So I posted here not too long ago regarding my brother and how to handle or deal with him. Since then we had another event which made it painfully clear that he needs help. He stated we were all going to hell and that Joan of Arc had spoken to him and told him to free Canada. Pretty heated argument in which he wouldnt let us leave, He had been selling of his possesions and ours. Following that we had him brought to the hospital where the doctor confirmed he had schizophrenia, but he could not control whether we keep him due to the horrible Canadian laws. We had a trial regarding whether or not he should stay, and basically the doctor, the lawyer, and the psychologist, and his attorney all agreed my brother had schizophrenia but because he wasn’t hurting anyone yet they didn’t need to keep him. Truly pathetic, we stated a list of things hes done that has shown hes getting more and more angry and violent, but that wasn’t enough. When they stated the above thing about Joan of Arc, and our previous event with holy water he denied any of it happening.
Since hes returned he has sold more of his items, and last week even asked for a gaming device of mine to use. Today I went into his room to discover that he had already sold this device that I’ve had since I was a young child. I’m really not sure of what to do at this point and maybe I’m just venting frustrations about a system here that seems to care more for violent patients as opposed to patients who are becoming worse. The entire staff at the hospital told us that he should stay and he should be taking medication of some sort as he is very vocally abusive. His vocal abuse is very targeted towards my mother and seems to be targeting most of his anger at her, which we stated in the trial but they were not interested in.
How long did some of you have to continue this process or still are before it ended? My mom is afraid that hes gonna take all his money from selling stuff and just leave. I’ve already lost him as a brother, at this point hes merely a stranger.
I don’t know much about the subject, but do you think he might be selling things to buy drugs? That could make things worse. Do you know what he’s doing with the money?
As ridiculous as these laws are (here in the U.S. too), sometimes family members must “embellish” what is going on. The last time my husband and I had our son committed, the go-between between us and the judge kept coming back to us saying “judge says we need more, we need more”. So even though our situation was extremely threatening with our son, it wasn’t quite enough for the court system, so we “embellished” just enough to have him committed. It’s a sad state of affairs that we have to do that, but we must do whatever it takes to get our loved ones the help they need. It seemed to me that the judge really knew he needed to be in the hospital, but she had to cover herself too.
My son also sells everything. He asked me to take him to Walmart about three weeks ago, which I did. He talked me into buying him a 32" Vizio flat screen tv. The very next day it was gone from his downstairs apartment. I asked him where it was and he said “a friend was borrowing it”. We never saw it again. Every gaming system, every cell phone quickly disappears. About six months ago when we were having our cable updated and the AT&T men were down in the basement working, son tried to sell them the good leather living room set from his apartment. One of the AT&T guys tipped me off.
Our daughter (his sister) also feels as you do, that she has lost him as a brother.
I do believe my son is finally med compliant. He still has other issues but does take his meds after a couple of stints in jail and several hospital stays.
I do hope you will be able to eventually have your brother committed because that is what he needs, to be in a safe environment receiving proper medications. Hang in there and know there is a lot of support on this website.
If you put him to use anti psychotics your brother will no longer have anger. And hallusinations and paranoid dellusions can be controlled with very high doses of range of B vitamins. Mainly B3, B6, Folic Acid and B12.
Vitamin B-3:
3 - 6g daily, in 3 doses, after meals. Normal does is 3 - 4.5g daily. [Dose can be increased to 30g]
Vitamin B-6 (Pyridoxine):
Under 1,000mg/day. [Do not exceed 2,000 mg/day]
Vitamin C:
3g./day, or more
Folic Acid & Vitamin B-12:
Large doses preferable
Omega-3 EFAs (e.g. Fish Oil):
3 - 9 x 1,000mg. capsules/day
I couldn’t be sure about that. He doesn’t have a phone and dislikes any contact with anyone he doesn’t really know, shouts at people on the street usually. He says hes saving up to move to another city in Quebec because where we live its full of “English” and he says the “English” lifestyle is bad. Hes been talking about leaving for years now, my parents even gave him money once to go live there and he came back within a month with no money. He had apparently gone there lived on the most basic food and just didn’t bother getting a job.
For the 3rd post, I did try to embellish a bit so that they would take him in but I suppose it wasn’t enough. The doctor widely agreed that this was a long process that we will have to do over and over again as he gradually gets worse. We had a an incident during christmas where he opened his gift a full week early without saying any word and had already put it up for sale by the time we discovered it in his room.
and lastly, he does refuse any sort of medication. During the trial he stated he would only take it if he was forced to by the law, said if the doctor prescribed him some he would not take any because he believes hes fine.
Getting court ordered treatment by way of injection is hard. My son was warned during his last hospitalization that it could happen to him. I think for that to happen you would need so many hospitalizations. So getting him hospitalized is the problem. I get irritated with the laws as I think they do more harm then good but I understand why they are in place. Basically my son is protected until he does something that can’t be ignored. Unless a CTO (Community Treatment Order) is put into place he is legally not obligated to take medications. Even with a CTO apparently the person can’t be admitted for not taking medications but for symptoms. Although I think they can be brought in for observation easier.
With my son’s last hospitalization I pretty much had to wait until he was so far into psychosis that he could not keep it together in front of other people. He had barely eaten or slept in days. Voices. He couldn’t not talk about what was happening to him. Even then once the person is in the hospital then personnel there have to see these things for themselves to keep him for observation. He became so delusion after admittance that I’m not sure he even knew where he was. So this is the system that we have to work with and yes it sucks.
In the meantime all I can say is do what you can to protect your possessions from being sold. I would be concerned about the money going on drugs. Do you know if he still has the money from the sell of these items? I know when my son is not stable that he used to steal money from me and it would be for drugs or alcohol.
As much as I don’t want my son inpatient sometimes that is what it takes. Sometimes it may require some tough love. My son has been stable for awhile now but I still take my purse to my room at night. Temptation is hard to resist.
I would suspect he’s selling possessions (his and yours) for drug money too. It’s just the most likely scenario. It’s cause and effect. If you are on drugs and you have no money, then you sell l stuff. I did it, people I knew did it. I’m not a bad person but during my active addiction I sold my dads irreplaceable tool set that his father had given him before his father died. At the time I felt a little bad, years after I got clean and sober I felt terrible about it. Also, when I was a kid, our whole family had chipped in and bought my dad a realy nice toolbox for Christmas. This was around 1967 he was constantly buying and finding new tools for it so it was packed with tools. In 1988 i sold it to a stranger for $10.00 worth of crack. '
Like I said, I’m not horrible person but the combination of schizophrenia and drugs makes people do bad stuff. If he is selling all this stuff and he has nothing to show for it that would just add to my suspicions that he’s using or drinking. By the way I got clean in1990.
Hi Rayja, firstly sorry for your difficulties at the moment. I have schizophrenia too so I’ll try to comment on your brothers situation. Firstly you have to know that I don’t know the ins and outs of your situation but what I would like to say is this. Schizophrenia can be crazy, yes I did a lot of crazy things in my time due to the voices I heard but the truth is this illness (spiritual illness) rectifies itself in time. My parents were awful frustrated with me and found me a handful. I was hearing spiritual voices, guardian angels talking to me. I was being told by these voices to behave and do odd/crazy things. I was told to do a lot of crazy things like behave like a dog in public, to beg barechested on my kness in the city center of my hometown. Yes the illness can be a bit crazy but it is a spiritual illness, so I fully understand where your brother is coming from when he says he hears the voice of Joan of Arc. Trust me, I had experiences similar to that. And you have to understand that at least hes hearing good voices which is a good sign, because some people hear the devils voice and that is the worst scenario. But Joan of Arc is a relatively good voice to hear, as you probabaly know she is being canonised to be a saint by the Vatican. What Im saying to you is that at the moment you may well be frustrated and desperate for your brother but this illness will balance itself out and rectify itself. You just need to be supportive and tolerant, and I emphasise the word tolerant.
As regards your brother, I was an angry man when I was in the throes of this illness. I even spat in my mothers face when I was ill. I regret it deeply but I have to forgive myself. But it was my illness that caused it. In the end I wouldn’t have gotten through this illness without the support of my parents and family. I wouldn’t have gotten through it without their support and tolerance. You, your brother and your family will get through it too. Just keep the faith, it balances out and as you probably know it can be good one day, bad the next but with support and tolerance it improves and gets better.
Also as regards your brother selling stuff, I had a difficult one like that, I had to throw $500 in the public bin. But you’ve just git to forget about those things. You got to understand that things will improve…I wish you and your brother and family the very best. You have my blessings. And if you want to ask me more, you can private message me or just reply to this post.