<p>I had to look it up too. ( are you kidding? I want a mail application so when I hold my finger over a word it brings up the dictionary like when I am reading on my ipod)
It’s what my younger D has- finally given a name by my older daughters boyfriends dad ( who is a neurologist on the other side of the country)</p>
<p>I was concerned when I learned that not only was younger D much more depressed than I had realized, but the Dr at the university clinic just started her ( at springbreak) on Lithium, but also is continuing her other medication- including a SSRI ( which is contraindicated with Lithium), meds for ADD & for thyroid ( which the clinic diagnosed).</p>
<p>Of course everything I read indicates that Lithium is supposed to be closely monitored which isn’t possible because the clinic isn’t open during the break.</p>
<p>So since my older D has friends/roommate in med school I asked for her opinion ( also hoping to get some insight in case her sister had told her anything I wasn’t aware of- no that isn’t spying)</p>
<p>She mentioned to me that they were going to talk to the dad, but I didn’t give them any extra info besides what they already knew, because I felt I should ask my D’s permission first to discuss her medical history.</p>
<p>Anyway- I found it enlightening, that finally someone paid attention to her not being able to smell anything.
She has been like this since birth- we both had mentioned it to various Drs, including neurologists & physicians from the UW medical school, many times but no one has ever been concerned enough despite other concerns to look further into it.
Usually they just say that she must smell something since she is able to taste food.
But you still can taste food, when you have a cold.
& I have seen that she can’t smell natural gas, as well as a lot of other things.</p>
<p>So it is encouraging that someone thinks it is important enough that she should have an MRI, but discouraging that, she is almost 21 & this is the first time it has ever been suggested.( apparently Stevie Wonder has this as well- )</p>
<p>Still very worried about the lithium though. I am going to try to get her into her old Dr, if I can make her come back to Seattle.</p>
<p>OMG
I am so angry & upset.
I have taken my D to many Drs including specialists & no one thought it was a concern.
Without even reading her medical history or being on the same side of the country as my younger D- this Dr rattled off a list of things that could cause problems that are related to the same area of the brain as anosmia- All things that she does, that I thought were caused because I wasn’t a good enough parent.
Possibly all things that could have been treated and without which she could have had an actual childhood. 
</p>
<p>The University of Washington, is obviously not as good of a medical school as they think they are, if several Drs with lifetimes of experience between them, did not put 2 +2 together enough to even find out what it meant.</p>
<p>I said to my H, we are certainly going to have to reevaluate how we view people from Alabama.
mea culpa. :o</p>
<p>Hope your D will finally be helped!</p>
<p>Also, we in AL are always reevaluating people from other places as well!!</p>
<p>As a person from Alabama, I guess I am glad you are going to reevaluate your opinion of all of us. But I must admit that feels like a bit of a bass-ak-ward compliment…</p>
<p>Also, I truly do hope your daughter’s issues are cleared up soon.</p>
<p>I just added that cause we in the north seem to think we are superior to people who drink sweet tea- I don’t really feel that just because someone has an accent or is friendly, means that they are less intelligent.
( and cause I was trying to lighten it up)</p>
<p>But thanks for your understanding.</p>
<p>Wow. It’s amazing, emerald, that nobody has taken this problem seriously all these years, or even seemed to know that the condition has a name. I would be p*$$#@^, too. I just read a small article on this condition on the web. It’s potentially quite dangerous. Does she not smell anything at all? How long has this been going on? Was she born without an olfactory sense, for instance? I’d be very worried about the school’s clinic prescribing two drugs that are contraindicated for simultaneous use. Lithium alone is a pretty heavy duty drug, and an SSRI is nothing to sneeze at. Have you address this with her school doctor? Must we all become medical autodidacts in an effort to protect ourselves from medical incompetence?:(</p>
<p>While no one doctor can know everything (and Click’n’Clack proved conclusively that 2 or more people can know less than 1 person), you would think that if we can look up a string of symptoms on the internet…they could too.</p>
<p>What’s esp. frustrating is when you have looked something up and found not ‘junk science’ but a peer-reviewed study from a major research university. Then you take that report along to your kid’s appointment and they smirk at it and dismiss it because it’s from the internet. My D has several physical issues…among them hyper-flexibility. Studies indicate that hyper-flexible people have different reactions to pain and pain medication than us stiff-folks. Certainly things that cause other people agony hardly register (like a torn shoulder tendon) and they had to give her different anaesthetic during her recent operation. But most of her ‘regular’ doctors just pooh-poohed this when I’d mention it. Grrrrr…</p>
<p>This is one reason, among many, that I do my damnedest to stay out of the hands of the doctors. I don’t do ‘alternative medicine’ or dose myself but I neither do run to them for every ache and pain, as do several of my friends. Broken limbs and arterial blood will send me to the doctor, but very little else.</p>
<p>EK – Many people aren’t diagnosed with whatever they may have until they are older. It’s better, I guess, than never being diagnosed at all. Don’t beat yourself up about your parenting any more. Everyone does the best they can with what they have. Keeping my fingers crossed that you and YD meet with compassionate and intelligent care ('cause one isn’t much good without the other) from here on out.</p>
<p>Reminds me of my mother–she had many chronic conditions over the years.</p>
<p>Doctors would say to her, “There’s nothing wrong with you, Mrs. XXXX.”</p>
<p>She’d answer, “No. There’s something wrong with me. You just haven’t figured it out.”</p>
<p>Glad that you know have a label you can put to her condition, even if there may not be anything that you can do to “cure” it.</p>
<p>Had she been seen by a neurologist before, EK4? Sometimes seeing the right specialist who asks the right questions is the key to finally understanding what is going on. The problem is that many health plans restrict access to specialists. Very frustrating…</p>
<p>y*D has several physical issues…among them hyper-flexibility. Studies indicate that hyper-flexible people have different reactions to pain and pain medication than us stiff-folks. *</p>
<p>Is she double jointed anyplace?
I am double jointed in my fingers & have loose ligaments every place else- at least until I turned 53.
It causes a lot of problems- my knees hyperextend- if your muscles are not really strong you can hurt yourself easily & we tend to get arthritis* much earlier* than other people.
( which I can attest to.)
I don’t know about the pain meds re: hyperflexible- but I am also a redhead and we process anesthesia differently- so when I was in labor- nothing they would give me helped & when I had surgery, I had so much anesthesia I upchucked for a day afterwards. ( sorry for the tmi)</p>
<p>My D1 forwarded me the email from her potential FIL ( I only say that cause they have flown her out to see them twice & because her name is the same as her boyfriends sister & SIL- which I think is weird coincidence- I didn’t know it was * that popular* ) & he was right on target with so many things but I don’t know how to tell D2.</p>
<p>I have mentioned before the things like piercing her own ears when she was 6, taking her braces off herself when she was in high school as well as other things- & damage/injury to that part of the brain could explain it.</p>
<p>trying not to beat myself up- & I know that this is my kid so I have a vested interest :), but don’t they get paid to diagnose people correctly? Couldn’t you assume that perhaps just by virtue of earning a speciality degree that they perhaps were curious about things that could be related to that speciality, or is it just to specialize you can bill more?</p>
<p>I think along with info about consumer financial awareness, we need to teach more about being an advocate for yourself in the health industry. It could be a full time job.
:p</p>
<p>Glad your d finally found someone who could give her a diagnosis. Her situation reminds me of “Mystery Diagnosis,” where the patient has to endure months or years of problems because all the MDs are listening for horses instead of zebras. Often the condition is something so rare that most doctors will never see a patient with the condition. But that’s certainly no excuse for discounting symptoms. It’s too bad the friend’s dad isn’t closer - did he suggest that your d see a neurologist? </p>
<p>I would also be very concerned about an MD who prescribes lithium when it’s contraindicated with another med the patient is on. Thinking of you and your d and hoping she gets care that will make a real difference in her health soon.</p>
<p>D’s not double-jointed but she can easily touch her thumb to her wrist and reach up and behind her back like Houdini…as a matter of fact, before they fixed her shoulder, the doctor asked if she was sure she wanted surgery because she had a great future as an escape artist. Fortunately, hyperflex is great for swimmers which is her favorite sport. When she is in her 50’s and starts to get ‘stiff’, she’ll just be in the normal range of motion at last. </p>
<p>Hmmm…redheads, eh? My D is the descendant of red-haired people. Oh, dear, a double-whammy! </p>
<p>Why the heck did the school doctor put her on Lithium, of all things? That’s some high-powered stuff. I’d think awfully carefully about continuing that, esp. with the contra-indication. Get a second opinion stat. Is depression a marker for her anosmia? Perhaps knowing that she has an actual illness and isn’t just ‘weird’ might do a lot to clear up the depression. </p>
<p>When my D was diagnosed ADD in the 3rd grade, just knowing that there was a reason for her behavior (something measurable and understandable) made a huge difference in how she felt about herself. I’m tearing up remembering how she asked me 'There’s really something wrong? It’s not just me?"</p>
<p>D has self diagnosed herself as bipolar- although I have never seen any indication of mania.
It does have a genetic link & I ONCE mentioned that I thought that my dad ( who died from an overdose of prescription meds- Imipramine, Methaqualone & Meprobamate) had been diagnosed as bi-polar ( although he had never been on lithium & I never saw any manic behavior- )</p>
<p>We seem to have a genetic tendency to seasonal depression but we live in bleeping Seattle- we have already recieved twice the average rainfall for the month- I think that might have something to do with it.</p>
<p>Why do kids latch on to what you say and never let go of it, but what you really want them to remember ( like don’t make me find out, because it will be worse than if you just tell me in the first place), they completely dismiss?</p>
<p>bipolar can be ones sided -unipolar with only depression. Or another diagnosis could be dysthymic. lithium can be a good drug for the right person, it just has a bad rep. I will look up anosmia</p>
<p>How can bipolar disorder only involve depression? By its very definition, bipolar means “two poles”, opposites. I’ve never heard of bipolar disorder comprising only symptoms of either depression or mania.</p>
<p>Poetsheart, nice to see you posting</p>
<p>Bipolar dx can include “atypical depressive dx” or “atypical manic dx”, also “monopolar depression”, & about 10 other variants.</p>
<p>I think that an MRI is warranted , the things she has had- she has had since birth- how many clinically depressed people have been that way since birth?</p>
<p>I am hoping that Dr Dad knows some neuros in Seattle/that D will agree to see- although if all this is from an injury ( she could have sustained an injury at birth- I had labor of three days /high forceps & major episotomy- they had to drag her out), I don’t know how they would treat it.</p>
<p>Once they understand the ramifications, they can help her develop skills to lessen the impact on her life. There may be no ‘cure’, in the sense of ‘here’s a pill…go forth and prosper!’ but understanding what she’ll need to live a full life (a sniffer dog, perhaps, to watch for gas or smoke?), is the first step forward. </p>
<p>And yes, by the way, you can be depressed from birth if you do not make or process the right chemicals in your brain. Scientists still have a lot to learn about why the brain does what it does, or doesn’t do, because we are still a mystery to ourselves. Space isn’t the final frontier.</p>
<p>I thought she had Oppositional defiant disorder.
It was very hard for her ( & me)
I couldn’t put cloth diapers on her or hold her when she nursed, she couldn’t stand to be touched. She couldn’t even stand Hanna clothes ( she preferred naked) but she did " want those babies to come to my house" :)</p>
<p>I am still upset that I wasn’t able to get any Dr to diagnose her until I took her to a neurologist when she was 5 & he said she had anxiety & put her on Paxil- which was an amazing change until another dr took her off when she was 9 & she then refused for several years to take any more medication. <<double head=“” bang=“”>></double></p>
<p>I am watching the latest House on my laptop right now & his latest case has anosmia! funny. ( of course it being House- he has a ton of other things too).</p>
<p>I know the brain is incredibly plastic- for instance the oldest had several ICH (intracerebral hemorrhage) when she was a newborn & she seems to have done pretty well in that area- although she does have some LDs ( she was also born by c-section)</p>
<p>& D2 swears she has excellent taste buds even though she can’t smell because her brain made allowances. ( she always did like spicy food & she grabbed food off my plate when she was 4 mo old- her sister was just starting to nurse when she was that age)</p>
<p>My dd was in a horrible accident last May and was left with no sense of taste or smell. Slowly her ability to smell has come back but things are a bit off, do not smell the way she knows they used to. Recently she has begun to taste certain foods again, mostly those with a high acidity. Unfortunately this condition is not taken very seriously by doctors or the courts. My biggest fear was that she would not smell smoke in case of fire. She tells me that now she can smell it although it is a different smell then before.</p>
<p>Poetsheart, the way it was explained tome was to picture a horizontal line and label that line “normal”. Now draw a parallel line under it and label it “depression”. Draw a wavy line between the two. That is how unipolar works. It’s the cycling that makes it different from regular depression. In other words, my depression goes so deep that my “mania” appears as “normal.”</p>
<p>I’ve had just about every depression related label put on me, I just don’t care anymore as the only thing I do care about is remaining functional.</p>
<p>Ek, I hope better days are coming for your D.</p>