Anti depressants and teens

[Nochangeplease]

I’ve done a similar thread in the past. My dd 15 now has a history of depression, anxiety, and self harming going back 3/4 years now. I genuinely can’t remember if she’s taken 2, 3 or 4 overdoses resulting in an overnight hospital stay. She’s been discharged from Camhs for around a year and seemed to be doing ok. CAMHS support has been very intermittent on the whole.
She took an overdose about 2 months ago and told the other night when I asked if I needed to take her to a&e for her own safety because she was so low, that Xmas is what’s keeping her going. That makes me worry for January. I worry one day she will take an overdose and not be ok. I can’t rely on CAMHS support.
Aibu to ask them to put her on medication?
It was briefly discussed before but I wasn’t keen and neither was the medical team beciase of her age and hormones.
But I really feel the risk of the medication is now a lot lower than the risk to her life if things carry on this way.

I guess it’s best to press for it whilst we’re here as once discharged it’s back to waiting for people to call back and chasing them via email.

So sorry c this OP.

No one wants to give meds to a teen but surely the point of anxiety medication for anyone is to allow them to get head above water and tackle via CBT etc.

It sounds like your daughter is most definitely at this point, so if you don’t feel you are being listened to, I would kick up.

Push
I always think its useful to have a 4 point summary to hand , ie:
Depressed since xxx
In hospital xxx times
Tried therapy xxx times
Have been asking for medication since xxx
🥊

So sorry to hear this OP.

Has your daughter seen the duty CAMHS clinician? Are they keeping her in at all?

I'd try GP. If no luck ask for referral to a psychiatrist. Therapy works but needs consistency. I found therapy through NHS to be useless. 12 sessions is the max and its usually CBT which I didn't find helpful. In therapy a lot of the work is hard emotionally and it relies on the strength of the relationship with the therapist. Try building a trusting relationship with anyone in less than 12 hours. If you can afford it then private therapy may be the way to go. I'm a year in and doing pretty well now, finally starting to work on the hard stuff. Its taken me this long just to get to a point where I'm ready to talk about the trauma. 12 sessions never had a chance. Medication has definitely had its place though, just in stabilising me long enough to get any work done.

How come she wasnt referred back to CAMHS when she took the last overdose? I would 100% be considering medication for her. Hope things improve. Medication can be a game changer.

My ds has been on anti depressant and anti anxiety meds since he was 15. They have helped enormously. Not a "cure" for the underlying problems but enough to get him back out into the world again.

I am sorry your dd is struggling so much.

So after the last overdose, got seen by duty CAMHS in a&e, discharged and contacted within 7 days as is the protocol. This led to them agreeing to some sessions via teams but by the time this got sorted out, we only ended up with the initial one and then Xmas was coming so the next one was scheduled for Jan.

Got seen by duty again today. Dd was almost pushing them to keep her in as she thinks she’s at risk of suicide. I tried to push it too but they really wanted to send her home. We’ve agreed to come home and essentially trust that she’ll tell me again if she feels like doing something and we’ll go back and they’ll consider inpatient. For the first I’m genuinely scared she could die, not necessarily imminently but at some point if we don’t get help.
She’s been given a mild sedative for 7 days, by then we will have had contact from CAMHS (and probably social services, because I need that like a hole in the head). The duty worker is recommending anti depressants so will discuss that when her therapist calls, who will then then to get it approved by a medical doctor. I’m worried about the time this might end up taking.

I wish I could afford private therapy. She does have a good relationship with her CAMHS therapist, but it just isn’t ongoing, consistent or reliable.