Ocd in 8 year old

[Mommyofmk]

I apologize in advance as this post may be a bit long but I want to make sure I get it all out there.
For the past month my 8 year old daughter has been coming to me with these confessions and intrusive thoughts. Things from images of a man and woman having the s-word to just ordinary things that happened during her day at school. From the moment I pick her up from school the confessions begin. She has to get every single detail out and if I interupt her or stop her for any reason she has a complete melt down crying, screaming, anger so I just let her tell me until she's done. As I said before some of the stuff is just normal child things like I borrowed my friends pencil and I asked to go to the bathroom 3 times today. Most of the time she just wants reassurance to make sure everything is ok and that she didn't do anything wrong but then there are times where she will tell me things like that traffic cone looks like a penis or I sometimes have thoughts of a man and a woman having the s-word. Then there are times where she says "I don't know if this is the truth or I'm lying I feel like I'm lying I'm so confused" I have taken her to the children's hospital and she has been diagnosed with OCD however what confuses me is that "I feel like I'm lying" part. I have been doing quite a bit of research on OCD and nothing regarding that has come up. The doctors have also suggested medication for her but I'm still a bit iffy however the wait list for cbt is quite long and I don't want the child to suffer any more than she needs. If someone can please shed some light here and help me out that would be amazing!!

[Mommyofmk]

Thank you!!! I'm doing the best I can considering I have no idea what I'm doing here nor a clue in the world as to what it feels like to be in her shoes but seeing her suffer the way she was gave me the drive to do anything I could to make it stop. I reached out the every doctor, nurse, pharmacist and used every resource available to me. I really appreciate your encouragement because I have never dealt with this personally and hearing everyone's kind words makes me feel like I'm doing something right.

[JGF25]

Love it!

[Mommyofmk]

I would just let her confess because no matter what I said it would still happen but I gave her a time limit and told her what times we could talk about it and any time after those specific times we would not discuss them anymore. With the help of the medication and over a few weeks time she was able to tell that she was just having "what if" thoughts and say to herself "ok this is just my bully bossing me and I'm going to boss back". During the times when she was not able to confess I would find things such as cross stitch, painting, art programs at the library, baking cake pops and anything else I could think of to distract her mind from the obsessions. Through the entire process I told her exactly what I was doing and why I was doing it. " I'm going to start you in some programs so that you can keep your mind busy so the bully doesn't boss you so much" eventually she learned that if she keeps her mind busy that she doesn't have time to dwell on the thoughts. This was a temporary "band-aid" to help her cope until she was able to chalk the thoughts up to ocd and move on.

[JGF25]

There is a lot of information on the web regarding parenting a child with OCD.  Here is one such link.

http://beyondocd.org/uploads/pdf/parents-guide.pdf

[Cabrinabaru]

Thank you so much for your feedback. It is so helpful.
When your daughter ask you repeatedly " am I in trouble if" questions(things she isn't and wouldn't be in trouble for), how do you respond ?
My daughter ask constantly and is constantly needing reassurance that she isn't in trouble but I feel that if I always say " no, you aren't in trouble" that I'm just fueling her rituals.

[Mommyofmk]

As for homework.... She doesn't even want to begin the task let alone complete it. It takes her 2 hours to do 15 mins of homework because she cries and can't focus long enough to complete the task. And when the task is complete it is sloppy and illegible because she rushes through it. But as I said before since starting the Celexa this and almost every other ocd symptom has subsided to the point where she can actually relax and enjoy certain things.

[Mommyofmk]

Your story sounds almost exactly like my daughters it's as if I were writing it myself. The cheating thing happened almost on a daily basis with her. What I did with that was at our parent teacher interview I had the teacher explain to her that, yes, cheating is frowned upon however it is not the worst thing in the world. I suppose hearing it from her teachers mouth was enough to settle her. Yes, my daughter did have a constant "what if" like what if I do this or what if I do that is it bad am I in trouble?? Or she would then say ok what if I did this and then I would ask did you do it and she would reply with an I don't know if I did it I think I did but I don't know. The therapist has told me that ocd can convince you of anything you allow it to. It can twist and bend your mind to the point you have actually convinced yourself you did do it. Have you talked to her about ocd?? Have you explained to her what it is? I label her ocd thoughts as "the bully" and I tell her that she needs to "boss back" to the bully. I found that actually giving it a label and allowing her to see that it's not her actually feeling this but rather a "glitch" in her brain, put her slightly at ease. It is sooo heartbreaking and difficult to see them suffer through all of this they can't even enjoy being a child and do things that children normally do

[Cabrinabaru]

Thank you so much for your feedback.
It is greatly appreciated. I feel like I am in this alone becasue I dont want to involve my friends with it.
What I meant was that she isnt saying and doing the bad things but has truly convinced herself that she did. I cant reason with her about it.
I like the journal idea. We will try that tomorrow.
How does this effect your daughter in school? Does she complete work on time or need to redo things?

[Cabrinabaru]

I forgot to also mention that she is obssesed with thinking she is cheating. If she glances at a piece of paper at school, if we help her with homework, if we make a suggestion, etc.- she considers all of that cheating and will not continue the task or will say she cheated.
Its so heartbreaking to watch because she is so mentally tormented that she cant relax and have a normal conversation with me anymore.

[Mommyofmk]

Yes!!! My daughter is in constant need for reassurance it doesn't matter if I have reassured her once or 100 times she still needs to be reassured she is NOT in trouble. I also find that as soon as one issue is over with and she has confessed and convinced herself that she is not in trouble, another confession comes up and the cycle starts again. When you mentioned your daughters confessions about the bad things that you know she wouldn't do, do you mean she didn't do these things and she has convinced herself she has done them? or did you mean she has started to now do certain things to break the rules?
I know exactly how you feel as my daughter only confesses to me as well. I feel like I have to do anything I can to help her. I decided that I was going to take her to the store and have her pick out her own diary/ thought book. As soon as she has a confession she writes it in the book and I tell her that at 6:30 I will read her stories and we will talk about it for 25 mins and after that she needs to do some arts and crafts. I have found this to be extremely helpful because the confessions were taking up sooooo much of her time.

[Cabrinabaru]

Thank you the info. We have an appointment Wednesday and I plan on discussing this with her doctor.
My daughter is constantly needing reassurance for every single thing. She will ask me 20 times within an hour " am I in trouble if....". It always over things she would never be in trouble over.
I feel like in her " confessional".
Her latest is that she tells me she does things( bad things) that I know she didn't do and would never do( she has always been a rule follower).
Did your daughter do any of these? If so, how did you address it?
It seems I'm the one she does this with- not my husband, therefore, I feel I have the weight of the world on me to bring her through all of this.
Any feedback is greatly appreciated. This is all new to me( we are one month in) and I feel like I'm loosing my mind trying to help her because I can't reason with her.

[Mommyofmk]

I forgot to mention... Distraction, distraction, distraction. Find anyone and anything to distract her from her thoughts. Continue every day just like normal school, daycare etc.

[Mommyofmk]

She had even more anxiety with worse panic attacks. He had some weird body twitches and she was very very angry. I was doing a lot of research on medication and also speaking to a pharmacist. Apparently doctors prescribe Prozac and Zoloft first because they are older medications with more studies done on them. However we know that older is not always better. Talk to your doctor and see if he can maybe switch your daughter to the celexa. My daughter is on 5mg of it and she is doing a heck of a lot better.  I really hope things work out for your daughter. Keep me posted

[Cabrinabaru]

My daughter is going through basically what yours is. She is 10. The doctor put her on prozac 4 weeks ago and I think she is suffering more than when she wasn't taking anything.
What were your daughters side effects in prozac?

[JGF25]

Definitely talk to the doctor about weaning off later because sometimes people wean off just to find that they are back where they began.  So perhaps when you are weaning off, you can keep a journal and see if she is reverting back to intrusive thoughts.  CBT is great but it doesn't always take care of the entire problem and you have to be really, really good at it in my opinion to rely solely on it.  I have done it but I was definitely not OCD free.  Glad she is improving though :)  

[Mommyofmk]

Thank you so much eflower and  jgf25. I really appreciate your response and kind words. We have started her on a low dose of Celexa 5mg daily. I can honestly say that within 3 days of treatment she was doing 50% better. Now about 3 weeks in she is almost back to her normal self with only a few intrusive thoughts that she is able to just brush off. I am so glad that my husband and I decided to start her on the medication because I could not see her poor body and mind suffer like that. I am so glad that you guys took the time to respond and help me with this decision. We are currently still on the waiting list for cbt and as soon as she has completed her program we will begin to wean her off the medication. We did begin her course of medication with Prozac which caused her terrible side effects we then switched to Zoloft which also did the same. After about a week and almost giving up I did as much research as I could and found celexa. I really hope that my post can help another mother or family out there that is struggling with the same issue. Thanks again guys for all your help.

[Eflower]

Hey there.

My OCD started when I was 8 as well. I would have intrusive thoughts that I would obsess over to the point where I couldn't eat.  One in particular bothered me for months; I became afraid that I didn't really love my mom (who I was and am extremely close to).  I was absolutely sickened over it and I felt the need to "confess" it to her all the time. I had several other obsessions too at various points of my childhood.

My poor mom had no idea what was going on with me.  She took me to the doctor for the not eating, but she chalked the obsessive thoughts up to "growing pains"... she just had never experienced anything like it so she didn't know what to do.

I wanted to reply to your post because I think you are absolutely doing the right thing by seeking treatment for your daughter.  I wish that my mom had.  Yes she is young to be on medication but SSRI's aren't addictive and medication doesn't have to be forever... Some people are treated and after they learn how to cope by going to therapy they can come off the medication.

Your daughter is lucky to have you in her corner and you are doing the right thing.

[JGF25]

When you have OCD you can convince yourself of anything and it just sticks in your mind to the point where you don' know what reality is anymore.  

I'm glad you got her treatment.  My sister started with OCD at age 7 so your daughter's age does not surprise me.  I honestly don't know about medication and children your daughter's age.  I'm sure there is some research out there.  CBT is such a great tool and she will have to learn it eventually and you will also because part of CBT is not seeking reassurance and so you may have to stop giving it to her but then again she is so young that perhaps the "usual" rules will not apply here.  

I wish I could help you with the medication part.  It seems so young to be put on meds but if she had ADHD she would be put on meds right so there really isn't a difference I guess.  It is awful to have OCD as a teenager/adult so I can't imagine what she is going through.  She probably doesn't have a clue why.  

Anyway I do want to reassure you that people with OCD go on to live very normal lives.  For instance I went to college, got married, had kids, have a career all with managing my OCD.  So as a mom, don't think it will hold your daughter back because it won't if it is managed well.