generalparenting

Yesterday I spoke about medicating my son for Bipolar. Today I am going to talk about the effects his anxiety has on him. He is steadily becoming more and more anxious at night. Now as I said he doesn’t have a diagnosis of being Bipolar yet but definitely has some anxiety issues. He has panic attacks at night that can be pretty severe. It’s hard to help him through. He has been getting a lot of showers in the evening to try to relax him and he has a few movies he likes to watch but other than that it’s pretty much up in the air. He was in counseling for awhile but when the counselor suggested that my son could control the attacks that was it. My son clammed up and won’t talk to him again. I can’t make him go if he isn’t going to talk to him. He feels he was being judged so he doesn’t want bothered with trying a new counselor. So we are trying to manage the best we can. He likes to read and color so sometimes he has calm days where that is all he does, those days he usually has a decent night but if there is any excitement in his day he either has a hard time sleeping or has an anxious night. Now there are medications for the anxiety that he can take that have no side effects, these are different than the Bipolar medications but we still try things like different teas and candles. Sometimes they work sometimes they don’t but they are always worth a try. My son is like me and doesn’t want to be medicated unless he has to be and so far he doesn’t think he has to be. I’m not going to make him take medication if he doesn’t think it’s gotten so out of control that he can’t take it any more. We talk every time he has his panic and we try to figure out what triggered it. Usually we can pin point it, that helps. It is still a struggle and is heart breaking for me to see him suffer. I hope we find some more ways to deal with the anxiety so that his evenings aren’t so bad for him. I don’t want him to dread the evenings coming, that will only bring more stress and anxiety. Again, I will keep you posted

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