Anyone else have a child with OCD

[Got_Cloth]

My daughter had a probably diagnosis for a few year of OCD. Because of her age, and the fact it didnt seem to really effect her life that much, we decided to just let it go.
Recently, her actions have gotten a lot worse.She is not sleeping because she has to clean and organize at all times. her room has to be spotless and after i lost my baby a little over a month ago, and my hubby had to have emergency surgery over a week ago, she has gotten even worse and more obsessive things.
She has been seeing a psychologist for a while, because he sleep issues were found to not be medically related. her sleep specialist recomended a particular psychologist. We have seen him many times, and while i do not know exactly how I feel about him, my daughter loves him, and she talks to him, so we will not be switching.
So today, he officially "diagnosed" her with OCD. She is 8 years old, and has been classifying, and organizing since she started walking. She started obsessive cleaning at 4 years old, after the death of my first son. She also has a diagnosis of Aspergers, and they are watching her for possible bi-polar disorder.
Today the doc mentioned going to a psychiatrist to possibly medicate her for the OCD, as well as starting a behavior program to help her in the day to day. The program would be something we would do at home with her, not like a center or anything.

So does anyone else have a child with OCD? Any ideas, or books, blogs, or any helpful resources?

[Got_Cloth]

just bumping, hoping that someone has some direction for us.

[sbgrace]

I hate OCD.

The best thing you could do for her is get her into a therapist who is trained in and specializes in Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) in Children. The OCD Foundation online will have lists of doctors and whether they work with children. http://www.ocfoundation.org/ You would look at find help find a therapist. You want someone who does OCD with CBT (Cognitive Behavioral Therapy) because the type of therapy that works with OCD is different than for other disorders and specific. Given her age pediatric experience would be best but if you don't have anyone reasonably close with that I'd take her to someone who specializes in OCD/CBT over someone who doesn't even if the "doesn't" does kids. Did that make any sense?

Tamar Chansky has a good book about pediatiatric OCD for parents. I think it is Freeing Your Child from OCD. Also, there is a yahoo group for parenting OCD and last time I checked she and other pediatric OCD authors will answer questions. I can't remember the other books and my husband has rearranged my books for some reason and I can't find the titles of the other pediatric books. But if you search on amazon for Chansky's OCD book you will see the others as well. I believe she has a website too. And the OCD Foundation is a good source of information.

As far as meds--uncontrolled OCD will destroy a life. I would do medication in a child if I couldn't get relief through CBT or we needed to get to a certain point to make CBT doable (that is very possible). I would try CBT first. I might research trying the supplements inositol and perhaps N-acetylcysteine as a first try given their effectiveness and safety profiles before I moved to SSRI drugs.

I'm sorry for you and your daughter and hope she's able to get relief very soon.
Oh, a good therapist will help you learn how to help her. Parents generally make things worse trying to help without training and at her age your actions are going to be important for her recovery. Generally, the tendency is to help or reassure or etc. and that feeds the OCD. However, her anxiety levels are likely so high that to pull back "support" would be intolerable. You'll need a therapists guidance.