Meet the Other Phone. A phone that grows with your child.

Meet the Other Phone.
A phone that grows with your child.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Teenagers

Parenting teenagers has its ups and downs. Get advice from Mumsnetters here.

19yo on anti depressants - keeps reinventing herself

35 replies

wabbit · 26/03/2011 16:17

My dd is again on anti depressants and has given up yet another college course. She is enacting a pattern that has been going on for years now, since secondary school which she left before she entered Yr 11.

I agreed to her leaving school because of the amount of time I was being called into school to mediate between her and teachers and her and other pupils. She became impossible to get up in a morning - I really do mean impossible, as a single mum I had absolutely no way of moving her physically, she was bigger than me and would intimidate me, and my little boy, her baby brother if she didn't get to stay at home or do what she wanted to do.

At this point though I wasn't so aware of how much of a bully she was, it's only hindsight and the fact that it has been going on for years that I can see what she's been doing.

Two years ago she started an introductory Btec diploma in art and design and by the second term she was doing so well she was given an award for her contribution to the course and her commitment. The following sept she started the First Diploma in Art and Design and from what I could see, her relationships with tutors and students began to fail and she gave up at the end of the first term. She spent hours and hours in her bedroom, became argumentative and bullying in the home and started the cycle that she'd set up at school all over again.

DD reinvented herself last year, changing from wanting to be a tattoo artist - the reason for leaving her course which 'wasn't getting her anywhere' to becoming a Young Farmer Confused In the September she started an agriculture course and for the first half term was getting on fantastically, loving the work and enjoying getting good marks, then she fell out with some of the girls on the course and with one tutor in particular. DD was so vile to one girl that the girl left the course. Facebooking became a huge problem as what happened at college would continue on into the night over the net and DD made quite a few enemies.

This resulted in DD getting a warning from the college this February that unless she undertook an anger management and went back on anti-depressants she would be kicked off the course. She hasn't been back since and the college have now assumed that she has left the course.

I don't really have much experience with depression but DD's swinging from being idle and insolent to loving and motivated is so extreme that I do not recognise it as depression.

I suspect that she's also been looking at symptoms of depression on the net, and been using search results to make excuses for her not going back to college. eg: she can't stand large crowds or being in a confined space with a number of people - Oooh look, I can't use public transport and can't get to college.

Despite this, she used the megabus to go down to London to visit her Dad two weeks ago and spent every night out with a group of friends she made down there.

Her latest reinvention of herself is into a street-wise, hard edged, hooped ear-ringed South London black girl - her Dad kicked her out after a week and after bumming on sofas for a few days she came home, unannounced and so edgy I wish she wasn't about.

Thursday night I poked my nose into her bedroom to ask her to be a little quieter on web-cam as DS was going to bed, seeing that she hadn't unpacked her case or put away a basket of washing I reminded her about this - MAJOR objection which resulted in her ordering me out of her room and calling me a 'F+ing Prick' Hmm So I told her that she couldn't talk to me that way, came downstairs and disabled the internet.

HUGE objection (not surprised this time as I knew it would get her attention) I said she could have access if she apologised. DP backed me up and got told not to interfere, I said he was backing me up as he was entitled to do so, being my partner. She threatened to smash up my computer and all the car windows, I told her that if she caused ANY criminal damage I would call the police to which she replied that she could take being arrested and spending a night in a cell just to see my face.

At this point, I rang my mother who has a very good relationship with DD as she doles out money on demand and is in many respects very similar to DD.

Knowing I was on the phone to her Nana, DD retreated upstairs and later left the house. I have not seen or heard from her since. Mum tells me that she's with a friend.

I wish she'd leave for good.

OP posts:
wabbit · 28/03/2011 16:23

She took two weeks supply of 20mg Citalopram, all the paracetamol in the medicine cupboard, all the neurofen, and ibuprofen... some cocodamol too Sad...

Fortunately we don't really have a big stockpile of these things, most packs only had a few tabs left, but there were lots of different boxes littering the head of her bed...

miraculously she hasn't suffered any heart irregularities or side affects other than this awful detachment that she has about what she's done and how she's feeling.

Hospital treated her very quickly as she was talking to this forum friend and the ambulance was quick.

Woke up just not knowing how to feel - only when I saw the blood drenched towel where she had been cutting her arm in the bedroom did it really kick in.

OP posts:
GypsyMoth · 28/03/2011 16:28

she really meant it then....not just a cry for help,or maybe it was? has she given any reason?

this is something i went through with ex h,but his attempts were feeble,and designed to control me,and it worked!

maybe post on the mental health board...see what everyone suggests. they seem knowledgeable over there and may have some ideas for you

dittany · 28/03/2011 16:32

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

Thornykate · 28/03/2011 17:31

Oh no sorry to hear that wabbit. Agree with tiffany maybe post in the teen mental health see if that can help re the referral?

FWIW I think it sounds positive that your DS had a back up plan ie had alerted friend on Internet about what she was doing. Hopefully this other girl is a good influence & not someone who may encourage your DS with the self harm.

I know you are up to your neck already but maybe a letter or email to head of Camhs expressing your concern might speed things up? And be kind to yourself too u have had a terrible shock x

wabbit · 28/03/2011 17:34

Thank you all, have just come back from dr's

No appt, but dr was gentle and understanding/ish DD not too impressed but I think he will try to work on building up a relationship in which she can trust him so that is positive.

Going to feed DD tea and toast and have a cuddle x

OP posts:
nestypirate · 28/03/2011 21:14

Good luck, wabbit. Hope it works out a bit better.

wabbit · 30/03/2011 01:36

I had half day at work today so that I could come home for when DD woke up, she's been soaking up all the love and attention and been very loving in return - I know though that this is because currently she's regained her balance briefly on the tight-rope that is her mental health.

It's just lovely not to have the mistrust, cynicism and defensive/offensiveness that's characterised her recently.

I've bought her some Vitamin D and B complex supplements and 'rescue remedy' I've been having second thoughts about her taking a very conventional route to finding help... I worry that a psychiatrist (rather than psychologist) might treat her condition and not the root causes of her emotional imbalances.

I also fear that a 'mentally ill' label might be another reinvention of herself - but I'm probably tired and irrational and doing her a great disservice Sad

She just needs help - and isn't getting it from anyone other than us at the moment.

OP posts:
wabbit · 03/04/2011 00:00

DD had an appointment with the Crisis Team on Thursday and saw a Psychiatric Nurse who spent an hour and a half with her talking (I assume as I was not there) about her history and how she is currently feeling - She had a meeting with Psychiatrist on Friday and he confirmed what the nurse had advised us on Thurs - saying they didn't think there was an acute mental illness but a series of courses of CBT would be made available to her to help her with anxiety, self esteem and anger management and she is going on the waiting list for therapy with a Psychologist (which is currently a wait of 12+ months!)

DP's sister who is a Paediatric Psychologist and who has been an ear for DP to discuss problems with DD over the years gave me fantastic advice about talking to the Psychiatrist. She has expressed concern that there are patterns with DD that are present in Borderline Personality Disorder and advised me that I mention it so that it would be in their minds and create a possible framework from which her professionals could put together a coherent picture of what is happening.

BestNameEver are you a mental health professional? I've been looking up lots of different web sites about personality development as I've not encountered BPD before, unfortunately DD's cyclic behavioural patterns are disturbingly similar to the symptoms. So much so that both you and DP's sister have picked up on the similarities.

My mum has agreed to help pay for an independent assessment and Dp's sister is going to hunt out someone who works successfully with DD's age-group, I'm hoping that the Cognitive Behavioural Therapy will help in the meantime, giving her some strategies to cope with her emotions.

OP posts:
wabbit · 03/04/2011 00:42

Hmm DD went out for the first time tonight, just to a local pub, she's come home with an ex boyfriend who she has an on/off open relationship with... Oh I wish she wouldn't do this. A f%ck buddy just isn't what she needs right now

DP has gone to bed... I don't want to go to bed I'm worried - at least she's 'back' feisty and all - not the detached, washed out, wet rag she was last week after the overdose.

OP posts:
Pixielovescake · 09/04/2011 18:15

How is your DD today Wabbit ?

New posts on this thread. Refresh page