Rabbit in head lights...1st CAMHS appmt

[Hallybear79]

After months of waiting for out 1st appointment with CAMHs for our DS (possible ADHD/ASD),it's finally here (this coming Friday). Once this whole process was in motion, i'd always felt revved up, prepared & strong but now its nearly here i feel scared & a bit lost. I've got a notebook full of his behaviour issues, diaries, lists of other concerns etc but i still feel so unprepared.
Could anyone tell me what to expect, is there any questions i should ask. Etc. I've read in peoples discussions in the past that there 1st appointment was at home, or without there child. Our letter informed us we've got to go to them but never mentioned whether our son hould be present t this stage. Am i just over thinking these issues?

At our first appointment we took Dd3, it was with a mental health practitioner who basically asked us what we wanted from CAMHs, she also took a brief history and talked to Dd3 about why she thought we had asked for help from them.

She wasnt very happy to talk and sat with her back to them but she did answer the questions with more insight than I realised she had. The fact that she wouldnt look at them and wore a wooly hat throughout the appointment was mentioned in the report so obviously they thought that was slightly unusual

We then got referred to tier 2 and saw a mental health nurse with lots of Asd experience who helped us to gather together all the info we needed for a referral to tier 3 which in our case was a psychiatrist.

Good luck

Hi, I just want to say good luck. I felt the exact same as you when I had my first appointment. Even though I had been preparing for 5 months I felt very unprepared and I still worry I did not tell them everything I should have.

DS has not been referred to CAMHs yet so not sure what they will expect but I had to take ds with me for all the appointments we had at the multidisciplinary clinic. I am getting the results in two weeks time and that is the only appointment where they have said I should not take ds.

Good luck, I hope it goes well and you get the results quickly.