My daughter has been racking up the Dx's since age 6. She has several now that are either neurological, neuro-behavioral, or psychological.
IT is completely possible for a child to "suddenly" acquire schizophrenia. Juvenile onset has been on the rise for the last 10 years or so. Classic presentation used to pop up near the end of puberty/early adulthood but it can appear at any time.
Same for bi-polar-though I will admit that they didnt used to diagnose it in children much but now that they do I feel like its becoming more and more common. Several folks in the field insist that a lot of the ADHD Dx's out there are actually juvenile onset bi-polar with rapid cycling.
Also, its not that uncommon to get several Dx's in "one fell swoop". Sometimes the parent dont take their child in until things become unmanageable or possibly dangerous, then the Dr. realizes that this is more than one thing going on here. Several Dx's tend to run together as well and if you have 1 mental illness or neurological disorder you are more likely to get/have another one as well.
Its also possible that the child has been well medicated for years now so the family kept some of the Dx's under wraps but now that the meds arent working so well anymore/needs a med change they need to put there cards on the table and get all the support that they can. I have heard of families of students with high functioning autism holding back the Dx from the school because they worried about their child being labeled or put in a self contained class that had more severely effected kids in it-so it does happen.
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And, what's appropriate for the kid in class? No one seems to know what to do except send him to the academic counselor if he's "having a bad day."
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I really dont want to sound condescending but...whatever the child needs is whats appropriate. My daughter has had fluctuating services over the years depending on where she is at (several of her conditions have waxing and waning phases, and puberty created it own challenge in getting her meds right). Sometimes in middle school she had a social skills, organization, and self regulation class as her elective (taught by the school counselor and sped teacher), in elementary she had social skills and pragmatic language with the counselor and speech therapist, sometimes she had the ability to see the counselor as needed whenever during the day, for a while we had to have a modified school day because the whole day was too much for her so when she reached the "I'm done" point she would get her work and go home. Sometimes she had to be excused from classes early so she could sit in the office during passing periods because the hallways were too overwhelming, She has always had "break cards" where she can give a teacher a break card and use it to walk up to the office, have a snack, get some water and then walk back to class, she often had extensions on projects, tests and assignments because if she was "super off", there was no way she could anything done. We also had a BIP's and endless accommodation the classroom (like needing to sit in the back of the room because sitting in the front made her feel like people were watching her and she would get horrible anxiety, needing to have the door open to the classroom open she she didnt feel trapped, ect)
We also have safety plans and so should any school that has a student with behaviors/symptoms that could cause a safety concern and specifically spell out the what the next "level of care" is should the student need more psychiatric help, and what behaviors would trigger the need to take things to the next level of care-i.e. when police would be called, when student would be sent to psych emergency via ambulance ect, where in the chain of parents are notified.
There is nothing inappropriate if its what the student needs, but there is a level of need that is inappropriate for the general education classroom and not able to be accommodated. If that is what you asking well...that would depend on what symptoms/behaviors the student has.
My kid goes to a special therapy enhanced school now because we did in fact reach the point that the general environment couldn't reasonably accommodate her needs. That option should be reserved but kept open for when its needed.
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being very unfocused and not doing any work.
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Well, thats easy then-this could be because of the medicine he is on-several medications that are taken for bi-polar and schizophrenia can have a side effect know as "cognitive dulling". They make it hard to think and concentrate and learn...thats tough at school. Often you can help by providing check lists of items due on the students desk, verbal or nonverbal redirection-writing directions and prompts down for the student and cuing him to use them, word banks and graphic organizers (if he gets lost in the middle of writing or cant remember the right words).
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03-05-2020, 10:51 AM
