It‘s Not Mental — The Book Description — Availability

Otherwise mentally healthy children can experience sleep problems, symptoms of depression, bipolar mood swings, and/or psychosis. 

The award-winning book, "It's Not Mental - Finding Innovative Support and Medical Treatment for a Child Diagnosed with a Severe Mental Illness" is currently available on Amazon, Barnes and Noble and other on-line booksellers, and, in Lexington and Midway, Kentucky,  at:  

• Morris Bookshop,   
• Good Foods Co-op,   
• Joseph-Beth Booksellers,  and    
• Midway Center for Integrative Medicine.

Being distributed through Ingram Books, any book store can order a copy of the book for you. 

If you live in Lexington, KY, please shop local!

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Book Description

Can a person diagnosed with a mental illness—a brain disorder—in reality have a physical illness—a disorder affecting the brain? “It’s Not Mental” is the compelling yet educational story of Keri, a highly gifted, learning-disabled child diagnosed with mental illness. It is also the story of her parents’ persistence in finding help for their daughter, help that ultimately led to a future filled with promise.

Beginning in infancy, Keri began to experience a range of increasingly debilitating symptoms. Sleep dysfunction, body pains, attentional difficulties, tics, obsessions, mood swings, and hallucinations, gradually diminished her quality of life. Before reaching her teens, she’d been diagnosed with schizoaffective disorder and several co-occurring conditions, while underlying issues were ignored.

At their wits’ end, Keri’s parents struggled to find comprehensive medical care for their daughter’s widening range of symptoms. What they found instead were doctors too busy to listen or too rigid to look beyond a “mental” diagnosis. Without an integrated approach to her care, Keri, like many children in similar circumstances, became subject to a merry-go-round of psychiatric medications.

But the author would not give up. She continued to investigate brain malfunctions, psychiatric diagnoses, hormones, diet, sleep, and immune function, all the while navigating the torturous paths of our health care system. Much of what she learned is outlined here in gripping narrative based on real-life experience. In easy-to-understand prose and with clear explanations of medical jargon, she covers topics such as: 

*  Helping a child deal with hallucinations while they’re happening
*  Using a psychiatric service dog to give a child greater independence
*  Obtaining special accommodations at school
*  Communicating effectively with doctors
*  Identifying and obtaining necessary medical tests
*  Dealing with medication side effects

Otherwise mentally healthy people can experience sleep problems and/or symptoms of depression, bipolar mood swings, and/or psychosis. 

It’s Not Mental encourages us to think outside the box. It is only by tearing down the barriers of stigma and abandoning our traditional band-aid approach to psychiatric treatment that we can embrace more effective emotional, educational, and medical support for these children and their underlying condition(s).  






These are some symptoms discussed because all these pertained to this one child/teen/young-adult!

• Training and using a psychiatric service dog (medical service dog)
• Obsessive-compulsive Disorder (OCD)
• Major Depressive Disorder
• Anxiety Disorder
• Kleine-Levin syndrome
• Tourette syndrome
• Post-Traumatic Stress disorder
• Mood disorder
• Bipolar disorder
• Psychotic disorder
• Schizoaffective disorder
• Fibromyalgia
• Chronic-Fatigue syndrome
• Narcolepsy
• Hypothalamic dysfunction
• Convergence insufficiency
• Intestinal malabsorption
• Mitochondrial dysfunction
• Nutritional insufficiencies
• Idiopathic Hypersomnia

Related Reading:

• Childhood-onset Schizoaffective - A Medical Doctor's Perspective of the Case
• Bipolar and Off Her Meds
• Looking Beyond the Symptoms – An Integrative Approach
• No Longer Bipolar / No longer Schizophrenic - Recovered, In Remission, or Misdiagnosed ???
• Recovered - No Longer on Psychiatric Medications
• Sets of Symptoms--Not the Cause–Get Diagnostic Labels
• Inflammation of Body and Brain
• Gluten Sensitivity and Symptoms of Schizophrenia
   

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Last Updated:   01 January 2012