first time posting. 9 year old son who has been escalating

[propofolman]

I recently found this site and have been trying to push my wife to terms that our son has more deeply seeded emotional problems than his ADD/Anxiety diagnosis.  He was diagnosed at 7 reluctantly by his psychiatrist (he completed all the tests, etc) and since then has been reasonable on meds (abilify and intuiniv).

His typical moods go from happy to extreme anger, anxiety, yelling, despair, threatening to hurt himself, etc.  As long he gets what he wants, he is happy, but as soon as negotiating happens, it goes downhill.

We recently made a simple behavior together where he picked what he wanted on it.  It lasted 2 days when he started to fail at it.

This summer has been challenging and now that school just started its been pretty bad.  He tends to do do this but now has started to introduce self violence (hitting and punching himself), violence towards other (wife, daughter), and just recently started to run away.  Thankfully its just been outside our house, but this is a brand new addition to our misery.  We have calls in to his therapist and my wife went and spoke to his guidance counselor... .

sorry for the post being all of the the place, but needed to vent a little.

Our objective is to better understand the struggles our child faces and to learn the skills to improve our relationship and provide a supportive environment and also improve on our own emotional responses, attitudes and effectiveness as a family leaders

[meantcorn34]

So sorry for what you are going through. Diagnoses are difficult with children because they are growing and changing, and nobody wants a child to be stuck with a label. That being said, it doesn't sound like the help you are getting is working.

I can only share what worked for me. First, a complete eval including a developmental pediatrician and psychologist. A major hospital specializing in children would be best to access these services. The results of the eval will give you direction as to your next steps, and direction as to the type of help your son, and the family as a whole need.

In home behavioral support was sometimes helpful, depending on the staff assigned.

I recommend you not get stuck on BPD or any other diagnosis. I understand the need to know what's wrong and put a name to it. I felt the same. My son has had multiple diagnoses over the years (he is now 23). As long as they treat the symptoms, your son will benefit.

Best of luck to you.