My Daughter Has Bipolar Disorder: Here’s What I Wish You Knew

My hands gripped the steering wheel with such force that the tendons popped out in my arms. In the backseat of the car, my eight-year-old daughter screamed. In front of me, a tractor-trailer loomed.

“I could just run into it and end everything,” I thought, as my daughter continued to howl.

I was exhausted. Tired of trying to parent this challenging child, tired of the judgments from family, the eye rolls and looks from friends. I heard the whispers, I saw the smirks.

I was weary from meetings with teachers, calls from the nurse. Deep fatigue settled into my muscles and I lived with headaches that pounded behind my eyes.

Now, my daughter yelled at me to take her home. We were not going home.

We were headed towards UCLA Children & Adolescent Mental Health Department where the head of the psychiatric team would evaluate my child.

It had been several years of parenting a little girl who was stubborn, headstrong, spirited, at times downright mean and most times, difficult. Her moods would turn from pleasant to unbearable in minutes and the school nurse called me almost daily.

“Hello again, she’s here complaining of a stomachache, can you pick her up?” The nurse asked. We were at the point where she didn’t even have to say anything. I’d see the number flash on my phone and I just knew.

Often when I dropped the kids off at school, my daughter’s teacher would have to peel her from my body.

“DON’T LEAVE ME!” My daughter howled, digging her fingers into the flesh of my upper arm as her teacher tried to physically remove her from me.

Her screams echoed down the hallway as I walked to the car with tears stinging my eyes.

What is wrong with my child? I asked myself again and again.

I’d get home, her screams still fresh in my mind. I fought back the urge to sob on the kitchen floor. Sometimes I did.

Why is she like this?

I observed other kids who had a variety of personalities, but none as demanding as my child.

“You’re a weak parent.”

“You have to be stricter.”

“You need to be tough.”

“You did this.”

“If she were my daughter…”

I heard it over and over again but something deep inside told me there was a problem that was much larger than poor parenting skills. I was a good mom, dedicated to my children, always there for them.

I resented the judgment.

On that day when I wanted to drive headfirst into the truck in front of me on the crowded freeway on a fall morning, we learned that there was a diagnosis for my little girl; she was on the bipolar spectrum.

It’s difficult to diagnose children; they are constantly growing and changing. But when the head of the department over the course of several weeks, observed my child and took notes and ran tests then gave me a diagnosis, I was inclined to believe him.

Some of the symptoms of early-onset bipolar disorder (that she exhibited) included:

• Separation anxiety
• Rages & explosive temper tantrums (lasting up to several hours)
• Marked irritability
• Oppositional behavior
• Frequent mood swings
• Distractibility
• Hyperactivity
• Impulsivity
• Restlessness/ fidgetiness
• Aggressive behavior
• Grandiosity
• Difficulty getting up in the morning
• Rapid or pressured speech

The diagnosis fit her behavior but I didn’t want to acknowledge there was something seriously wrong. In my hand, I clutched the prescription for a mood stabilizer but was reluctant to fill it. Maybe this was all in my head.

Maybe, as relatives suggested, the problem was with me.

I wasn’t cut out to be the parent of a child like this. Her moods and reactions were over the top, she was hard to handle. I was puzzled and frustrated by her behavior which was a vast contrast to my easy-going son.

I read as much as I could get my hands on about medication and early-onset bipolar disorder. Someone said I was trying to make life easier for myself by medicating her. Now I had immeasurable guilt on top of everything else I was feeling: confusion, disbelief, failure, frustration, exhaustion.

I had been coping with depression for years; maybe it was my fault that she had something wrong with her.

As the prescription sat in my purse, I went back and forth trying to determine the best thing for her. I wanted my daughter to be normal and stable; I wanted her to thrive.

Finally, after a week of research and thinking, I filled the prescription and hoped for the best. I can’t say it worked miracles; she was on a very low dose.

For the next ten years, we would have weekly therapy, meetings with psychiatrists, medication changes, meetings with her teachers. We’d switch schools because of her extreme anxiety. I’d do everything in my power to help her do well, to be comfortable, to be a success. To just get through high school.

I was constantly torn between setting boundaries and having consequences, employing a “tough love” approach, yet being mindful of her mental health, the anxiety that plagued her, the feelings of being overwhelmed to the point where she refused to go to school.

I did a two-month outpatient therapy program learning how to cope with kids who have a mental illness. I took notes, I got the books, I attended the meetings.

I learned how not to escalate a situation when my daughter was in ‘crisis’ mode. It’s incredibly important to stay calm. Once a child loses control of their emotions, you cannot reason with them. You cannot tell them what to do, they won’t hear you. Everything needs to settle, then things can be addressed.

Unfortunately, relatives were quick to assume my seemingly calm, patient demeanor was me giving into her, trying to be her ‘best friend’ and what everyone missed was how I was attempting to not escalate a tricky situation.

It would be helpful if people tried to understand rather than blame me for her behavior. It’s a tough illness and there’s not a lot of parenting advice on how to raise a child who is struggling with it.

Kids with Bipolar Disorder have difficulty within their own bodies; oftentimes problems are small but their feelings are enormous, like a tornado whipping through their bones. They have a low tolerance for pain, every thought and feeling is magnified. Their brains are not normal and healthy, their response to the outside world is hard to fathom.

I have been to hundreds of therapy sessions, met with various psychiatrists, read multiple books; I have spent hours online researching medications, learning about different therapy modalities for treating bipolar disorder, have tried to gain knowledge of how brain chemistry works.

The diagnosis from therapists and doctors with decades of experience has been that she is on the bipolar spectrum, if not totally bipolar. Yet family members, friends, neighbors with zero education find fault with me, this is not uncommon. Most of the people I know who have children struggling with this disease experience the same response from family.

With bipolar disorder, you don’t just feel “down in the dumps;” your depressive state may lead to suicidal thoughts that change over to feelings of euphoria and endless energy.

When she threatened suicide, which has happened quite a lot over the year, I was torn between not wanting to give attention to her hysterics and also not wanting to blow off something incredibly serious.

“Studies have found that 72 percent of adolescents with bipolar disorder acknowledge thinking about suicide at one point or another. Research shows teens with both bipolar I and bipolar II are at an elevated risk for suicide.”

Tell me, how do you raise a child with a mental illness where the idea of suicide is always bubbling close to the surface? How do you parent a child when they are suffering from something you don’t understand and cannot see?

I asked (on one of the message boards I frequent) what parents wish people know about their child’s bipolar illness.

Here are some of the responses:

Our children’s “behaviors” are not caused by our parenting methods.

Their behaviors are symptoms of their disorder; like seizures are a symptom of epilepsy. Bipolar disorder is a medical condition. Our kids don’t want to behave badly. They want to feel good, yet every day is a struggle for many of our kids.

No two cases of bipolar are alike, some may respond great to meds and therapy others may struggle a lifetime, it is a very individual illness and stereotypes and misconceptions can dismiss and/or vilify the suffers and their caregivers.

I wish my family understood that when she lies or steals or curses or retreats from contact, she’s not doing it because she’s a bitch. I know that’s hard for them, it’s hard for me, but they just see a kid who misbehaves, not a kid who’s struggling to maintain “normal.”

Rather than think of the behaviors that can come from a mood swing, particularly and often expressed as anger and rage in a child, as “bad,” think of them as emotional “seizures” that require help and support, not disdain and punishment.

Mental illness is worse than illnesses that are visible.

I wish people would stop suggesting that all my kid needs is an ass whooping, or I need to do this or that. Mental health can’t be fixed with physical force, nor is it my parenting skills.

When our kids are hospitalized, please treat us like you would if they were in for a broken arm or cancer. Don’t ignore us because you are embarrassed to mention mental illness. Bringing us a casserole or two wouldn’t hurt either!

I wish my friends and family knew how exhausted I am all the time.

My kid doesn’t “need a good whipping” and doesn’t need stricter parenting. She is sick, and she needs treatment. She has plenty of discipline and structure. Her behaviors are not my fault. But if I have a hard time believing that it’s not my fault, how can I expect others to believe it?

One thing I don’t like is when people say…”Do you really think she needs to be on all those meds?”

That they won’t ‘grow out of it’. It’s not just a phase. It’s not because they’re a teen.

Kids like this don’t LEARN from their mistakes. Their brain chemistry makes them get manic and repeat them over and over. It’s not that easy to just ‘make them behave.’ And that spanking WILL NOT help. (My kids loved it!)

We are dealing with things they NEVER had to. Kids who don’t care about going to school on time. Or going, at all. Who have no love of learning. Who curse at us. That they CANNOT IMAGINE the stress of our daily lives.

If you are the parent of a child who is dealing with mental illness, I want to give you a big hug. I am on a few different message boards/groups and what I see most is parents who are at their wit's end, hanging on by their fingernails, dealing with immense frustration and fatigue. We are burned out.

We live in constant anxiety, waiting for the next crisis, meltdown, tantrum. We pray the meds work. We pray, period.

I see parents who love their children and refuse to give up hope that someday they will find the right medication or therapy or a combination of something that will help them.

There are families who have been pulled apart at the seams because a family member is bipolar and this affects everyone. Moms and dads who can barely hold it together because their child is in constant crisis mode. Siblings who hate their brother or sister because the stress in the house is so thick you can grab it.

Parenting a child who is bipolar is not easy and it's not fun. And it's certainly not for the weak.

If you see someone or know of a family member who is dealing with mental illness in some capacity, try to gain a little understanding and turn down the judgment.

We get enough of that on our own. Life is hard and we are doing our best.