Deborah Pardes
@DBPardes · 3:21
When The KIDS are NOT ALRIGHT: Helping Children Deal with Mental Health conditions
And how do I help him or her understand that I care, that there's help, that they're not alone. The Pandemic really helped us see the scourge of different elements a child could take on. Just because things shift and change so fast. There's fears from the outside that become fears that they grapple with inside. And there are so many ways this has shown up in mostly negative ways
Vanessa Bui
@VanessaVanBui · 2:42
We've been on so many waiting lists for formal programs to treat her anxiety and OCD, and we were lucky enough to finally get into a program about five weeks ago at Rogers Behavioral Health in Culver City. And we're still there. I think we'll be there for at least a few more weeks. She's learning coping skills. She's learning how to manage her anxiety and how to deal with her OCD through what they call ERP, exposure response prevention
Deborah Pardes
@DBPardes · 1:05
Hey, vanessa. I'm really happy we're in conversation, and let's see what new voices come in from parents who are also in this moment of their lives where they're confronted by some big decisions. And I wanted to ask you about your conversation with your daughter around your decision. How much did you sit her down and deliberate and talk about it? How involved was she in the decisions you were making versus how much did you just say, here's what we're doing
Vanessa Bui
@VanessaVanBui · 1:33
And so the decision on the therapist, the decision on going to Rogers for help was very much a family team decision on let's do this, let's figure out how to get better. And I think we're all very hopeful. There's definitely ways to get better, and there's not one way
Deborah Pardes
@DBPardes · 2:14
But while you and I are still going back and forth, I wanted to ask you about when you decided to pull her out and bring her into this program. What kind of communication did you have with the school and what was that like? And tell me about how that felt and how difficult was it to actually have the conversation? Or was it just a very easy process of just making a parental decision and then that was that?
Vanessa Bui
@VanessaVanBui · 2:06
And so when we pulled her out of school, no one was surprised. In fact, everyone was very supportive. They wanted to see her be happy and healthy again. And I want to also share that about a year and a half ago, we had an opportunity to join a program at UCLA for Anxiety and OCD. And we chose school over the program. We didn't want to take her out of school because we were concerned that if we took out her school that it would create more anxiety