For anyone that has dealt with a kid with mental issues, particularly bi polar disorder or schizophrenia, I don’t have to inform you that it’s pure hell. As his parents, my wife and I struggle everyday with the guilt feelings of not being in a position to be able to do enough for our child. As the leader of our home I am continually looking for a better way to handle this struggle.
Our son is now twenty-one years old and although he is living in an apartment on his own, we must visit every single day to make sure he takes his medicine. He will never have what we would call a normal life. It just breaks our hearts to think that the little sweet innocent baby boy that we brought into our home at the very young age of three months old will most likely never hold a job or have a family of his own. Anyone that doesn’t think that bi polar or schizophrenia is not a crippling disease, needs to witness the life of our adopted son.
He loved to drive! He took the savings bonds that his grand father gave to him every birthday since his very first and bought a vehicle right after his graduation. He also enrolled in a Trade School to become an industrial electrician. I can’t express to you how excited we all had been for him even though at that time the only point that began to show itself was the bi polar disorder. My wife and I helped out by taking out a college loan in our name to assist paying for the schooling and books. He now was just eighteen.
I guess he made it through about four weeks of school before he began missing a day here and a day there. Before you know it he was missing two or three days at a time. Not long after he dropped out completely. We were very upset with him at that point not knowing or understanding that he not only had bi polar but now he was beginning to take on the mental illness of schizophrenia. We had no idea except that we began to see stranger and stranger behavior from him.
It wasn’t too much time after this that he totaled out his vehicle. He was driving too quick and slid it into a tree right in front of someone’s home. We still did not fully realize the illness at this point and just believed he was being irresponsible. He had quit college, wrecked his vehicle, did not have work, and wanted to sleep all the time. In our book he was just becoming lazy and irresponsible.
What we were clueless of was that the pacing, speaking with nobody, the sleeping, the unpredictable actions was part and parcel of bi polar and schizophrenia disease. The regrettable factor was that this was only the tip of the iceberg. All heck was starting to expose itself and we failed to recognize precisely what we were in store for. His bed room was in the basement and he wasted most of his time down there in most cases sleeping. On the other hand, he then would spend the majority of his nights up, going through the fridge and cabinets creating chaos. Not to say he seemed to be wandering through the entire home creating disturbance and keeping the rest of us awake.
Disagreement after disagreement took place, however absolutely no improvement had been made. For those who have any kind of knowledge of bi polar or perhaps schizophrenia you should understand that without proper medication it will get absolutely unmanageable. Well that’s precisely what had been occurring. Within the genuine sense of the expression, things had been getting nuts. Our answer had been that we had to become more forceful and demanding of what we expected of him. Completely wrong solution, at least in our situation!
He was getting more and more delusional. He began referring to the home as his and we had been guest there. He began unusual gestures with his hands and head. He would stare right passed you without saying a word while you would be talking with him. Following, in a few seconds he would then answer a question you may have asked two or three minutes ago. He became more and more aggressive in his behavior. His mother started to get frightened of him.
This all continued until the time he totally erupted in to physical violence. He swung and hit his mom in the face. Despite the fact that I wanted to un-load on him, I threw him to the ground and kept him there till the police showed up. I never used that much energy to hold an individual down until that moment in time. He was battling with each and every oz of his being to get free. I was not going to allow that to occur until the police got there. He’d bite my arm that I had all-around his neck. I invested 12 years in the Marine Corps and never did I encounter something so totally spinning out of control.
I realize that I wanted to beat him to a pulp but could not simply because he was my son. The police finally arrived and was able to hand cuff him. They knew immediately that he experienced some type of psychological problems. They didn’t arrest him based on our pleas to get him psychological help. They instead placed him on a hold in a local psychological locked ward.
Once he was evaluated they immediately determined he experienced not just bi polar disorder, but also schizophrenia. It was like a light went on for my wife and me. It was good to realize that there was a reason for his behavior and not that he was just a misfit. That has not made existence any easier, but now we understand more about it. As a matter of fact we are becoming experts through the college of hard knocks. Not a college you wish to attend, trust me.
If you’re a parent who has a child with either bi polar or schizophrenia, trust me when I tell you that we understand. Get help and stay focused.
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