Hi marie, i read with insterest about your daughter, and now being a widow of a diabetic and going through a ton of things when Al was in the hospital i have to agree with Agnespuffin. although i live in canada, in a large northwestern ontario city with a doctor stortage over 30,000 people where i live are without a doctor and must use the er or walkin clinics (we are lucky in this country as there is no or very little cost, only the rich pay). One of Al's doctor's did not have hospital visiting priveledges and so he had to see a new doctor at the hospital, this doctor changed all his meds around and he was on rapid-nova insulin 3 times a day and nph at night and this was given on a sliding scale, which i had to give him every day of hislife (we were married for 25 years last Nov.). i will admit that i was glad when his old doctor retired this new one was more up on new meds. we also have a diabet. northwest, which diabetic goes to school and can bring another person alone. you would be surprised what foods can bring the sugars up. also and i know everone is different but Al had a white coat syndrom which made his blood sugars go up when he sees someone in a lab coat! also if the nurses didn't give him the insulin at his usual times he would have a reaction. i feel sorry for your family and your daughter and wish you the best. ps agnes picked up joan hess and mary daheim at the library, the kichen will be there and so will the paint! debbie

Thank you all so much for taking the time to give me/us these suggestions! Emily & I have been sitting here this morning, rereading every one of your posts and adding things to our ongoing lists to do, to take and to buy. They have helped so much. You've helped us both by suggesting things we hadn't thought of and you've also saved me money, because I'm not having to ship off things DD will need but we'd forgotten. And yes, I do realize that there will be local stores that she can shop at for forgotten items, but as I mentioned here before, we've been there and done this with DS nine years ago. Let me mention it again for any other new freshman parents: the local stores in the area will be a nightmare to shop at that move-in day and for at least the next week afterwards! Most needed items will be quickly sold out and the check-out lines will be staggeringly long with stressed out, frazzled parents and students. Been there, will NOT be doing that one again this time! Lisa: thank you for that suggestion! I'd hadn't yet thought of her immunization records, but have just added this to our list. Suero: thanks for that link. I've made a list of things we need to check with housing about. Lazy: yes, the school does provide bed, mattress, desk, chair, etc. I'm with you on the stores and madhouse there will be at them that first day/week ;^D Gotta run errands with DD once again. Will be back later to check on this thread once more. Lynn

I'm so sorry you're going through this. My sister is bipolar type 2, with rapid cycling, and I watched my mother try to deal with her. (Fortunately or unfortunately, my sister self-medicated with food, not drugs or alcohol, so she wasn't a physical danger to herself.) I *so* understand that you're afraid of alienating your daughter, and are worried that she'll leave and you won't see her. The only thing I know for sure is that nothing good ever comes out of acting from fear. I'll tell you my bias. I watched my mother do much the same with my sister as you're doing with your daughter. My mother's main concerns were keeping my sister relatively calm and not letting her break their relationship. My mother did things she *knew* were counter-productive, because she was afraid of losing my sister. She "helped" my sister in school - to the point of actually doing many of her assignments. She wrote absence excuse notes for fake illnesses. She provided my sister with spending money. (I, OTOH, started working at age 15.) Later on, my mother gave my sister a place to live, rent-free. She paid for everything - clothes, food, utilities, car insurance, gas ... you name it. My sister got a good education and could get good jobs, but when she got them, she spent all her money on spending sprees. (In one week in 1986, she bought a $20,000 car, a $2,000 exercise machine, $1,500 of stereo equipment, $1,000 in CD's, and probably a whole lot more stuff I never knew about.) My mother eventually gave her money, because she didn't want to lose my sister. (By that time, it wasn't a physical loss she was afraid of, but my sister would go into her room and completely ignore my mother if she didn't like what my mom was doing.) When her illness cycled, my sister would rage at my mother. (In type 2 bipolar, the manic cycle is more a matter of anger than what we think of as mania.) My sister would throw books and scream and make life miserable, but my mother took it, because she was afraid my sister would stop talking to her. My sister lived with my mom until the day my mother died. One of the last things my mother said to me was, "Take care of your sister." Well, I loved my mother enormously, but *THAT* wasn't going to happen, at least not the way my mother was doing it. Once my sister lost her safety net and had to be responsible for herself, she managed to do it. My sister is still ill, on multiple medications, and is hospitalized from time to time, but now she's much more responsible. She holds down a full-time job, something she hadn't done for more than a couple months at a time before my mom died. My sister will tell you that what my mother did for her, though it was done out of love (and fear), made her illness worse, not better. She'll also tell you that while she loved our mother, she never respected her. I don't know if any of this strikes a chord, but there it is. I can't say what you should do, because I'm not in your situation. I just want to urge you to consider that you're not just hurting yourself by placating your daughter to the extent you've described, you're actually hurting her. I keep thinking of that old adage about the definition of madness being doing the same thing over and over and expecting the results to change. I think you know you have to do something different, because you don't like the results you're getting. As to why bipolar illness (and ADHD, and all the rest) are diagnosed so often today, who knows? Personally, I think they're real illnesses and have been around forever, but they're also over-diagnosed. You don't need to solve the societal problem, though, you just need to figure out what's happening with your daughter. If she *does* have bipolar illness, then it doesn't really matter if 10,000 other people have been misdiagnosed with bipolar. And if she doesn't have it, many of the things you need to do are still the same. (BTW, I agree with Alisande that you're right to look at the diagnosis with a critical eye, and ask for a second opinion.) I'm sorry if anything I've written makes it sound like there's anything remotely simple about the problems you're facing. I wish you the best of luck.

Patti, this is all so confusing for you and your DD. I may be clutching at straws here, but does the hospital where the surgery was performed have a Patient's Advocate? If so that person should be able to pull all of this together. Getting that done, though, isn't going to help with the physical pain and agony that she is suffering from right now, and I would think she would need a specialist who can sort it out and recommend something for that. I had a Hysterectomy when I was 39. One ovary was removed and part of the other was removed, leaving part to produce hormones. That worked fine for 13 years, after which I was prescribed Hormone replacement pills. Haven't taken them for several years now. I've said that to make the point that with both ovaries gone, one of those doctors should have prescribed Estrogen replacement for her. I would think she should insist on that now and it will surely help her to feel better. I wish her well and hope she can get the replacement meds quickly. Then she will feel more like taking care of the other part of the problem. And for you, Patti, I know Moms suffer right along with their children, regardless of age. Take care. Sue