Wednesday, March 21, 2007

Honey's day and art therapy

Honey is home again today (yesterday as well). I cant help but feel that she was again in withdrawal (we are not ready for that yet!! Honey is still trying to get to a stable place- then we will be more ready to reduce the poison in a slow, precise manner-- withdrawal symptoms are not expected at this time, so it is frustrating and scary for Honey, and worrisome and scary for me ). It is the liquid, I am almost certain. I bumped her back to 31.25mg of the tablet (1 1/4 25mg tablet) and gave her 6.25mg of the liquid yesterday and today (by late in the day yesterday, she was still struggling, but seemed to be coming around, today, she appears more stable (no crying and doing more than just sitting there). She says she is still feeling "out of it", overwhelmed and tired. Our "helper" has just emailed me. She had shared that the liquid could/would be a problem and had I received her concerns prior to getting the script for the liquid/Honey starting the liquid, we would have been able to make a safer decision. Our "Helper" writes this:

"Yes, different pills have different "inactive" ingredients. In most cases, it is a difference in timing of release or amount being metabolized. The liquid contains no real fillers. I cannot say you will have less trouble in the switchover by doing it gradually. I've not seen a smooth transition no matter how it's done. My best advice is to not do this while she is in school. Regardless of her preferences, you are the one who needs to keep her safe. I would be concerned about her safety during a transition like this. If she cannot control other things (her actions and attitudes that are out-of-character), she certainly cannot control her reaction to possible akathisia or other difficult reactions while switching over."

So, starting tomorrow we will go back to all tablet at least until school is out. Tapering down/off will have to wait.
At this point, I may have to look into a compounding pharmacist. If liquid is going to cause these crazy withdrawal symptoms, I am not sure it is worth it. She was struggling with 12mg of liquid/25mg tablet.
Who knows, but for now, I wont worry about it too much (other than looking into a compounding pharmacist and checking on cost there, I will also let Honey's doctor know that we have put everything on hold (tablets only) until school is out. Will let her know what is up then, unless she wants to see Honey)
Honey spent about 4 hours today gathering some affirmations that spoke to her (posted below) and picked several to put up in her room and around the house. I will take a photo of them later. They are beautiful.
Yesterday she spent hours making "bead buddies"... that was weird. She even wanted to go in our very messy and unorganized storage/crawl space area to find her old "bead buddies" that she made maybe 8 years ago- when they were the thing to make. After she tired of bead buddies she made some of those deals where you put the plastic bead things on a grid like deal, then iron the beads so they melt and you can remove them from the grid deal- that was weird too. I did see though that these were soothing activities for her and she really jumped right in with making some affirmations she can display. I will have to take a look around this weekend at Michaels and see if I can find something that takes little thought that she might enjoy. Art therapy, I guess. Stephany will know. If she sees this I bet she will say something. I think she mentioned this once to me.
We were talking last night about her thoughts always going back to negative or upsetting thoughts. We talked about how our thoughts become who we are and how if we are able to change our thoughts, to turn negative thinking away by using affirmations, that maybe the negative/upsetting thoughts can be controlled more (instead of allowing them to control us.)
more later
also, Honey mentioned the possiblity of my homeschooling her for the remainder of the year.

3 comments:

soulful sepulcher said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Honey's mom said...

Yes, I asked her how she felt when she was doing these crafy projects and she said good- and she got a little teary eyed.
I love your ideas.
It was weird to read your ideas about magazine clippings.
She has been cutting stuff out of magazines for about a year. Because it feels good. ( I am so thankful it is magazines she is cutting and not herself )
Now we have some ideas of what she can do with her clippings.
I will be quiet, stephany. I guess I would have tried to fill it up with chatter, but I like your wisdom. It really is theraputic for her, isn't it?

soulful sepulcher said...
This comment has been removed by the author.