Hi,

This is my first, perhaps only post, but I wanted to share an abbreviated story of our family's experience with Bipolar. My dtr first showed signs of depression a the age of 13. She excelled at school, had many friends and all was well with the world. She had no health issues. However it was not long before she started to show signs of depression. She became so depressed that she talked of suicide. The doctor recommended an antidepressant, zoloft, but after increasing the dose several times it did not appear to help that much. After a period of time her depression turned into manic, up all nite, happy time and the depression soon subsided. But it was not long before things would come crashing down and we were back to depression again. There was no other way to describe this time period other than it was like riding a roller coaster. Up and down, very difficult to keep up with. And the anger she displayed was scary.

We took her back to her doctor who sent us to a pdoc. My dtr was diagnosed with childhood bp, something I had never heard of. After reading info on it, it appeared she had many of the symptoms and this was a possibility. We decided to put her on meds for bp and she was started on lithium. This seemed to help a bit, but it was by no means perfect. These years were agonizing, almost unbearable but together our family managed to her my dtr get through the high school years.

Once she had graduated we decided it was time to have a showdown with the doctor. The meds were not working, she had not had a menstrual cycle for years (doc blamed the meds) and we needed answers. After confronting her doctor we were sent to a gynecologist who after listening to our story sent us to a endocronologist. This man was a lifesaver. He immediatly had bloodwork done on all of her hormones. He also called for a thyroid uptake test done in the hospital and an MRI.

The result of the tests was this......
Even though her regular thyroid tests appeared to be normal, her thyroid uptake test showed that it was not working properly. She was put on thyroid meds. The bloodtests showed that most of her hormones were off of the charts, particularly her prolactin which was well over 200. The question was, why were her horomones off of the charts. Well, the answer to that question also answered the question of why she was not having her periods.
The MRI revealed that she has a small tumor on her pituatary gland (the gland that is the control centre for all of her hormones)
It was determined that many of the above medical findings were causing identical symptoms to bipolar symptoms and she was told that she did not have bipolar. She was to come off of the bp meds and begin taking meds for thyroid and meds to shrink the tumor which continue to this day. I have to say that taking her off of the zoloft was a nightmare. Never ever just stop this med. It took us 3 stages and 3 months to wean her off of this med and each stage was horrendous. But she is now off of zoloft and lithium. Once she started on the med to shrink the tumor it was less than a month later that her cycles returned.

The reason for writing the above abbreviated story is not to say that your children do not have bp. I would never say that. However I urge parents, particularly of teen girls to not make the same mistake I made and hang your hat on one diagnosis. Particulary if the meds are not working. I did this and it is difficult for me to forgive myself. I am very angry with the doctors that did not listen to us when we asked if it could be something else when the meds she was taking did not seem to be working. It was almost as if we were offending them.

It is now 8 years later. My dtr does not have any symptoms of bp. She still has her tumor (benign) but with meds it continues to stay small enough that it is not affecting her moods or hormones. She works full time, lives on her own and is independant. My heart goes out to those whose children are not well. I lived that rollercoaster life for many many years and I don't know how we survived. I hope I have not added to that burden. I ask only that you not be afraid to ask questions and if your instinct is telling you that there might be something else going on, rely on your instincts. I wish I had done the same.

Take care.

Welcome to NeuroTalk Nessa. I'm sorry your daughter and family had to suffer for all those years but I'm glad she is finally healthy. Thanks for sharing your story.

I too am sorry you had to go through this. And thank you for sharing your
story.

Donna