Mental Health Awareness Thread

[mredskins]

Originally Posted by BaltimoreSkins

So this weekend we discovered that our 14 year old has been cutting her arm. We have been open with her that we will go through her phone and discovered that something was going on. She then wrote a speech and there was a subtle mention of it in the speech. We talked to her last night and learned of the myriad of pain she is in. She carved the word ugly into her arm as well as just typical cuts you associate with cutting. I don't know how much she provided and how much she was still hiding in terms of emotions and physical pain.

There is so much guilt here. Both my wife and I work in education. We are trained to see signs and completely missed them with our own daughter. Working on getting her counseling but in the mean time we are going to get her to meet with school social worker.

Seeing you kid in pain is soul crushing.

Dude i am so sorry.

I have a 14 almost 15 year old boy, this has been the most difficult year of parenting. It's such a tight walk act of when to pressure them when to back off when to give them privacy when to intervene.

Their mood swings and yearn to be independent are further challenges.

Don't beat yourself up, you will always view your daughter as your child through the glasses of her parent; you see other children through your professional glasses; its two different worlds. Their is zero negligence on you or your wife's part, plus you have now identified and working to a solution that is great work.

Their are times where i just start to cry and think am I even doing this correctly. My son at least from my perspective is doing fine, there are ups and downs but i still feel lost at times as a parent.

This morning i felt guilty because he came downstairs to talk to me last night and i was playing CoD with my buddies and i couldn't have just got off, so he walked off. =( I should have just turned the game off but i want balance some fun time for me as well.

As parents of teenagers we are coming out of the years where i controlled basically everything and we were his sole voice of "authority". It's a hard transition.

I will say this my niece was cutting herself my sister and BIL identified it got her the help she needed and she is doing amazing.

Your family will make this hurdle and come out stronger, hold strong fellow teenage parent, I gotcah you.