Bipolar Teens Support Group

I am dealing with my 17 year old daughter and her issues with being raised by me after my husband left due to my illness and his inability to cope. She has just turned into a different person in the last year and has finally opened up with some very raw resentment towards me. I also have an 11 year old son, both kids live with their dad now but visit often.

I have BPII and my biggest problems were depression and anger. I slept all the time and when I was awake I was likely screaming at my ex or the kids. I have been well for the past 4 years and our relationships are significantly better.

Living with dad has been both a blessing and a small curse. He is not a good example in the way he copes and deals with life. He doesn't have BP and he is still screaming all the time. He runs hot and cold, if things are going well he's fine, if not, he's pissed and lets everyone know it. The bottom line is he cannot deal with serious stress of any kind, he just loses it.

So my daughter has been making a lot of trouble for herself and dad has come completely unhinged which just doesn't help her. And he has been keeping a lot of information from me about her bad choices so I am in the dark in a big way.

We are all heading into counseling together along with wife #2 and her kids.

I want to know how many of you think a board for teens of BP parents might go over at mdjunction. Would you encourage you child to join? Do you think it would benefit them? And how do we protect their privacy here?

Hi Dee! Glad you are here. I think it could be helpful for some teens to have a discussion board of that sort. We could either do it here as a thread or you could contact Roy about starting a new discussion group. I'm happy to do it here, though. It must be tough for kids of BP parents...my mom had major depression and I would wager she actually had BP and I sure didn't know what to do with it. Looking back, it would have been helpful for all of us to have done therapy, so you're doing the right thing by doing that, I think.

Well, let me know what you think about starting a thread. Take care of yourself!!! Hugs, peach

Hey peach. I think Roy is going to start a new group. I was commenting on another site that I thought most of our postings would overwhelm my daughter. I want a safe place where children with BP loved ones can openly discuss their feelings.

Thanks.

hi im 19 years old and I’ve been raised by my mother, my two grandparents and my uncle all who suffer from Bipolar,

the best advice i can give to you , is don’t make your 17 yr old go through counselling, all through out my life my parents have sent me to counsellors, shrinks, and it was possibly the worst thing they could have done. it didn’t give me answers it just sugar coat things, and made me cry all the anger out.

the best thing to do is just talk to your daughter and tell her everything up front. i was 12 when my mother had a good chat with me, for years she would make excuses for the cuts on her wrists and hands. she was in a world of denial hiding everything from me, expecting the shrinks and counsellors to try and help me when they couldn’t. i felt at ease when my mum sat me down and was like i was sad and i cut myself (well offcourse that’s not exactly what she said but you get what i mean)

id be more than happy to answer anything you want to ask me.

im only 2 years older than your daughter but I’ve lived through what she’s dealing with and im still living with it.

x