Depressed 14 year old daughter

[Chris37]

Hi, my DD has been attending Camhs from about last summer with a few breaks. had been self harming( has stopped), very low moods, feeling sad,acting grumpy, low self esteem, lost interest in lots of things she used to enjoy etc. Has a close group of friends who she sees a lot and outwardly would appear very confident. At her request we are going to ask for a change of counsellor as says she doesn't connect with current and has tried. Says she doesn't feel talking has worked at all and nothing has been solved.Camhs have said she doesn't open up much- thinks she is very anxious and has some difficulties understanding concepts/communications - is increasingly very literal in communicating with me and husband. Possible aspects of Aspergers?Is very articulate, thoughtful,, very independent, deep thinker.Should we push Camhs for a "diagnosis"- I think she is depressed. Not sure re aspergers.If she is depressed, should we consider medication.we reckon she has been like this for probably @ a year or so before we got to Camhs. Put it down to change in adolescence.we knew things would take time but feel we are running out of energy taking its toll on us all including dd1and dd3. I want to encourage her things will get better.anyone have similar experience? Any words of advice would be much appreciated.Sorry this is so long.

Have you googled Girls with aspergers?

There are some good articles out there, most of them say similar things, that girls are diagnosed later or misdiagnosed on a regular basis, that girls issues become noticable later, that depression and eating disorders are common and most imortantly (in my opinion) they are good at masking their issues!!

If you havent read any I would recommend it and the book Aspergirls! If you think your Dd fits the profile it will help if you arm yourself with knowledge and help your Dd to maybe understand a bit more about herself and her differences.

Good luck

God she sounds like me. At that age I mean....I am more than likely on the spectrum and really had a hard time from age 14 to about 17 when it improved vastly because I was able to leave school and study only what I loved...in my case it was a BTECH in drama....as that's not going to happen for your DD at 14 the other thing which helped me enormously was painting, making stuff (maybe if she is artistic she'd like DeviantArt website) and also....walking my sister's dog.

I suppose the exercise plus the green surroundings did something for me...I don't know for sure but when I had to take over those daily walks, I improved slowly but surely. Maybe she'd like a pet?

MrsF has hit on several of the things that I found helped, fresh air and exercise, and an activity on which I could really concentrate - for me it was puzzles or chess or sudoku. Since discovered it is called a displacement activity. For my dh it was fencing and writing and my 5 year old, when I was in and out of hospital, said 'when I am sad I take the sad thing out of my head and put Pokemon there instead'

Also if you can run with any area of special interest, that might help. ds and dd got low when they were disgnosed with their sn, and concentrating on their strengths/passions was helpful.