| Solutions How can I help my child? |
| Build a support group. It should include you and your family, understanding friends, your child's child/adolescent psychiatrist, your child's therapist, your child's teachers, and your child's caseworker. |
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| Be an advocate for your child. |
| Know the resources in at your area and county. Know your child's state and federal rights. Know what your child's public school can provide him or her. See Resources Some of the suggested sites are: www.reedmartin.com www.leginfo.ca.gov www.wrightslaw.com www.dredf.org and www.taskca.org |
| Be familiar with parenting stategies that help your child develop skills to better handle frustrating situations at school and at home. The Explosive Child, by Ross Greene Ph.D. outlines an approach for working with inflexible and low frustation children. Dr. Greene shows how to teach the child vocabulary and problem solving skills to avoid frustration and "meltdowns". He believes that these children do not respond well to discipline applied after the problem. Instead the parent or teacher must intervene before the problem occurs by teaching the child needed skills. Below are the highlights from this approach. 1) Learn what activities are stressful for your child. What deficits create the stress within the activity? An example may be a transition from watching tv to coming to the dinner table. The underlining problem may be difficulty switching from one activity to another, being able to verbalize, and low frustation. 2) Learn how to pick your battles. Dr. Greene describes how to prioritize the activities that cause problems into 3 groups. The first is Basket A - non-negotiable activities such as safety issues. The second is Basket B - activities that you will negotiate with problem solving. The third is Basket C - activities that are not important at this time. 3) Activities in Basket B are dealt with using problems solving. As the parent you help the child learn how to appropriately verbilize his frustations and use problem solving skills to resolve the situation and avoid a "meltdown." 4) Dr. Greene calls this a "user-friendly" environment because the child knows his parent/s and teachers will support him. Another strategies to use while children are frustrated and having a problem understanding or processing the situation is to talk very slowly and put spacing between words. This helps the child process the conversation. Another suggestion by many parents is to provide an outlet for excess energy such as punching bags, trampolines, going for walks, etc. |
| Know what your goals are for your child: stabilization on medications, development of strategies to remediate and appropriate coping skills for your child's deficits, development of skills to better cope with frustration, and development of life skills and advocating skills by 18 years old. |
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| Know your child's illness, his deficits and strengths. See Deficits and Disorders Some suggested sources are :www.bpkids.org and The Bipolar Child by Papolos |
| Adopted Children - If your child is adopted through a county check with Post Adoption Assistance. Money may be available for therapy, day or residential treatment programs. Even if you did not adopt through the county, you may still be able to use the service. It does provide funds faster than county department of mental health's AB 2726/3632 See Resources |
| Public School Resources - If your child's illness is impacting his school work for such reasons as he is absent for hospitalizations, unable to focus, is easily frustrated and frequently gets into trouble, you can ask for one or both of these services: 504 (ADA)- is a section of the federal law for diabilities that allows for special accomendations in the classroom that further helps your child. Since your child is emotional disabled, he would qualify. An example would be reducing the amount of homework since evenings are a difficult time. Special Education (IDEA) - is a modified program that goes beyond the 504 and provides services, either in a resource room or in a special day class. The student has an individual education program or IEP. This program also gives access to special funds from the state called AB 2726/3632. These funds can be used to pay for a program or private, non-profit school that can better provide an educational program for your child if the school can not provide an appropriate program. Because your child is bipolar and the diagnosis can be substantiated by a child and adolescent psychiatrist, he or she can qualify as either "severely emotional disturbed" or "other." To begin this process ask the principal that your child be assessed for the program. |
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| Day program and residential treatment programs are programs to help stabilize your child and provide the needed skills to develop problem solving strategies, selfcare, emotional maturity and self advocating skills. If your child is not stable at home with weekly therapy sessions, you may want to look into a more restricted environment, a therapeutic day program. The next choice is the 24 hour therapeutic environment of a residential treatment center. At the center medications can safely be adjusted. Your child's child and adolescent pychiatrist can help you choose the best options. For a sample of some residential treatment centers see: Private, Nonprofit www.strugglingteens.com www.natsap.org |
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