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Originally Posted by Skeezyks
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Oh, thank you kindly - I don't know how I missed those!
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Originally Posted by BirdDancer
Interesting! I can't claim to identify with this from my childhood, though. Not that I didn't have a temper at times. I had rather clear periods of euphoria (and other typical manic type features) and depression (mostly anxious), but they started at around 14.
My youngest nephew was diagnosed with Asperger's Syndrome when he was quite young. That dx was pretty clear for him. Coincidentally, his older brother eventually also received an Asperger's diagnosis, but years later. My older nephew also received an ADD diagnosis, inattentive type. He has always been a quiet easy-going person, even in childhood. My younger nephew was usually quiet and often depressed, even at a very young age, like 6, but he would have violent outbursts at times a few years later (I think usually provoked to at least a small degree) and my sister said he'd have periods where he'd pace back and forth in distress. The worst of his childhood "mood" issues were suicidal depression related. As he got older (16/17) he would physically fight his father and the police were called (though I believe he was again provoked to various degrees). At about 19, he hit my older nephew to the degree where not only were cops called, but he had a restraining order put against him. He lived with my dad and brother, and while there he was very quiet and calm. He was only tentatively diagnosed bipolar at that time (along with Asperger's), taking bipolar meds, but later more firmly dxd bipolar.
My sister (their mother) also has a bipolar diagnosis, and it seems from her descriptions, and my childhood observations, that her elevated moods were exhibited mostly as violence, fury, and severe frustrated distress (mixed episodes), like my youngest nephew's. My bipolar manic episodes had some of that, but plenty of more classic euphoric manic features.
The point to my share here is that bipolar can look different in different people, but my curiosity about the Disruptive Mood Dysregulation Disorder is if it requires clear depressive symptoms. The articles referenced above don't clearly mention depression. If there is no clear depression, I'd wonder how certain a full fledged bipolar diagnosis will be.
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Ja, my son's dX situation has been a pickle, no doubt about it. For a while, I was beginning to question whether he warn't BP - or there is another term, which presently escapes me - which I think essentially means 'pre-bipolar' but someone on the medication forum did a masterful job comparing/contrasting the nuances of symptoms, when they appeared, etc., - the thinking was that what we had been witnessing fit more into AS than bi-polar - which is what the doctors had said - but now I understood
why and it made sense.
The disruptive mood dysregulation was a new dX that had been given to him at the MH facility that he'd been taken to for a while. I haven't the chance at Dr. Grohol's articles on the subject just yet but from the little I understand of DMD, my son doesn't meet the strict diagnostic criteria for it. Which would be good, 'cause DMD sounds like a monster, a real monster.
Regardless of what someone has, unless it's simple ADHD, the treatment will always be from the same bag - a few ancient neuroleptics, a few 2nd gen APs, a handful of SSRIs and some off-label use anti-seizure and sympathomimetic agents. Mix and match. Results may vary.
What if the cure for a given MI malady, mixed episodic BP or a certain strain of AS, for example, would require a hybrid of a re-engineered psychedelic and an anti-depressant along with an antihypetensive and 30 mcg of vitamin C? Would we ever know? Just seems like they've developed one line of medications and because of development costs, etc., they are forcing the complexity of human psychiatry to fit that moulde.
Any road, I'm derailing my own thread (again).