Stop Diagnosing Your Child!

When your teen is in a crisis, there is this overwhelming need to find the answers.

Desperation can really wreak havoc when you feel time is at an essence and nothing else you do on your own seems to be working.

So when you haven’t reached out to a professional mental health provider because of shame and embarrassment, you try to figure out for yourself what is wrong with your teen.

That is where you made your first mistake.

I can tell you from experience that when my teen was showing all kinds of sporadic and risky symptoms and behaviors, it frightened me.

So I started to google the symptoms and behaviors in the cyber world. What I came up with were some frightening diagnosis’ that left me worried, scared and downright panicky.

Did you know that many symptoms can crisscross each other and what could show up as borderline personality disorder could also be the same symptoms of teenage hormones?

When I shared with someone what I had found, they quickly brought me to my senses and told me immediately that my teen did not have the diagnosis that I was coming up with. They were not as emotionally involved and much more equipped in knowledge on subjects like this. Because they had interacted with youth of many ages as well as studied many different aspects of mental disorders, they were in a much better place than myself in understanding these issues.

They were also quick to inform me to get the correct diagnosis from a professional and not diagnose on my own.

I was very thankful to God that this person revealed this information to me otherwise I could have caused more damage or problems for my teen that were not necessary.

They also reminded me of how dangerous it is to take guesses and make assumptions when I clearly did not have the expertise in the psychological field to determine what the real issue was.

Think of it in this manner. You are entering a cooking contest. In your hand-written special recipe, you notice your recipe has an ineligible ingredient due to some damage on it. Because you have done this particular recipe before, you think you remember what that ingredient is. However, there are many other similar ingredients to choose from that could either turn this recipe into a total disaster or complete it to how it was originally developed. Would you really take that chance and live with the consequences?

You must ask yourself if you really want to create more than one crisis for your teen based on a good guess. Sadly, many parents are doing this and their teen ends up with more issues than what they originally had.

This person was right. I was totally off base and what I thought was the most horrible thing was something altogether different.

So if you are googling for a diagnosis for your teen right now and ended up on my site, stop what you are doing, put your pride aside, call a mental health professional and let them figure out your teen’s diagnosis. I guarantee, you will know what you are dealing with and what your next step of treatment will be when you put your teen in the hands of a professional. Then and only then will you have all the tools in place to fight the war against the illness in your teen.

For by wise guidance you can wage your war, and in abundance of counselors there is victory.

Proverbs 24:6

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