My daughter and I had the discussion last night. She turns 7 this week.

What I said "Baby, I don't want you to be afraid but I want to talk to you about something awful that happened today. An evil man walked into a school in another state, and he killed a lot of kids and teachers. They are angels now. It's important that you say a prayer for them and their moms and dads and brothers and sisters because they will be sad for a very long time. I wanted to talk to you about it first though, before you saw it on the news and got scared, or before you hear people talking about it at school. Don't be afraid of going to school. Your teacher will always protect you. But it is important that you always listen to her during an emergency. If there's a fire, a tornado, or a stranger in the school, you always listen to what she says and do what she asks very quickly."

Her first questions were; why would someone want to kill a lot of kids? (I don't know honey, he was a very ill person, his mind wasn't right). What were the kids names? (I don't know but if you want me to tell you when I find out, I will). Is the evil guy going to go to another school? (No, he is dead. He killed himself because he knew what he did was a horrible awful thing).

She got teary eyed and asked if she could snuggle in my bed for a while. I obliged. We talked about it a little more today, about how important it is to hide if something like this happened at her school.

Ritalin doesn't make people kill. You know the first ADHD kids are now in their thirties, right? We have 30+ years of experience with this drug, and to try and pin what some people are doing now on a drug that has been safely used for that period of time is ludicrous.

Ok, I guess I meant that as an example, but what I really meant was all the anti depressants and other medications that I've read are being given to kids at a much higher rate than 30 yrs ago.....

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Oh god, I heard this earlier and just CRINGED. Such irresponsible reporting.

Information from CNN's site, including information from the medical examiner:

Lanza was found dead next to three guns, a semi-automatic .223-caliber Bushmaster rifle and two pistols made by Glock and Sig Sauer, a law enforcement source told CNN. All belonged to his mother.
Carver, who performed autopsies on seven of the victims, said the wounds he knew about were caused by a "long weapon." Asked by a reporter whether the rifle was the primary weapon, he responded, "Yes."

http://www.cnn.com/2012/12/15/us/con...html?hpt=hp_t1

My best friend from college's sister's best friend (follow that?) was one of the teachers killed. She could barely get the words out over the phone. I feel like an idiot for never even asking, being that she's from CT. It hurts and I don't even know the person.

I feel less and less safe going to work every morning.

I'm a developmental psychologist, not a physician... but with regard to the meds commentary, my perspective is that while ADHD is most certainly over diagnosed and stimulant meds like Adderall and Ritalin overused, I'm not as worried about the meds as I am the misdiagnoses. Incorrectly labeling a child as ADHD and shuffling them off onto meds means that child isn't getting the care they actually need and a disorder goes untreated... which can absolutely worsen over time. It allows parents, teachers, and peers to ignore other symptoms or warning signs. This is the part that actually scares me.

I'm not sure if anyone has already posted this, but my sister who is a Pi Phi just passed on to me that one of the victims, Lauren Rousseau, was a Pi Beta Phi (Connecticut Alpha).

This is what really disturbed us, too. I knew it wouldn't be long before we started hearing he was a "loner," "lacked empathy," "wasn't very social" and that it would be a short trip from there to "he may have had Asperger Syndrome."

:(

The Catholic Church in Newtown was just evacuated due to a bomb threat.

I read an article this morning (I wish I could find it now) that said he may have had Aspberger's, but that there is no indication that the disorder causes a person to act out violently. I don't mind if they mention it, as long as it's also pointed out that there is most likely no direct correlation between this particular disorder and the killer's murderous/suicidal thoughts and actions.

There was a really great article posted today by the mother of a mentally ill child who has violent episodes.

I came here to post the same article. Beautifully written. My heart goes out to the mother. And my heart goes out to Adam Lanza's father. It has been reported that people who knew the killer knew that something was very, very wrong with him. I wonder if his parents had tried to get him help and found the same thing as the woman who wrote that article - the options are limited for the severely mentally ill. Back in the 50's and 60's, there were state run institutions for mentally ill....as well as the developmentally disabled. They were wretched and it's actually a good thing that most (if not all) were done away with. But, they were not replaced by better alternatives. Our health care system is in disarray and mental illness treatment is expensive - even with health insurance. The social stigma of mental illness is incredible. I hope this tragedy brings forth a new way to treat those who are mentally ill so that the people who died at Sandy Hook didn't die in vain.

I know it's bad to speak ill of the dead, but I keep coming back to this: His (late) mother KNEW he struggled with all kinds of mental issues, yet she kept an array of weaponry in the house, complete with rounds of ammunition. One of those weapons was a military-type assault rifle. Did she never think that might not have been a good idea?
Something else--he knew which weapon to use. The pistols were (I believe) unfired. All the dead were riddled with large bullets from the assault rifle. And guns like these render "secure schools" ineffective. He shot his way into the building. Some of the dead had as many as 11 bullet wounds; all had an least three.
Little children, most of them six, so young they still had their baby teeth. Good God--what have we come to? And--I'm sorry--some jackass this morning said if the teachers there were armed there would have been fewer deaths. Some days I feel like I'm in an alternative universe.

This is a town and school I had been to. I have friends and family in Sandy Hook, other parts of Newtown, and other surrounding communities. One of my co-workers did her student teaching at Sandy Hook Elementary last year. It's not that I was deeply saddened and angered by all the other school and mass shootings, but this hit really close to home and made everything so harsh and real. This is a town similar to where I grew up, similar to the town where I teach. The high school where I teach has open campus policies such that students or anyone else can enter and exit as they please. I've stated since I began working at this school that I feel seriously unsafe. I get weird looks for that statement, as it is a very quiet and affluent community full of privileged students.
I hope that schools and communities can work to create safer schools. I hope these families can begin to heal. There are all sorts of outpourings of love, support, etc. all over MA and CT radios. I'm sure this is the same in other places as well.

Sigh. This sucks.