Anyone a introvert? | Page 6 | The Compost Bin | Forums

well, finally got her blood work back yesterday, hypo-thyroid which explains a lot of what she has been dealing with, waiting to hear back on the vitamin D today

Well, she did well this summer, she was seeing a counselor once a week and was progressing well, she was able to get back to work. We started her at one night a week and slowly worked her up to four. 

Around the end of August her counselor said she was doing much better and she shouldn't have to see her anymore. I was confused by this because in my mind she never found out what was the root of her anxiety. It's definitely not introversion, I believe she has illness anxiety disorder, a hypochondriac to the point where it is crippling her.

September she had another panic attack, we called the counselor and got her back in, the counselor again mentioned being on some type of medication but my daughter didn't want it. We still had an Ativan prescription from when this all started and it was being used in emergency situations, such as a panic attack. She has probably taken 3 or 4 of them since May.

Well her anxiety has been increasing, I talked to her about it one day when she thought for sure she had a brain tumor, I told her I would call her primary and schedule any testing she needed, MRI, Cat, blood work to show here there is nothing wrong with her. She replied but Dad, 3 weeks later I will have the same issues.

I mentioned to her that I thought this all stemmed from when her appendix ruptured when she was 11, she says she believes it was earlier than that.

She really seems focused on brain tumors and then one day it hit me, my Aunt. She died from a brain tumor when my daughter was 8 years old, she was really the only one on that side of my family my daughter was close to and she has a picture of her in her bedroom next to my mother who had passed away when I was 2. We went to the funeral and my daughter wanted to pay her respects at the casket, I don't believe in hiding things from my daughter so I took her up with me and my daughter totally lost it.

I mentioned to her that I thought that this might be where it is coming from, she replied dad, we didn't go to the funeral. Yes we did I replied and told her basically what happened that day. She had totally blocked it from her memory.

 I explained to her that what my Aunt had is not hereditary, I can't prove it but I believe it was caused by environmental reasons, our family farm sits firmly above the Marcellus shale, now I'm not saying fracking caused it because this was 50 years ago but those videos you see of people lighting their water faucets on fire has been done for years in the area. Methane gas and who knows what else has been percolating through peoples wells for decades. I had even mentioned to my grandmother back in the 80's how strange it was that every other house in the area was afflicted by some strange type of cancer, she blew it off and said that cancer is everywhere.

So anywho last week my daughter decided she did want a prescription so she made an appt for her primary and he is very resistant to put her on any type of ssri's but he gave her a prescription for paxil. So I went and picked it up and explained to her the biggest concerns with drugs like these. I let the dogs out and she grabbed the paperwork for the pills and went and sat in her room. When I came in I found her sitting on her bed crying.

What's the matter honey?

I can't take these.

Why?

She held up the warning sheet, due to her illness anxiety she had it set in her mind that all the warnings were going to happen to her.

I said honey those are just warnings, it doesn't mean they are going to happen to you. They have to put those on there. The biggest concerns is feelings of self harm or harming others. These are the exact same warnings that the Ativan you have been taking have.

I want to try something different she replied.

They all will have the exact same warnings.

But I called the doctor and explained what was going on and what my thoughts were.

He said Kyle, I can't fix her with pills, that is what I was telling her, it is just going to mask the anxiety and not keep those thoughts out of her head.

I told him I agreed, but her counselor has put it into her head that she needs these.

Then I will refer you to a different counselor.

I told him I thought that was best because I wasn't really happy with the way she said she didn't need anymore counseling back in August.

We got through the weekend and my daughter had an appt with her counselor, I asked her if I could go so I could explain what my thoughts were on where the anxiety is coming from. My daughter said no, she wanted to go by herself.

She got back from the counselor and said that the counselor wants me to go to a new Primary care.

What? Why?

Because she couldn't believe that he gave me paxil without explaining them to me.

I said honey, he did. He did the first time we met him, he explained the negative side affects and why he didn't feel comfortable putting you on them.

Doesn't matter, he should still have explained them.

I told her honestly, I think the best thing to do is to take you to a psychiatrist, someone that can handle both the counseling and medication if needed. Having two different people with two different beliefs in your treatment is not working out.

Last night she had another panic attack because she took her temperature and it was 97.8, she started melting down, so I had her take it again and it was 99.6, it made it even worse. We tried getting her to come out of it but she ended up taking an Ativan.

I don't know what we are going to do at this point.

So we had a meeting with her counselor last week, she called me in the last 15 minutes of the appointment to talk about what has been happening.

She said that she is concerned that the tools she has given to my daughter to combat the anxiety and panic has stopped working, she voiced her concerns as well that her current primary did not refer her to a psychiatric nurse practitioner that is in his practice at a different office for an eval and just gave her paxil instead.

The way her counselor described it was my daughter is in a deep well with her anxiety with a ladder leading out of it but she can't reach the ladder because of her anxiety.

She suggested setting up a appointment with the Nurse practitioner for an eval and go from there as far as medication.

I voiced what my wife and I had been thinking of taking her to someone that could handle both the counseling and the medication side of it if needed. She replied if we were in a large city then that would not be an issue but here in rural Maine it is difficult, most people either go towards the counseling side or the medication side with a majority going towards the medicine because there is more money in it.

My daughter asked for her to set up the appointment.

So later that night we got a phone message from the office that the appointment would be Feb. 19th.

Since it was late I waited till the next morning to call the office and explained the situation and said that my daughter couldn't wait that long. They said since it was an initial consult and eval that was the soonest they could get her in but they could put her on the cancellation list in case something opens up.

I called her counselor and left a message and went to work.

During our busy time a man came in for takeout, we chit chatted as I took his order and he handed me his credit card. I looked at the name on his card and it was a womans name. I asked him if he was wife was a nurse. He said yes, she is a nurse practitioner. He asked me if I knew her. I said no, but I had been trying to reach her because my daughter needed to see her and the soonest they could get her in was Feb.

His order came up and I wished him a good night.

About an hour later a woman came in and I asked her if I could help her. She held out a business card to me, it was the Nurse, she said you were looking for me, is there somewhere we could talk?

I took her outside and told her everything that was going on, she asked me to write my daughters name and DOB on the back of her card and she will get it resolved on Mon. I thanked her profusely and her husband that was waiting in the car.

So we had the appointment yesterday, my daughter was with her for 2 hours and she gave her a low dosage of zoloft with a follow up in 4 weeks.

I hope this works.