My life shattered into a living nightmare six years ago when my youngest child, my only son, was diagnosed with severe early-onset schizo-affective disorder, which is basically all of the symptoms of bipolar illness (he's a rapid cycler--sometimes ten or fifteen times per day) along with schizophrenia. I had left my husband seven months before our youngest child was born because he had become dangerously psychotic, however I had believed it to be caused by drug and alcohol abuse. Then, at age twelve, our son started to act just like the father he had never met.
He had been a beautiful, intelligent, loving child, a straight A student. After his diagnosis his docs and I were able to note that there were signs (called "prodromal") as he was growing up. He was a loner, he had trouble making connections between ideas, he occasionally had OCD, but I never made a big deal of anything since he did so well in school and was so kind and sweet. Within a year after fifth grade his grades dropped to failing and he lapsed into first a severe depression, then violent outbursts, bizarre obsessions about his body,and then I came home from work one day with food for dinner and he met me at the door with the most horrible grin on his face and told me that he knew that I was putting poison into his food. I knew in that instant that my son was schizophrenic and it felt exactly if I had been hit with a sledgehammer in my stomach. I think a big part of me just died right then.
He's been hospitalized eight times in the last six years and had two suicide attempts. They can't seem to find the right combination of meds to keep him stable. He's on clozaril and abilify right now but the clozaril has affected his heart and can cause death without constant monitoring. For the last year and a half it has been so bad that I myself have gone into a terrible depression and I don't even want to share some of the thoughts that go through my head at times. Mental illness takes a terrible toll, not only on the victims, but also on the family members who love them.
Please believe that I know exactly what you are going through. I send my deepest sympathy to you. You have a hard road ahead of you unless you are willing to completely disown your child and I don't think that is your intention. You need to be very strong AND courageous. Mental illness is the "Demon" of all illnesses, and I don't mean that in the JW sense. You will become very sensitive to "crazy people" jokes. No one would ever think of making a TV sitcom about the humorous side of cancer and no one would ever come to a company halloween party costumed as a quadriplegic or a patient suffering the side effects of chemo therapy but it seems that the mentally ill are fair game for insensitivity along those lines. Please take care of yourself--and I hope you are able to have a good support system.
