I'm Julie Cochrane, used to be Timoclea on Fornits, and I never sign in, but you can do a Google search on me or find me on Baen's Bar at
http://bar.baen.com to verify who I am and my bona fides.
I have bipolar disorder, controlled through meds and a prior course of good therapy. I have a 9 y.o. daughter with pediatric bipolar disorder, so I know about being a parent of a kid with mental health problems, and I know about *being* a kid with mental health problems.
My first advice is regular hospitalization is quite necessary for your daughter right now because of the self-harm through cutting and her needing to be restabilized on her psychiatric medication. Also, it can't hurt to have the hospital doctors take a look and get their second opinion about her diagnosis.
Many people with bipolar-spectrum mental illnesses (depression, OCD, and all the anxiety disorders seem to be related to similar "broken" things in the brain, just less severe) become addicted to alcohol or other drugs. Some psychiatrists believe that the genetic vulnerability to mental illness and the genetic vulnerability to alcoholism or other drug addiction are caused by the same genes.
The first thing you need to do is get your daughter stable on medication and detoxed from the drugs. Do this either directly in hospital or in a *short term* detox center. Something in the neighborhood of three weeks to three months. Do not try anything longer on the first effort.
Then, after your daughter comes home, if she continues to live at home (after 18, obviously her living at home or not would be a mutual choice), hand her her medication when it is time for her to take it and watch her swallow it.
Many people with mental illnesses have the symptom of firmly believing that they are absolutely not ill, that nothing at all is wrong with them---despite the objective evidence clear to *everyone* around them.
DO NOT send your daughter to a facility with a bad reputation like PCS. Where there's smoke, you can't afford to take a chance that there's going to be fire. This is your beautiful, irreplaceable baby, here. She's the only one of her you have, and you still have lots of options to try that may well work before you even consider something as drastic as some program that may take *years* even if she elects to stay in it after she turns 18. And some program that a lot of people say they have PTSD from.
I know someone who used to work as a therapist at a program in Alabama that has some complaints, but not nearly as horrible a reputation as PCS. She said she'd *never* send a kid to a program in Utah, and usually had to open a trauma file on kids they got that used to be in pretty much any program in Utah.
I'd go further. I know a number of LDS people who are great folks, but I've never heard of a program run by people who claim to be Mormons that *doesn't* have a raft of abuse allegations. Everyday Mormons can be great people, but stay *far away* from programs run by Mormons. Frequently the people running those programs have personally horrible reputations and appear to just be hiding behind their nominal religion to get the trust of their home communities.
Do not use any facility in Missouri. Missouri has almost zero regulations for anything that calls itself a religious school of any kind. There is virtually *no* consumer protection or quality control.
You're not at the stage to try a commitment longer than a short-term detox, anyway.
I know your situation is terrifying, but I see it practically every day in the national support/advocacy group for pediatric bipolar disorder.
You're at the stage of temporary hospitalization in a regular hospital to get her stabilized, and then short term detox. You want to use the least intrusive treatment that works, to avoid doing further harm, so you try each level of treatment before going on to the next most intrusive level.
90% of the time, you get success *before* you get to institutionalizing your child in a program---and make no mistake, a program like PCS, or any of the similar "programs," that is potentially years long is institutionalizing your child. They'll tell you they won't keep your kid for years but will send them home just as soon as they're ready. Most parents I've talked to have found that to be a flat lie and that they keep the kid until the 18th birthday, for years if the kid gets there younger, *or until the family runs out of insurance and money including all the kid's college fund and all the equity in the parents' house and any liquid retirement savings*
*Most* people in your shoes will get results as good with a short term detox as they would with even the best and safest longer program (institutionalization).
Some kids really do need to be institutionalized. *Your* kid right now needs to be stabilized on meds and dried out in preparation for outpatient follow-up care. Try that *next*. For *most* people in your shoes it will work.
What do I mean by "work"? I mean mental illness is frequently for life and addicts relapse. Mental illness is usually for life no matter where you send the kid. Anyone who says they can "cure" it is lying. Except for short-term reactions to some extreme stressor, there are *no* cures. Well, phobias can sometimes be cured. Other than that, unless it's *one* episode of reactive schizophrenia, or post-partum depression, or you get lucky with PTSD, or *one* episode of clinical depression brought on by something like a death of someone close, mental illness is for life. No cures, only ongoing treatments that are *usually* effective.
No matter where you send a mentally ill person, or an addict, or for how long, chances are at some point in their life after they get out, they'll relapse. In some ways, it's a bit like surviving cancer--you always have to watch it, because you may have to treat it again if you have a problem with it again. With cancer, they count "success" in terms of do you make it another five years. With mental illness and addiction, think of it in terms of how long you get sobriety or stability before you fall off, and how well you do at climbing back on.
For most people, you're going to have *at least* as long without a relapse after getting out of short-term detox as you would after getting out of an institution like a "Program." Particularly if someone directly observes your loved one taking her meds at the appropriate times each day, and makes sure she gets to outpatient appointments. Don't worry too much about non-cooperation with the therapist when she's at outpatient appointments---most therapists will be good enough to get past that initial resistance after a few sessions. Persist.
And with the short-term detox, there's much less chance of making a mistake in choice of facility (fewer bad apple facilities) and landing your kid with PTSD or permanent physical injuries on top of her other problems. Many of the Programs have a history of being lax at providing timely medical care to patients. Sometimes kids even *die* from medical neglect or improper restraint techniques in some of these places.
If you can at all swing it, change jobs and move so that your kid gets out of detox and comes home to a completely new environment and the opportunity to make new friends instead of falling back in with old friends who are still using Meth. One of the triggers of relapse is being back in the environment where the addict was using.
A fresh start out of detox, with *lots* of therapy and family emotional support, is her best chance of going longest without relapse.
Julie
