Anyone with a Bi-polar child?

[~Coyotebones~]

I am starting to think that my 6 year old son may have child onset bipolar disorder.  He has pretty bad tantrums and is violent with his younger brother; it seems to be cyclic and I can't find any external reasons for his behaviour when it does happen.  Bi-polar disorder runs in my family and I am pretty sure that I have a mild form of it too.   I am pretty drained mentally and physically right now, so I'm not describing too much, but I mostly was wondering if anyone here is even dealing with this (as it is pretty rare) and would like to talk with people who are experiencing it and have an AP style of parenting.  I am sure that he is not on the autism spectrum.

[Heavenly]

My son has bipolar disorder (and other issues) and he was diagnosed when he was 7 years old.  The first thing I want to say is that if you are planning to have him assessed make sure it is an incredibly extensive evaluation.  I hear of so many children on bipolar email lists and the like who went to a psychiatrist once for 2 hrs, with the parent talking for most of the meeting, and then getting diagnosed with bipolar disorder.  Bipolar disorder is a very difficult illness to diagnose in young children and you need to have an incredibly involved assessment to rule out any other problem before giving a child a label of bipolar disorder.  Our assessment was done by a place in southwestern Ontario that is the leading authority for bipolar disorder in children for our area.  It consisted of about 30 hours of assessment, meeting with a psychiatrist, a psychologist and a social worker, and also included 4 home visits.  I would not have felt comfortable putting the label of bipolar disorder on my child without that type of assessment. 

Bipolar disorder involves a lot more than tantrums and hurting a sibling.  I am not saying your child does not have bipolar disorder, but there would need to be a lot more than that going on to warrant a diagnosis.  My son had almost every sympom of early-onset bipolar disorder when he was diagnosed, including being suicidal.  You say that it is cyclical but in a child it is very rare that you would be able to see the cycle because almost all children display ultradian cycling, which is ultra-ultra-rapid cycling.  The child will usually cycle multiple times within a day.  It is very hard to see the distinct cycles unless you are paying very close attention.  Only 4% of adults are ultradian cycling, I am one of them, so I am well experienced in this type of cycling. 

By advice to you is to start of keeping a mood diary, a diary of every little thing that goes on day to day, even if it seems insignificant.  You have to log everything because only after days or weeks of entries will you be able to see a pattern.  You can also start a mood chart, there are lots of example online.  I would also institute a firm style of discipline, and no I don't mean spanking, to see if it helps.  Before jumping to a diagnosis of mental illness it is important to make sure that it is simply not a discipline issue.  Yes, I know with AP there is usually a focus on strictly gentle discipline, but with a child with these issues you need to be a bit more firm.  We're fans of supernanny, and no she does not advocate hitting a child ever. 

Good luck, and if you have any other questions or specific issues please feel free to ask.  We have been living with a child with bipolar for many years, and a treated one for 3 years, and we've learned a lot.

[Heavenly]

I forgot to add that our son recently completed a psycho-educational assessment as well, which was very helpful and gave us even more insight into his issues (he has received the added diagnosis of ADHD:I and multiple learning disabilities on top of all his prior diagnoses).  An assessment like that can also be very useful, but we had to wait until he was stable to be able to accurately assess his learning capabilities.

One other note - 100% stability with a child with bipolar disorder is not very likely.  There will always be issues, there will always be cycling, but if you can get them to a place where they are able to be happy and living as successful a life as possible then that is a good place to be. It has taken a long time but our son is doing as well as we could expect now.