Conduct Disorder (CD) plus Substance Abuse—
Sadly, this is very common. In my clinic, every youngster with CD is assumed to be abusing substances until proven otherwise. Compared with kids who do not have CD, kids who have CD are three times more likely to smoke cigarettes, 2.5 times more likely to drink, and five times more likely to smoke pot. As far as having a problem from drug use, kids with CD a 5.5 times more likely to be addicted to cigarettes, six times more likely to be alcoholics, 7 times more likely to be addicted to pot. This is certainly the most common comorbidity and often goes along with the ones below.
John-
When John was 9, he told his mom that he wanted to buy lunch instead of bring it. His mom at that point still believed that some of what John said was innocent of any other purpose, and so she let him. She did notice that he was very hungry when he came home from school. He said the lunches were small and for an extra 75 cents he could get seconds. She believed this. Two weeks later the principal called to report that John was caught with cigarettes on the playground. John's mom was amazed, as she did not smoke and neither did her husband. Not only that, but he had a whole pack. Well, it took a lot of "interrogation" to get the story out. The lunch money went to buy cigarettes from a boy in Jr. High. John then smoked a few of those and then sold the rest at a big profit. His parents remembered that two years later when he was found drunk in the locker room at Jr. High. Now his parents are lots wiser. John still thinks his parents are totally unreasonable. The rule is you get your allowance and phone privileges as long as those random urine drug screens are normal. If he doesn’t cooperate, then they are assumed to be positive. So he ended up poor and lonely for a few weeks, but now that is under control. As far as cigarettes go, if he can buy them, he can smoke them outside. If he is caught drinking or around people who are drinking, good-bye allowance and phone. John hates it and can't wait until he moves out so he can finally do what he wants.
Conduct Disorder (CD) plus ADHD—
When these two disorders are present, usually the ADHD symptoms are much more severe than when ADHD is present without CD.
Michael-
Michael is now 14. When his mother thinks back to his infancy, she could actually see it coming at age 18 months. At that age he got up in the middle of the night, put a chair up to the door, opened it and went walking outside. The cops found him a while later and brought him home. If only that had been his only contact with them!
Michael's mother hated school almost as much as Michael did. Almost every day there were calls from the school about Michael. In grade primary he tried to stab a youngster with scissors. He was swearing at his teachers by grade one. On Grade two it was stealing lunch money. Every time they seemed to get one problem under control, he was into something else. Everyone seemed at a loss about what to do except her brother. It didn't matter what the weather was like, Michael was out there. His uncle said that by the time he was ten, he could do the work of a grown man. There was no fear in Michael. Cold weather, big swells, nothing bothered him. He refused to do any homework from fourth grade on. Up until that grade, his teachers let him go out for a walk around the building every hour or so, but when a set of keys went missing and were "discovered" by Michael a few days later, the walks ended. Still, compared to the last few years, this was easy.
Michael was suspended from 7th grade after two weeks when he threw a match into a boy's locker. Why? The boy called him stupid. He was out for a week, then after only two more days, he was thrown out for making death threats against the teacher. His parents tried home school and they thought they were getting somewhere - until they got a call from the bank. They were overdrawn. When it all came out Michael had stolen the cash card and figured out the password and had taken out $500 dollars. They still don't know how he did it. Before they could even sort that out, Michael was arrested for vandalizing the school. He would have only received probation, but after giving the judge the finger, he was sent to the MCYC Youth Center. It was the staff there that finally figured it out. This guy could not sit still for anything, he said the first thing that came to his mouth, and was constantly getting in bigger trouble for it. He saw the doctor, ADHD was diagnosed, and he was given medication for this in the Youth Centre. But what will happen in two months when he gets out? His mother spends a lot of sleepless nights thinking about that.
Conduct Disorder (CD) and Depression—
Kara-
Kara is 14, too. Her life didn't start out quite so difficult. In fact, her mom swears that until she was almost 10, there were no problems. That is hard for everyone to believe now. Her mom remembers thinking that Kara was certainly starting the teen years early. At age 11 she was having a tantrum about not being able to go out with her boyfriend who was 15. You could hardly blame her. By the time Kara was 11, she looked like she was 15 or 16. Unfortunately, she did not have the maturity of a 16 year old. She ran away from home at age 12 for a week before they could find her. She brought a bottle of rum to school and got drunk. But more than this, she was absolutely unbearable to live with. She had become super defiant, and would fight her parents or anyone else for no reason at all. She never seemed happy, just angry. Unless she was with her friends, which by age 13 or 14 were 18 or so. Her parents kept asking themselves, "what had happened to their old daughter?” She was failing in school mostly because she was never there. She was never where she told her parents she said she was. The first clue came when she came home high on something and told her parents she was going up stairs to bed. They heard a crash and came in the bathroom to find her trying to cut herself with a broken mirror. Kara wanted to die. Her boyfriend of two months had left her. For a few weeks she just hung around the house and lay on her bed and listened to music. Her parents let her out one night to go to her girlfriend's house. They got a call later that night that Kara had admitted to taking a half a bottle of Tylenol.
It is not uncommon that a mood disorder along with CD gets missed. There are usually so many pressing problems to sort out and so many different stressors, that it isn't until suicide is tried or talked of that many families, physicians, and other health professionals consider comorbid depression. Recent studies of teenagers who have committed suicide have found that these kids are about three times more likely to have CD and 15 times more likely to abuse substance. Suicide is worth worrying about in CD.
Conduct Disorder (CD) plus Tourettes, OCD, and ADHD—
Jake-
Jake is now 12. He has seen more doctors, nurses, and psychologists than most people will see in a lifetime. His father worried that maybe his son could have Tourette's like him, but he never dreamed it could get like this. When he was 4 he was thrown out of pre-school for fighting. Because of his reputation, he was the first youngster where the school approached the parents about getting a teacher's aide in grade primary rather than the parents approaching the school. Lucky for Jake, he never seemed to have all of these problems at once. Usually he would have a tic, especially blinking, which would last a few weeks or so. Then he would have to touch things, and then that might go away, too. The tics and OCD were nothing compared to his behavior. His temper was incredible. The usual pattern was that the excitement of being around other kids would get him so wound up that he was literally bouncing around. This usually led to pushing, fighting, and punishment. He resisted this and usually ended up being sent home as they could not deal with him. He attacked him sister. He attacked his mother and broke her arm. That led to living with different relatives and now a foster home. No one seemed to be able to manage him. The new foster parents were actually being bothered the most by his poor sleep and a nearly constant vocal grunting tic. They brought him to yet another doctor to see if they could do anything about this. He was placed on some medicine for the tic and amazingly, he behavior improved quite a bit. For the first time his parents are hopeful that maybe he can come home again.
==> My Out-of-Control Child: Parenting/Teaching Children with ODD
* ODD Support Group for Parents and Teachers
Sadly, this is very common. In my clinic, every youngster with CD is assumed to be abusing substances until proven otherwise. Compared with kids who do not have CD, kids who have CD are three times more likely to smoke cigarettes, 2.5 times more likely to drink, and five times more likely to smoke pot. As far as having a problem from drug use, kids with CD a 5.5 times more likely to be addicted to cigarettes, six times more likely to be alcoholics, 7 times more likely to be addicted to pot. This is certainly the most common comorbidity and often goes along with the ones below.
John-
When John was 9, he told his mom that he wanted to buy lunch instead of bring it. His mom at that point still believed that some of what John said was innocent of any other purpose, and so she let him. She did notice that he was very hungry when he came home from school. He said the lunches were small and for an extra 75 cents he could get seconds. She believed this. Two weeks later the principal called to report that John was caught with cigarettes on the playground. John's mom was amazed, as she did not smoke and neither did her husband. Not only that, but he had a whole pack. Well, it took a lot of "interrogation" to get the story out. The lunch money went to buy cigarettes from a boy in Jr. High. John then smoked a few of those and then sold the rest at a big profit. His parents remembered that two years later when he was found drunk in the locker room at Jr. High. Now his parents are lots wiser. John still thinks his parents are totally unreasonable. The rule is you get your allowance and phone privileges as long as those random urine drug screens are normal. If he doesn’t cooperate, then they are assumed to be positive. So he ended up poor and lonely for a few weeks, but now that is under control. As far as cigarettes go, if he can buy them, he can smoke them outside. If he is caught drinking or around people who are drinking, good-bye allowance and phone. John hates it and can't wait until he moves out so he can finally do what he wants.
Conduct Disorder (CD) plus ADHD—
When these two disorders are present, usually the ADHD symptoms are much more severe than when ADHD is present without CD.
Michael-
Michael is now 14. When his mother thinks back to his infancy, she could actually see it coming at age 18 months. At that age he got up in the middle of the night, put a chair up to the door, opened it and went walking outside. The cops found him a while later and brought him home. If only that had been his only contact with them!
Michael's mother hated school almost as much as Michael did. Almost every day there were calls from the school about Michael. In grade primary he tried to stab a youngster with scissors. He was swearing at his teachers by grade one. On Grade two it was stealing lunch money. Every time they seemed to get one problem under control, he was into something else. Everyone seemed at a loss about what to do except her brother. It didn't matter what the weather was like, Michael was out there. His uncle said that by the time he was ten, he could do the work of a grown man. There was no fear in Michael. Cold weather, big swells, nothing bothered him. He refused to do any homework from fourth grade on. Up until that grade, his teachers let him go out for a walk around the building every hour or so, but when a set of keys went missing and were "discovered" by Michael a few days later, the walks ended. Still, compared to the last few years, this was easy.
Michael was suspended from 7th grade after two weeks when he threw a match into a boy's locker. Why? The boy called him stupid. He was out for a week, then after only two more days, he was thrown out for making death threats against the teacher. His parents tried home school and they thought they were getting somewhere - until they got a call from the bank. They were overdrawn. When it all came out Michael had stolen the cash card and figured out the password and had taken out $500 dollars. They still don't know how he did it. Before they could even sort that out, Michael was arrested for vandalizing the school. He would have only received probation, but after giving the judge the finger, he was sent to the MCYC Youth Center. It was the staff there that finally figured it out. This guy could not sit still for anything, he said the first thing that came to his mouth, and was constantly getting in bigger trouble for it. He saw the doctor, ADHD was diagnosed, and he was given medication for this in the Youth Centre. But what will happen in two months when he gets out? His mother spends a lot of sleepless nights thinking about that.
Conduct Disorder (CD) and Depression—
Kara-
Kara is 14, too. Her life didn't start out quite so difficult. In fact, her mom swears that until she was almost 10, there were no problems. That is hard for everyone to believe now. Her mom remembers thinking that Kara was certainly starting the teen years early. At age 11 she was having a tantrum about not being able to go out with her boyfriend who was 15. You could hardly blame her. By the time Kara was 11, she looked like she was 15 or 16. Unfortunately, she did not have the maturity of a 16 year old. She ran away from home at age 12 for a week before they could find her. She brought a bottle of rum to school and got drunk. But more than this, she was absolutely unbearable to live with. She had become super defiant, and would fight her parents or anyone else for no reason at all. She never seemed happy, just angry. Unless she was with her friends, which by age 13 or 14 were 18 or so. Her parents kept asking themselves, "what had happened to their old daughter?” She was failing in school mostly because she was never there. She was never where she told her parents she said she was. The first clue came when she came home high on something and told her parents she was going up stairs to bed. They heard a crash and came in the bathroom to find her trying to cut herself with a broken mirror. Kara wanted to die. Her boyfriend of two months had left her. For a few weeks she just hung around the house and lay on her bed and listened to music. Her parents let her out one night to go to her girlfriend's house. They got a call later that night that Kara had admitted to taking a half a bottle of Tylenol.
It is not uncommon that a mood disorder along with CD gets missed. There are usually so many pressing problems to sort out and so many different stressors, that it isn't until suicide is tried or talked of that many families, physicians, and other health professionals consider comorbid depression. Recent studies of teenagers who have committed suicide have found that these kids are about three times more likely to have CD and 15 times more likely to abuse substance. Suicide is worth worrying about in CD.
Conduct Disorder (CD) plus Tourettes, OCD, and ADHD—
Jake-
Jake is now 12. He has seen more doctors, nurses, and psychologists than most people will see in a lifetime. His father worried that maybe his son could have Tourette's like him, but he never dreamed it could get like this. When he was 4 he was thrown out of pre-school for fighting. Because of his reputation, he was the first youngster where the school approached the parents about getting a teacher's aide in grade primary rather than the parents approaching the school. Lucky for Jake, he never seemed to have all of these problems at once. Usually he would have a tic, especially blinking, which would last a few weeks or so. Then he would have to touch things, and then that might go away, too. The tics and OCD were nothing compared to his behavior. His temper was incredible. The usual pattern was that the excitement of being around other kids would get him so wound up that he was literally bouncing around. This usually led to pushing, fighting, and punishment. He resisted this and usually ended up being sent home as they could not deal with him. He attacked him sister. He attacked his mother and broke her arm. That led to living with different relatives and now a foster home. No one seemed to be able to manage him. The new foster parents were actually being bothered the most by his poor sleep and a nearly constant vocal grunting tic. They brought him to yet another doctor to see if they could do anything about this. He was placed on some medicine for the tic and amazingly, he behavior improved quite a bit. For the first time his parents are hopeful that maybe he can come home again.
==> My Out-of-Control Child: Parenting/Teaching Children with ODD
* ODD Support Group for Parents and Teachers
