he’d get down,” Angie said. “It was probably a good eight years before he realized we weren’t going away.”
False diagnoses
The Lipscombs spent the first several years of Jordan’s life in Kansas City. Before he was 4 years old, Jordan was selfhurting. He would also swing between emotional extremes. “He would run around and he would either be laughing and giggling and running through the house and you couldn’t settle him down, or he’d be literally on the floor sobbing, saying, ‘I hate myself; I want to die,’” Angie recalled. The couple had no idea how a child so young could even think in that manner. One doctor, trying to diagnose Jordan’s behavior and outbursts, believed he had Early Onset Bipolar Disorder. On May 1, 2002, before he was 5 years old, Jordan got his first dose of anti-psychotic medicine. “It was the first night he went to sleep without a three-hour crying fit,” Angie remembered. “Literally from the time we got him, he would not go to sleep without three hours of something.” After the couple moved to the Twin Cities shortly thereafter, a new doctor believed Jordan had ADHD and didn’t believe someone could be diagnosed with Early Onset Bipolar Disorder at such an early age. The new drugs they prescribed him didn’t work well, and Angie and Bob describe that year as one of the worst they have ever been through.
A measure of hope
In kindergarten, the Lipscombs regularly received calls from the principal telling the couple that several teachers had to chase Jordan all over the school or that he had locked himself in the bathroom or that he had disappeared for 45 minutes and no one could find him. He was even self-hurting, scratching his face and arms. Jordan’s behaviors were so out of the norm that no one had an accurate picture of what was causing them.
Bob and Angie Lipscomb and their 16-year-old adopted son Jordan have endured the tremendous challenges of Fetal Alcohol Syndrome that have plagued Jordan since birth. “It was very disheartening for many years,” Angie said. The couple continued searching for the right doctor and the right diagnosis that would reveal what was plaguing their son. After their initial visit with the doctor who diagnosed Jordan with ADHD, the Lipscombs went out of their insurance network and saw another doctor who said, “I really think he’s affected by alcohol,” Angie recalled. “Is there any way you have contact with the family to know if the mom drank?” They may not have known it at the time, but this revelation would start to put everything in place. Fortunately, the couple was able to contact the birth mother who admitted that she drank during the first three months of her pregnancy, not knowing she was expecting a baby. Several years later, the mother also revealed that she had used cocaine during her pregnancy and that she also suffered from fetal alcohol syndrome. The problems caused by Fetal Alcohol Syndrome (FAS) vary. It can include physical deformities, learning disorders and behavioral problems, as well as other
difficulties, according to the Mayo Clinic. While the extent of the problems varies, the Mayo Clinic is among leaders in medicine who observe that the “defects caused by fetal alcohol syndrome are irreversible.” While the correct diagnosis was a step in the right direction for Jordan and his parents, many difficulties remained, such as how to treat the disorder with medicine and how to understand and deal with the learning and behavioral challenges. “[Those with FAS] don’t learn by their mistakes, either,” Bob said. “You have to repeat things not only 100 times but maybe 200 times, and then they might get it after that. With Jordan, in kindergarten he would learn his ABCs and with his brain damage, with the fetal alcohol, he would know it on Monday, but Tuesday he wouldn’t know the ABCs. We couldn’t understand why that was.”
Medication and faith
The next several years were filled with more challenges for the Lipscombs. Different doctors and different treatment options often collided. One doctor took Jordan off all his medications and placed May 2014 | REFRESHED
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