• Mood changes, like persistent sadness or irritability

• Changes in level of functioning, such as school failure.

• Withdrawal from friends and family.

• A loss of interest in activities that had been important.

• Changes in eating and sleeping patterns

• Lack of energy.

• Trouble concentrating

• Unexplained aches and pains.

Parents need to ask themselves how severe the symptoms seem, and how persistent. When a child really seems to have changed, you can’t just write it off as adolescence.