Happy New Year and Abilify update

[Guest guest]

Here's to a peaceful and hopeful new year! I am grateful to this group for

being here, for sharing the highs and the lows, the uncertainties and the fears,

for your candor about the sheer intensity of the experiences and for your wealth

of information. And for the sincere, generous, human support. Thank you, one

and all.

I felt as if I went into the holiday season holding my breath. It was last year

at this time that , then 10, pretty much lost control of her OCD and

starting staying up late at night ritualizing and out of desperation we sought

out medication. So I was fearful of how the holidays would be this year. Since

she lost the benefits of Zoloft suddenly in late August, after about five months

of pretty good response, and didn't respond to trials of Lexapro or Anafranil

this fall, I figured we would have another Christmas like last year's. She had

been taking 20 minutes to walk through a room at home, at least 10 minutes to

get out of the car, and on and on. So I didn't get tickets for anything like

the Nutcracker - I figured we'd never make it to the theater in time!

And what happened (huge exhale!) has been Abilify, She worked up to 6 mg about

a week ago. Now can spontaneously leave the house, goes to bed because

she's tired, hasn't had a shouting match in a week, takes shorter showers, walks

through the house without incident! She's still tapping things, still has

repetitive behaviors, but BOY what a change! The most interesting change is

that she's letting me talk to her just a little about OCD. She has NEVER been

forthcoming about what she feels, what's going on in her thoughts, etc. Now,

when I coax her a bit, she'll actually say something that confirms that she

knows she has this disorder. Not a lot, but it's a start. It must be the

Abilify. She's also a little more zombie-like than I want her to be, but we

need to see what difference this makes when she goes back to school next week.

I fear for her, of course. She can't possibly take this stuff forever - first,

it's just plain too expensive. Second, she probably wants to do " normal " stuff

like having kids, and you can't take all of these chemicals when pregnant (I

know, she's only 11, but I have to think about her future!). I want so badly to

have her in ERP, which of course may not be compatible with Abilify (no strong

compulsions to work with while medicated). But for now, we'll take what we've

got and relax a bit as she gets the benefit of being freed, however temporarily,

from some of her rituals.

Without this group, I never would have known about the kids who have gotten

benefits from Abilify (the psychiatrist wanted to try Seroquel next and it might

have worked, who knows?). I asked for it because many of you had shared

positive experiences. So my thanks to you. And we'll see what happens.

Again, a Happy New Year as we work to make our kids' futures brighter.

Cheers,

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