Judgement

Judgement and criticism is something that all parents of special needs children have to face at one time or another. I have been dealing with it from the time my oldest child who is biracial was born and it certainly didn't end when Noah arrived. Whether it was judgement in whispers speculating exactly why he wasn't progressing in development, unwanted advice on how I could discipline him so much better to "beat" those tantrums out of him, or that I possibly couldn't be putting my son on medication to be helping him, I just must not be able to handle my child. It still shocks me though when a complete stranger makes a judgement about my life and caring for my son when he or she has no possible idea what I go through on a daily basis.

Yesterday as I was handing Noah's bedtime medicine to Lonnie (he will usually only take it from him), I realized he only had one pill of Zyprexa left. He takes two pills so I knew I'd have to pick up the prescription from the pharmacy today for tonight's dosage. I didn't think this would be a huge deal as the prescription was called in the last week of August from his doctor's office since they increased his dosage from 5 mg to 10 mg and no problems were mentioned. In the commotion of rearranging our house to make the play room and office, the website, and dealing with one of Noah's "up" days, I forgot! I remembered an hour before our usual pharmacy closed so I called them, they said it wasn't a problem, and they could even transfer to a closer pharmacy so I wouldn't have to drive as far. This sounded wonderful and it'd be ready 10 minutes before they closed. Well, what they didn't check was the hours of operation for the "closer" pharmacy. They were already closed for the day so I had to drive 10 miles away to the 24 hour pharmacy. I was upset by this but Noah had only had half of his Zyprexa dosage and he needed that other pill. I get there only to be informed that Medicaid has denied his new dosage due to his young age. I am a little frustrated but after almost a year dealing with prescriptions and Medicaid, I'm not surprised at all by this news. She explains that Medicaid will need additional documentation from the doctor's office before they can approve it. I say, "That's okay. I completely understand and his psychiatrist's office will have no problem sending that over. After all, Medicaid isn't the one that has to live with him." The pharmacy technician's response? "Yeah, that's how a lot of parents feel when they can't handle their children." Now if I heard any other mother tell me this scenario I'd probably say a million things on what I would've said, however, you never know what you will say when someone is blatantly calling you a horrible parent. I politely smiled, looked her dead in the eye, and asked her if she could please ask the pharmacist if I could have an emergency supply to last me until Monday. After I drove away, I had thought of many things I wanted to say to her. There's some ugly things I wanted to say for questioning my parenting and my choices for my son's mental health but mainly I wanted to scream, "Are you aware that his Zyprexa is the only thing that stands between him and a psychiatric hospital?!" It isn't easy being a parent of any child that has a disability but being a parent to a bipolar and autistic 5 year old is sometimes beyond challenging to say the least. Sometimes we have to make decisions that aren't easy, they're not ones we want to make, but no one said being a parent was a bed of roses.

Judgement comes in all forms and while we all have opinions, I just feel some opinions should be kept to themselves. I expect the criticism coming from random people who have no education in mental illness or autism but more times than not, the most criticism and judgement come from medical professionals or those educated as such. I recall a time I had to take Noah into the ER to have his Depakote levels tested in which I had to defend my son's psychiatrist's decision to have him on a mood stabilizer. To me, that is absolutely absurd, unprofessional, and completely uncalled for. No parent should have to defend a treatment plan agreed upon by both parents, a psychiatrist, a therapist, and a case worker to another medical professional just because they're not knowledgeable enough in that specialty to know that it is in fact in the child's best interest.

This is a perfect example on what this website is all about: awareness and education! We can no longer be quiet about these issues. People need to realize that pediatric mental illness is real and it does happen. Don't judge. Educate yourself.

Follow us on FB: www.facebook.com/lwamikids

www.lwamikids.org

<3 Awareness begins with you <3