Hi all. It's been ages since I've been on here. Had a lot of things happen in the last year and just didn't have enough time to be active here but now I have some questions and need advice from people who know their stuff.

I'm gonna do a quick run down but I do have a very long and detailed thing typed up. If anyone thinks they could be of help please and would like to see the whole thing send me a PM and I will send it to you.

This is for my 12 year old daughter. She ran into a post last November 28. Had 6 weeks of severe migraines, panic attacks, TMJ issues, whiplash injuries to her neck, shoulders and upper back. She was on a migraine preventative (amitriptaline) prior to this but by the 6 week mark this was upped from 10mg daily to 25 and Maxalt twice a day. She also ended up seeing a psychologist and has a neurologist consult coming up. Slowly things improved and we were able to phase out the Maxalt and psychologist.

She still has issues with panic and anxiety, especially in social situations or when we try to get her to try new foods. She is moody sometimes and a bunch of other minor issues we could put down to her age.

At the end of April she was diagnosed with scoliosis and Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome. Here is some info: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK1279/

There are also some excellent videos which describe a lot of the effects and problems created by EDS on the entire body: http://www.tcapp.org/doctor-videos I'd recommend watching the one by Dr. Francomano first, Dr. Henderson second, then Dr. Collins, Dr. Teasley, and Dr. Chopra.

Recently we found that DD has self-harmed a few times so back to the psychologist we went. Her moods have also been getting worse again. Our family doctor even mentioned she seems very like someone with borderline personality disorder but that can't be diagnosed until at least 18 here. A lot of things do fit with it but a lot of them could also just be pre-teen/teen issues for now. We also are getting a second opinion from another psychologist starting in January.

So..... I don't want to minimize her psychological issues but we all know that physical problems can make things worse. We have an appointment with the neurologist in a few weeks (yeah, it takes forever to get in). I will see if she'll explore the physical aspects of DD hitting the post and likely having post-concussion syndrome from it and see if she knows about EDS or is willing to learn about it to properly investigate that angle too. (Many EDS patients have physical differences in the brain, studies have shown they have higher anxiety and panic even prior to diagnosis and they can have traumatic brain injuries much easier than the normal population, among other issues.)

I'd also like to get her thyroid checked. My grandmother's family apparently has had major issues with thyroid and mental health. Some who refuse to take thyroid meds have been institutionalized and at least one committed suicide after going off them. I told our family doctor about this when I was there this week without DD and he quickly said "Absolutely, we can look into it." when I asked. I'm bringing her in Saturday to get the requisition and to deal with a few EDS issues.

Aside from my mom telling me about her Mom's family I'm a thyroid dummy. I feel this is probably my best place to find thyroid info that I can trust. I need help to find reputable links for thyroid and mental health. I don't have much time to scour the web to find reputable info right now but I really want to read up on it. I need good link to medical link emphasizing proper tests. I know enough from reading here that she needs more than just the standard numbers run but I want something convincing to bring with me in case he won't do the extras.

If anybody has other ideas of things for me to look into feel free to let me know.

FYI - I'm not trying to minimize or dismiss her mental problems and will continue to treat them as best we can but if there is something physical making it worse I want to find out about it sooner rather than later. And I would feel horrible if we found out later that we missed something that could have helped because we didn't look at all the angles.

Thanks!

Amanda

You might check out http://www.stopthethyroidmadness.com/ for information on thyroid. Wish the best for you and your daughter.

Is she gluten free? So many mental illnesses are associate with celiac disease, or other forms of gluten intolerance.

https://sites.google.com/site/jccgl...n,anxiety,panic
https://sites.google.com/site/jccgl...e/schizophrenia

I read a lot about toxoplamosis and mental illness too. Not that there's really any treatment, at least that I'm aware of.

I am very much of the belief that mental illness is physiological. You can maybe develop strategies for coping with it, but I feel that the underlying physiology has to be addressed. Doctors do it with drugs, but lots of people have found modifying their diet very helpful and eliminating gluten is one of the most successful things.

Also, have you had her vitamin d3 levels checked?