We help people understand and cope with lots of feelings and emotions. Sometimes they don’t have a label. But sometimes they be as a result of a specific condition. You may as part of your time with CAMHS, be diagnosed with one of these conditions, so this page is to give you just a brief overview of some of the conditions that we help with
Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder – ADHD
Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, or ADHD as most people refer to it can make it hard for people to concentrate. People with ADHD often feel restless. No one really knows what causes it, but it tends to run in families. You can get help for ADHD and learn ways to manage how you feel and behave
Anxiety
Anxiety is a feeling of worry or panic about something that might happen. Everyone gets these feelings from time to time but sometimes you might need extra help to deal with them.
Phobias
A phobia is something in particular you feel very nervous or panicky about. It could be a fear of going outside or a fear of heights.
Autism
Autism spectrum disorder makes it hard for a person to deal with the world around them. If you have Autism you might find it difficult to get on with other people or find it hard to understand how they are feeling.
What is the Autistic Spectrum?
All of us are unique so this means that our Autism is also unique. The spectrum describes all the different ways that Autism can affect you.
What are the symptoms?
Symptoms can include:
- Difficulty with social communication
- Difficulty with social interaction
- Preferring familiar routines
- Having specific and intense interests in things
- Repetitive movements.
How is it treated?
There is no cure for autism but if you have autism, you and your family can be helped with:
- Information about autism or Asperger’s syndrome
- Managing behavioural difficulties that you may have because of the condition
- Developing your social communication and emotional skills
- Medication, for some people some educational support either in a special school or in a mainstream school with extra help.
Depression
Depression can mean a number of symptoms including feeling sad for much of the time, feeling irritable or angry, sleep problems and thoughts about life not being worth living. Someone with depression may think there is little hope and be reluctant or unable to seek help.
Symptoms can include:
- Not wanting to do things that you previously enjoyed
- Not wanting to meet up with friends or avoiding situations
- Sleeping more or less than normal
- Eating more or less than normal
- Feeling irritable, upset, miserable or lonely
- Being self-critical
- Feeling hopeless
- Maybe wanting to self-harm
- Feeling tired and not having any energy.
Treatment for depression in young people is usually with talking therapy and sometimes medication can also help.
Eating disorders
Sometimes how we feel can change the way we eat or how much we eat. Anorexia is the fear of gaining weight. People feel overweight even when they have lost too much weight and are unwell. Bulimia is eating large amounts of food and then being sick to get rid of the food. People might look normal but are doing lots of harm to their bodies.
Symptoms and treatment
Symptoms of anorexia include losing a lot of weight quickly, eating less and less food, thinking about the calorie content of food, feeling panicky about eating food with other people or having a big meal. You may feel moody or irritable because of the lack of food and girls’ periods may stop, while boys stop having erections. You may become obsessed with everyone else’s body size and compare yourself to them. You may feel cold a lot of the time and grow a downy hair on your body.
Symptoms of bulimia include binge eating, vomiting or taking laxatives, excessive exercise, sore throat, dehydration, bad teeth, heart problems, muscle spasms, some weight loss, change in periods (for girls), isolating yourself and feeling helpless.
A specialist will talk to you about how you are feeling to see if they can help. It is likely that you would see the specialist on a regular basis and in most cases you will do this as an outpatient. If your weight was dangerously low and it posed a real problem to your health then it is likely you would be admitted to stay in hospital for you to be treated.
Compulsory treatment
If you are seriously ill and you cannot make decisions for yourself or you need to be protected from harm, then doctors would carry out compulsory treatment.
Psychosis
Psychosis is a medical word that’s used to describe hearing or seeing things that aren’t really there. This could be hearing voices or feeling like you are being watched. Psychosis is treated with talking therapy and sometimes medication. If you or someone you know is having these symptoms then it’s important to get help early.
Self-harm
Self-harm is when a young person chooses to hurt themselves in some way. If you are self-harming you might be cutting or burning yourself or overdosing on tablets. You might do it to punish yourself or relieve stress.
Self-harming is really dangerous. If you or a friend is self-harming you need to ask for help immediately.
Tourette's and tics
Lots of people have tics like sniffing or grunting but sometimes a person has tics for longer, in this case a doctor or specialist may diagnose this as Tourette's.
A tic is a movement or a sound that you don’t have control over. Some examples are blinking, clicking teeth or jerking arms. Most people start having fewer ticks when they are a teenager or adult.