Anxiety, Panic, and The PlayStation 2

 I apologize for my lack of posting over the last five days.  I have to thank Aslan for his “Way Back Wednesday” posts, as they are the ones that have kept this site updated.  Unfortunately life sometimes gets in the way of my free time.  As many of my longtime readers my know our older son, suffers from OCD which is possibly a symptom very mild Autism, and Generalized Anxiety Disorder.  Over the last 18 months with a combination of therapy and medication he has come so far.  He was originally on home based instruction, as he could not even set foot in the school building without a major panic attack.  We couldn’t go out for the day, or even be mad at him, without such a meltdown, he couldn’t even speak, or make sense.  Now he attends school, and lives a much more comfortable existence.  He is not as afraid of the unknown, and is learning to try many things.  The idea of friendship is still hard for him, and he would rather spend is free time in his room playing a game than going out with friends.  Life is more predicable that way.

The OCD can make that anxiety even more difficult at times.  My wife an I are generally good at averting these “attacks”, where his world seems to fall apart, and steer him in a different direction, though this last episode we weren’t able to.

My wife and I are a bit throwback I would say for today’s standards.  Our kids have rules, and limits, especially on their TV watching and game playing.  Games rated “E” for everyone are fine, “M” for mature is off limits, and “T” for teen, must be vetted with one of us for approval prior to play and or purchase.  Even though one child is 13 his maturity level is what we base our decisions on.   There is a particular series of games (I can’t mention the name per his doctor’s orders), that while the first in the series had some mild language and content, was still not something I would worry about them playing.  The second and third sequels however ramped this language and suggestive content, to a whole new level, and threw in drug use for good measure.  I who tend to be the easiest going as far a “parental approval”, even found them to be a bit offensive, and insulting.  So when Jon brought us the second installment of the game in Best Buy, I advised him it was a definite “no”.  He then of course asked his mother, who reminded him that if I said no, you know me the “easy” one, why would her answer be different.  Of course she read the box raised her eyebrows and replied with “absolutely not”.  This triggered a discussion with him on maturity and understanding why the game was so bad.  This is when his OCD kicked in.  For the next week all he talked about was the second and third sequels and why they are so great, and that there are no other good games in existence.  We were bombarded with You Tube videos, print ads, and notes pleading for the game.  Each and every day we were asked if he was “mature enough” yet.  Then over the weekend, the boys spent some time with their grandparents, who usually say yes to most things we say no to.  As he showed Grandma the You Tube Videos, she let him know she 100% agreed with our answer.  He then begged, pleaded and said how life was just no fun without that game.  From sun up to sun down, it was all he talked about.  He began to offer his life savings to anyone that would let him get the game.  Saturday his grandmother called and was supportive of us (Is the world out of sync?), and was telling us about his rants for the game.  Saturday afternoon, he methodically search the house for the first game in the series (you know the harmless one).  When he found it, I being the mean dad I am told him that that game is now added to the “no” list as it would not be fair to torment himself.  Out came a two hour crying episode, and the only thing he could say was why he needed this game to survive.  This stayed with him until late Saturday night, when he totally lost it.  He took is playstation 2 out, threw all his games away, packed up all his toys, all while yelling incoherently.  Needless to say the thought of returning to this was terrifying to both his mother and I.

We had been given another medication to use when the panic attacks surfaced, and have nod had the need to use it in quite a while.  I brought it out Saturday and told him to take it.  He willingly took it, saying that he knew he was out of control.  So I stayed up until I knew he had gone to bed and was asleep.  Sunday I had reconnected his Playstation 2, and returned his games to their rightful place, and put the other toys back in their exact locations.  And then we kept him on the extra medications though Sunday, weaning him back off by Tuesday morning, with an appointment with the psychiatrist yesterday afternoon. 

I am happy to say he seems to have moved back to being happy and satisfied.  He found a sonic the hedgehog game Monday that he loves (rated “E”), and has bounced back.  His doctor enforced with him that he is not allowed to play any of the games in the series, and no one is allowed to utter the name.  He will be seeing him again in 60 days.  We are now to track his ups and downs to see if there is a pattern, and if there is they will adjust his meds accordingly.  He explained that it is hard to tell if depression caused the OCD outburst or the OCD caused the depression. He believes it is the OCD that triggered the depression.  He gave us new guidelines for the “secondary” medication, which we need to start it at the beginning of the cycle, as it should hopefully allow him to pull himself back out before it gets as bad as it was.

And that is Another Day of Life.  Thanks for reading.

~Another Day

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