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Families Find Ways to Protect Their LGBTQ Kids

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From Scientific American comes this in-depth, research-packed article by Marla Broadfoot on the mental health challenges of LBTQ+ youth—as well as their parents—in the face of threats and legislation across the country putting them...

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A sepia-tone photograph of a lonely teddy bear small against a window.

Medical Journals Refuse to Retract Fraudulent Trial Reports That Omitted Suicidal Events in Children

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The published articles underreported suicide-related events and provided false claims that the drugs were effective.
Charles Spencer (left); cover of "A Very Private School" (right)

Charles Spencer’s Story of Boarding School Abuse Is Haunting

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But parents are still sending children away to board, and it’s still dangerous.

Engaging Voices, Part 1: Validating The Arrival of My Wife’s First ‘Alters’

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Sam Ruck shares his third excerpt from his book Healing Companions, which describes his life with, and love for, his wife and her “alters.” 

"Mad in the Family" Podcast

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Blogs & Personal Stories

Engaging Voices, Part 1: Validating The Arrival of My Wife’s First ‘Alters’

6
Sam Ruck shares his third excerpt from his book Healing Companions, which describes his life with, and love for, his wife and her “alters.” 

My Lived Experience Helps Others Heal: Working with Families on the Path to Recovery

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If one person is struggling, everyone in the family is struggling. Families need support.

Reflections on the Silicon Valley Teen Suicides-by-Train: Fifteen Years Later

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A psychiatrist and mom reflects on teen suicide clusters in Palo Alto and discusses alternative ways to address adolescent mental health.

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Editor's Corner

Going Outside: The Real World’s Impact on Youth Mental Health

For children, teens, and young people in towns and cities everywhere, community matters to mental health. Socializing matters. Having activities and safe destinations in the real world—and having the freedom, the agency, to get there—matters enormously, whether the human being in question is enrolled in grade school or navigating their 20s.

Or navigating their 90s. But as Michelle Goldberg articulated in a recent piece for The New York Times, the impact of social media use and screentime on younger generations means that youth are spending less and less time in three dimensions and more and more time in addictive and toxic cyberspace. “If we want to start getting kids offline,” she writes, “we need to give them better places to go instead. . . . We need a lot more places — parks, food courts, movie theaters, even video arcades — where kids can interact in person.”

One reason kids spend so much time inside on their phones is, she points out, widespread parental fear of letting them loose into an unsafe world. Interestingly, a similar call for community engagement and healthy in-person interaction was issued in a recent article in Nature that focused on urban youths specifically, urging cities to do more to support their mental health—such as providing safe spaces for socializing. 

Read more…

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Support Groups

MIA offers moderated, online peer-support groups for parents of both minor and adult children. The U.S./Canada group meets each Tuesday on a drop-in basis. The U.S./Europe group meets on the second Thursday of each month.  Learn more and sign up here.

For info on other online and in-person support groups, including those for parents and families, click here. To suggest more for the list, please email [email protected].

Q&A: What Is Executive Function, and How Can Parents and Teachers Help Kids Focus? In her latest piece, author, teacher, and advocate Ann Bracken describes EF and lays out multiple approaches designed to aid teachers, parents, and teens themselves.

Do you have a question of your own? Submit it for an online reply. For past Q&As on a range of topics, check out the archives.

Psychiatric Drug Info

Did you know:

  • That longer-term studies of children given a diagnostic label of ADHD have found worse outcomes for medicated youth?
  • In a large NIMH study, researchers concluded that few youth “benefit long-term” from antipsychotics (neuroleptic drugs)?
  • That use of marijuana, stimulants, and antidepressants increase the risk that a youth will receive a diagnostic label of bipolar disorder?

Research on psychiatric drug use in children and adolescents

Research on non-drug treatments

Resources Information on withdrawal from psychiatric drugs. Directory of therapists/providers who support drug withdrawal.

Parenting Today Series