Anyone else got an OCD child?

[Vicx]

I have an 8 year old OCD child who is a washer. Anyone else in the same boat?

Hi my 16 yr old DS has OCD and has had since about 9. His worries centre around germs though how he copes has varied over the years.
Have you had any diagnosis/treatment for your ds?

Hi NoHaudinMaWheest, thank you so much for getting back to me. A relief to meet someone who has walked in my shoes.
My DD has been under CAHMS on and off for 4 years, they have diagnosed as anxiety with OCD traits. Had her transferred to the Tavistock and pushing to have a OCD diagnosis.
When was your DS diagnosed? Did/does he get extra help at school?

I have a 16 year old dd, diagnosed at 11, who washes, has obsessions about food preparation, children vomiting and her db eating food in general.

Mix teenage hormones in as well and it's great fun

Ds was diagnosed at 10. He was also diagnosed at around the same time with Aspergers Syndrome. This makes accessing CBT much more difficult. He has had some very difficult times but at the moment the rituals are reasonably contained and we are working on reducing them with family support workers who come in in the evening when they are at their worst and a good clinical psychologist.
At his worst Ds spent 8 months as a inpatient in the Maudsley where they have a specialist young people's OCD clinic.
Primary school was very difficult as the head did not and did not want to understand. His current secondary has been excellent and he copes there with mainly background support although with the AS and also being dyslexic his needs are quite complex.
He will need to move to another school for 6th form in September and we are currently negotiating support for that.

I am sorry to learn of your problems but also relieved to meet other parents that have experience of OCD.

We were at CAHMS but have recently moved over to the Tavistock - long story: DD is my natural daughter but step parent adopted by my husband who has been around since she was 7 months. Everytime we ask for help with DD's OCD we get shafted with a flipping Adoption Social worker. Demanded CAHMS transfer me to the tavistock to see a psychaitrist to get a diagnosis and they transfered her to another adoption team. You can't fix mental health problems with an adoption social worker!!!!

I did not know about the Maudsley at the time I requested a transfer only learned of them when I spoke to the OCD UK advocate last week. If we are not seen by assessed by a psychiatrist by next week he said he'll help us write a letter for a one off diagnosis referral to the Maudsley.

The teachers at school aren't particularly helpful. They looked at me like I had munchasuen by proxy for the first year. They have given her no extra help or support. I called the Parent Partnership at our council last week and they will come into school mid february for a sit down with me, her teacher and senco. In the meantime I'm getting the school to monitor her OCD with a symptoms check list.

Hopefully the diagnosis will help the school take notice.

Have you thought of apply for a statement for your dd. Her problems are obviously long lasting and not likely to go away quickly. You do not need a diagnosis for a statement and can request on yourself. It is a much more certain way to get support for your child.
The Maudsley team were excellent. They worked with ds when local CAMHS said his AS made it impossible to work with him.

I am going to get a statement for her. It's 3 weeks until the Parent parntership woman comes into the school to discuss better support for my DD. In the mean time I am monitoring so we have some evidence to support her need for getting her statemented.
Cannot believe that your local CAHMS said your DS AS made it impossible to work with him. Shocking!

Hope the statementing process goes well. IME you have to keep pressing for it to go forward but I didn't have the truly awful experiences that some have had.

Re the local CAMHS it was true that he was very hard to engage but surely trying to connect with a reluctant child is part of their job?

Have you heard from the Tavistock yet?

Phoned the Tavistock this week as they hadn't contacted us. The adoption fostering and kinship team said we'd been transferred to cahms. CAHMS said they haven't got us on their books long story short tracked our case down and we've been transferred to family services! We've been allocated a family therapist whose bringing in a psychiatrist for assessment on 22nd feb.
Spoke to maudsley admin team a few times this week. Told them the saga with referrals and being passed from pillar to port. Senior admin raised it in team meeting and Dr Bruce Clark - psychiatric consiltant at maudsley phoned me. Said we should stick eith the app and try and get the diagnosis. If we don't get the diagnosis ask fir referral to them. If we get diagnosis of Ocd unless they can give valid reason for family therapy we should insist they treat the condition and go with the NICE guidelines for OCD which is CBT & ERP.
He gave me more help and hope in that one phonecall then a month of phonecalls to CaHMs and Tavistock. Really glad I phoned them - thanks for the tip and advice.
School wise - after 4 days of monitoring alanna with the new OCD check chart the teacher has said it's too time consuming and asked how long she has to do it. Fuming!!! They can do behaviour monitoring for naughty kids but can't monitor a child with a possible mental health problem?!
School and gp have also said that in a year of being at cahms they have no records or updates just the initial referral letter and the closing referral to Tavistock. Cahms said that wasall they had on their system too. Does that sound right?

It can't or shouldn't be right that they have no records after the inital referral. Unfortunately records do go missing but I would press again for them. Sometimes people just have to look harder.
Glad the Maudsley team were helpful. I can't see how family therapy could help OCD even if there were problems to be addressed. CBT and ERP are the standard treatments with medication in severe/non responsive cases.
We were offered family therapy as my Dh found it hard to deal with Ds's rituals. It was pretty useless to be honest and I stopped it as I felt it was doing more harm than good. I think it could be useful with a very good therapist but for the family fall out of OCD rather than treating the actual condition.
Sorry the school is so useless. I found that it is school attitude rather than anything else that has made the difference to Ds.