Caregiving Zone or Bipolar Disorders A Guide to Helping Children Adolescents

Caregiving Zone

Author: Peggy Flynn

Coping with illness and dying is a challenge. How do we allocate resources? What are the rights and responsibilities of the sick and those tending them? Can the burdens of caregiving be blessings in disguise?

In The Caregiving Zone, Peggy Flynn, founder and director of The Good Death Institute, describes the everyday challenges of caregiving. She encourages us to think about illness and death as incontrovertible realities that can be anticipated and made less burdensome for everyone involved. "Death is hard, but it doesn't have to be hideous."

Using personal stories and reflections, Ms. Flynn illuminates life "in the Zone" with understanding and empathy. She suggests that individuals and families "take charge of the inevitable" by confronting their fears and preparing for illness and death before events overtake them. She envisions "a program designed for families or groups of friends who want to be proactive about the inevitable."

The Caregiving Zone illustrates how both giving and receiving care can provide opportunities and rewards in addition to burdens. Sometimes, with insight, information and compassion, the benefits can outweigh the costs.

Interesting textbook: Entrepreneurship and Small Business Management or Financial Sector Transformation

Bipolar Disorders A Guide to Helping Children & Adolescents

Author: Mitzi Waltz

Until recently, bipolar disorders were almost never diagnosed in children and rarely recognized in adolescents, even though between 20 and 40 percent of the two million or more adults diagnosed with bipolar disorders in the United States experienced the onset of illness in their teen years or before. Psychiatrists now recognize that manic depression has frequently been misdiagnosed as ADHD (or oppositional defiant disorder, conduct disorder, or depression). According to recent data, 23 percent of children currently diagnosed with ADHD will evenutally be diagnosed as having a bipolar disorder. As many as a million children in the US alone may have childhood-onset bipolar disorder.

Bipolar disorders are different in children than in adults. There are some diagnostic criteria unique to children. Some reckless behavior is limited by being a child and being under adult control. Families and communities pay a heavy toll when this disorder is not recognized and treated. Suicide is a possible outcome, as are school failure, limited job prospects, legal difficulties, and hospitalizations. Understanding and recognizing the differences in the illness for children and adolescents is key for concerned parents and professionals.

Bipolar Disorders covers the range of topics that parents need to know about in order to help their children:

• Description of the range of bipolar disorders
• Diagnostic criteria, current and proposed, including comparisons to common misdiagnoses
• Family life with bipolar disorders, including recognizing and preventing mood swings, safety, and support
• Medications, with special attention to the physiology and responses of children and adolescents
• Therapeutic interventions in various "talk therapies"
• Other interventions, such as improving sleep patterns, preventing seasonal mood swings, diet, and supplements
• Insurance issues
• school, including special education system and 504 Plans or EIPs

As author Mitzi Waltz notes, "With early intervention, the possibilities for these kids are limitless."

Booknews

An excellent plain-language guide for parents of children and adolescents with bipolar disorders, explaining diagnosis and common misdiagnoses, medications and responses, therapeutic interventions, and alternative therapies. Gives advice on family life and support, and discusses insurance issues and working within the educational system. Material is detailed yet easy to understand. Includes an extensive list of resources such as groups and agencies, publications, web sites, mail order pharmacies, and alternative medicine resources. The author is a journalist and mother of a daughter with the disorder. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)