Teenage mood swing hormone found

[133724]

Teenage mood swings are known to be down to hormones, but scientists claim they have identified the specific one that makes adolescents so volatile.

A team from the State University of New York identified a hormone which normally acts to calm anxiety, but the effect is reversed in adolescence.

<snip>

A hormone called THP is normally released in response to stress.

It usually behaves like a tranquiliser, acting at sites in the brain that calm brain activity and, in adults and pre-pubescent children, helps someone cope with stress.

But a mouse study by the New York team shows THP actually increases anxiety at puberty.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/6434327.stm

Well this explains alot

[radfringe]

1. sending this article off to my sister

the oldest daughter will be 12 in June - she's already showing signs of mood swings...

the other daughter is 10, she'll be 'warming up' to this soon enough

[Selatius]

2. A good counter-agent to THP is THC

So get your hands on some weed to make your kids and yourself mellow out. Trust me, you'll be popular with all your kid's friends.

(I kid, I kid)

[WilliamPitt]

9. *sigh*

When I was a teacher and a dean, my "Don't do drugs" rap for my kids had nothing to do with morality or law or Just Say No. I made it simple: if you drink or get stoned beyond the unavoidable experimental stuff, you steal from yourself.

I had a classmate, whose parents emigrated from India, who was head-shoulders-torso smarter than all of us throughout all of grammar school. He skipped two grades, and was still brilliant past every one of us. After 6th, I went to a different junio high, and that grammar-school class went to the main public institution. I lost touch with this kid for two years.

I plugged back into the public mainstream two years later, and this genius kid had become a bag of dumb, wilted cabbage because of all the weed he smoked, all day long, at age 16. He didn't finish school. It was a comprehensive calamity.

I'd tell that story, and then say:

You've seen pictures of a brain, and seen how wrinkly and crenellated they are? Babies are born with brains as smooth as potter's clay. Every experience - sight, smell, touch, fear, comfort, hunger - throughout your early life, from birth onward, creates the neurological connections that form those wrinkles in the brain. Those wrinkles are the fingerprint of your unique experience.

And then I'd say, to these 14-15-16 year olds:

Around age 13, that process explodes. You, at your age, are vaccum cleaners. You are feeling and writhing and bursting and mostly insane because your mind is erupting with a hunger for pain, pleasure, information, experience. You're becoming the person you will come to be, right now, with every passing second, and it is a hard, fast, searing process. It is also magical.

And then, the point:

If you load up on booze, weed, X, acid, meth, whatever, at your age, while this magical process is unfolding, you are stealing from yourselves. You stunt and derail and slow and stultify the mind-bomb that marks this time in life, you lessen your width and depth and breadth, and stealing from yourself like this is the essence of stupid.

And finally, I'd finish:

Save it for later. Let the magic happen, and then decide if that stuff is something you want a piece of. The mind you decide with will belong to a full person, and the decision will be wiser for the wait.

Weed is wonderful stuff, but bad juju for developing minds. The teen years are wild enough on oxygen and Hot Pockets.

(and I know you know this, but it got me remembering)

[mainegreen]

17. Posts like this are I think why a lot of people here respect you.

Well thought out.

[undeterred]

19. Will Pitt has been 13 for over 20 years now.

:smoke:

[WilliamPitt]

22. Longest. Puberty. Ever.

My pituitary gland is the strongest muscle in my body. :)

[RevolutionStartsNow]

18. As the parent of a 15 year old, and as a former wild teenager...

I couldn't agree more, Will.

Also as someone in recovery, I am particularly concerned about my daughter's potential propensity for addiction, so we have a lot of "just say no" conversations. Fortunately she seems to have decided for herself -- at least for now -- that she doesn't want to mess with this stuff. I'll tell you, pot is everywhere here, but so are ecstasy, coke and a host of prescription pills (and freakin' cough syrup!).

I see her going through the normal pain and suffering that comes with being a teenager, the self-conciousness, the unrequited crushes, the drama with friends, the stress of grades, and the overall painful transition from adolescence to adulthood.

There's nothing a parent wants more than to protect their child from any danger or pain, but I'd rather keep her (as much as possible) from the dangers of drugs than from the normal (though sometimes excrutiating) pain of being a hormonal teenager.

[WilliamPitt]

3. Shit

They'll make a pill to "calm" teenagers, thus depriving them of the necessary anguish of emotional growth. Wisdom is about scars, inside and out, and pain teaches as much as love. I barely survived my teen years, but cherish the struggle today. The man who emerged was forged there.

So, instead, we'll have a generation of emotionally-stunted adults with the emotional IQ/experience of 4th-graders. Give Billy the pill before the pituitary pops off! TV, video games, Ritalin, rampant over-diagnosis of ADD, and now this: another alternative to parenting, to life, etc.

Awesome. Sounds like a perfect match for our shop/don't vote/consume political realm. Those who have never known pain ("Why should I trouble my beautiful mind?") can't empathize with suffering, whether it be far away or in the neighborhood down the street. That'll make the suffering far easier to continue, because human empathy will have finally been eradicated by a soothing blue capsule.

Brave New World, y'all. Well...at least the women will be pneumatic, and those Malthusian Belts go well with Gap jeans. :grr:

[ReadTomPaine]

4. I was thinking along similar lines actually...

A pill for this is sure to be on its way shortly.

[Skittles]

5. YES

and those of us who have suffered greatly seem to find it much, much easier to empathize with others, even if we do not directly experience their pain

[Skidmore]

6. My first thought too.

[POAS]

7. All I can think about is the teen angst shown

in the movie "Heathers".

[NashVegas]

11. I Was Thinking the Same Exact Thing

Heaven forbid adults should leave a little room for teens to learn to cope with emotions.

[The2ndWheel]

12. Isn't that the point though?

"another alternative to parenting, to life, etc."

Isn't that what our quest for perfection is all about? Where everyone can live safe, predictable, happy lives? If that isn't the goal, what have we been doing then?

I agree with everything you said though.

[GreenPartyVoter]

13. My first thought as well. They'll make a pill and force our kids to take it.

[seleff]

15. For Some it's more than mood swings, but dangerous anxiety-depression

I agree with a lot of what you say, but I'm going through a daughter for whom this is much more severe. Now daily it is "what's the point to life?" She's asked this question on and off since 11 or so. Now she's 18 and 2.5 yrs into an eating disorder (mostly anorexia) and 3 inpatient experiences have left her untrusting of almost everyone who she thinks just want to make her binge and get fat (i.e. approach a normal weight). Setting limits (like making $ and a car available only if she follows her Drs orders re her meal plan and moderate exercise) hasn't seemed to help, it just seems to drive her away from us. She terrorizes us in every attempt to help her by threatening to use symptoms or do self harm. She refed in her last IP but there was no progress in driving away her ED voice and her extreme anxiety. Given my daily fear that I will one day get a call from the police notifying me of her death (heart attack or suicide), I'd welcome a magic pill to help get past this anyday.

[RevolutionStartsNow]

20. I'm so sorry, seleff

What your daughter is going through is more than the usual teen angst. I see some of my daughter's friends with the same symptoms, one in particular. My heart breaks for this kid, who looks thinner every time I see her. She uses food as a weapon against her parents, living on celery and Tylenol when she's upset. When she comes to our house and is relaxed, she eats normally, so I suspect her problem is some combination of anorexia and depression.

While I am in agreement with most on this thread that there should never be a pill to keep teenagers from having to experience the "normal" anxiety and angst that comes with the territory, it sounds like you are dealing with something much more severe, and there are medications to address severe anxiety and depression that your daughter might be suffering.

Good luck, my heart goes out to you...

[shaniqua6392]

8. Are they going to try to make this one mandatory, too?

They are trying with the HPV vaccine. Why can't they just leave our children alone? I have 2 daughters, ages 14 and 25, and I have survived just fine. I can teach my own children how to handle stress naturally. Thank you very much. Why do I feel like I am constantly trying to protect my children from our government and pharmaceutical companies trying to make a fortune off of us? Just when I thought they already had a pill for everything, they come up with something else. Hey kids....Go sit in a quiet room with a cup of Kava tea...meditate for a little while.

[kiahzero]

16. ... wow.

That's quite a leap, there.

[shaniqua6392]

23. Funny thing is....

someone else pointed out this same fact in another post and I was the one criticized. Hmmm. I was attempting to point out that they always come up with some new drug for everything under the sun and they are attempting to make things mandatory, such as with the HPV vaccine. I just put nothing past them. I will go back to observing on DU. I don't know what I was thinking trying to voice my opinion here. Thanks for the reminder.

[Odin2005]

21. Your comparing cervical cancer to teenage angst?

Great logic there... :eyes:

[shaniqua6392]

24. No I was not.

I was pointing out that we, as parents, can raise our own children without the help of the government or pharmaceutical companies. I really don't know where in my post you saw that I was comparing the two. But, thanks for your input.

[fed-up]

10. I got through teen years by telling son his body had been temporarily taken over

by aliens and that in a few years they would be done and "my" son would be back.

This was always said in a kind, joking manner and seemed to reduce most tensions involved with his raging hormonal mood swings.

It let him know that I recognized that he was not quite himself and gave him the reassurance that "this too would pass".

That concept is what is now helping me get through what I think are menopausal hormonal mood swings.

There is nothing scarier than having mood swings that seem to be beyond normal self-control (for me increased sensitivity-increased b*tchiness, less patience). Having the knowldege that this will be a temporary glitch and that I will be back to "normal" at some point for me means that I don't need to rely on pharmaceuticals to get me through this. For whatever reason, nature designed our bodies to go through these periods.

[davsand]

14. Can I have that stuff NOW to cope with the stress I feel?

Screw the kids--I WANT that stuff now so I can minimize the stress I feel every time I watch the news or read the evening paper. Why don't we ALL just dose up and wait for it to pass? (Like a kidney stone...)

----

Am I the only one that has rare, but truly dark screamingly paranoid moments when I wonder if MAYBE we don't get fed a bunch of "happy pills" in our water and food supply already? Some of the sh*t the American people have just blindly accepted in the last few years has been pretty awful. I can't help but wonder some days about the lack of outrage.

Given that general malaise already demonstrated, I have to say I doubt seriously if it would raise too many eyebrows if they did start sedating our kids to "protect" them from mood swings.

Hell of a state--ain't it?


Laura