are inspiring, entertaining and talkative. (Are we having fun yet?)


• S's are supportive, sensitive and focused on relationships. (Can't we all just get along?)


• C's are cautious, analytical and detail oriented. (Cross your T's, dot your I's and mind your P's & Q's.)

J is cautious. You should have seen his eyes light up when he saw the words "quality" and "excellence" associated with his trait. His secondary trait is dominant. I'm split between dominant and supportive (which is a rare combination), but I'm mostly dominant (come on... my pseudonym is "Queen").

Jazzy is dominant and easy to parent because J and I "get" her. I always say she learned to talk early so she could boss us around.

Drew... Well, Drew thankfully isn't like us. But, I've been viewing his supportive personality exactly the way Dr. Rohm suggests I would view it. And in trying to motivate Drew to change traits I view as weaknesses, I have done several things Dr. Rohm says will de-motivate him. I am producing the opposite of what I want for my son.

The Bible says "Death and life are in the power of the tongue..." (Proverbs 18:21), and Dr. Rohm says we need to be careful to speak life, not death over our children. A few weeks ago I sought counsel from my aunt regarding my concerns and she said the same thing in a different way. Our children sense our thoughts about them. Our thoughts become their thoughts, and "For as he thinketh in his heart, so is he..." (Proverbs 23:7). We must be mindful of our words and thoughts about our children.

Dr. Rohm touched on something else that has been on my heart lately. He said around 80% of school teachers are cautious or supportive and will tend to think there's something wrong with the dominant's who tend towards defiance and the inspiring's who can be overly energetic/distracted. He said one practitioner told him that out of 100 dominant's and inspiring's that were referred to her for treatment, only 3 had true disorders.

This is another reason I am against the trend toward labeling/medicating children. If we medicate all the boys who are stubborn as mules, can't sit still and live life on the edge - who will be our entrepreneurs, fire fighters and navy seals? Who will fight our nation's wars? We aren't all wired to be paper pushers and bean counters. Leave these kids alone! Or better yet, find a way to bottle that energy and sell it to me!!!

Anyway, back on topic, I encourage you to look at Dr. Rohm's materials to see if they can give you insight into conflicts or concerns you are having with your children.

I saw our family in so much of what Dr. Rohm said in his seminar. Me standing over Drew saying "hurry", which causes him to get flustered and move more slowly. J making plans for our trip and asking repeatedly "Should we stay at hotel x or hotel y?" Which takes me from supportive, "Whatever you choose is fine with me, dear" to dominant, "I couldn't care less where we stay. Just choose already!"

J is going to read this and get frustrated because I used the full name of the traits instead of the initials D, I, S and C. But I'm dominant and this is my blog...

Long live the Queen!

Public Schools, Public Menace

J is going to clear space on my computer so I can post some pics, but in the meantime I want to tell you about a book I'm reading called Public Schools, Public Menace: How Public Schools Lie to Parents and Betray Our Children. I saw it on the shelf of a local library and since I can't resist an inflammatory title, I brought it home.

The author, Joel Turtel, gives an eye-opening look into the true problems of compulsory, government-controlled schooling and how they can be remedied. He devotes entire chapter to Mind-Altering Drugs in which he discusses the history and dangers of giving psychiatric drugs to children, and exposes the beneficiaries of this practice (which IMHO, is nothing short of abuse). This chapter alone makes the book worth reading.

In the words of Turtel, "A public-school system that coerces parents into giving their children mind-altering drugs that are potentially addictive, dangerous, or even lethal, is a moral abomination. A public-school system in which millions of children have to take Ritalin... is a frightening and embarrassing failure."

Public Schools, Public Menace is another must read for all parents, no matter how they choose to school their children. Next up on my reading list is Home Schooling: The Right Choice! by Christopher Klicka. This book was also recommended by "a certain friend". Stay away from this woman. She is dangerous!

ADHD...

Here's a video on ADHD that was posted on a forum I frequent:

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-3609599239524875493

It is long, but worth it! I have a family member who's been diagnosed with mental illness so I know psychiatric and brain disorders are real. But I do believe they are over diagnosed, and I find it sad that these labels (and their corresponding medications) are being thrust upon perfectly healthy children.

It seems some of us are playing the blame game. Instead of looking at ourselves and saying "I" have failed to discipline or provide a healthy diet or a peaceful home life, we point to our children and say "you" are the problem. We don't say, I'm sorry you've developed these unproductive habits as a result of "my" permissiveness, selfishness, laziness, etc. We say it is "your" ADHD, ODD and now, increasingly, bipolar.

Instead of realizing our children will develop in their own time and lowering our unreasonably high expectations, we say to the child, "your ability to complete these worksheets or score a certain percentage on this test is more important than your mental and physical well being." Never mind that we haven't completed a worksheet since we graduated high school and that no one even knows our standardized test scores (or even cares).

Nevertheless, in the midst of all this nonsense, there are some very real heroes who stand up and say, I will NOT do this to my child. I have a dear friend who is fighting this diagnosis for her son and I applaud her.

And if you child is on ADD meds, of course I'm not talking about you. ;)