Hi everyone. I hope you are all doing as well as you can be.
My brother Jason, 32, has been battling with schizoaffective disorder for almost 10 years. In the beginning none of us knew what was going on and I think that made his condition worse as he wasn’t getting early help for this. He was homeless for awhile and now has a place through a VA program, but is severely sick and stuck on this merry-go-round.
He thinks everyone abandoned him. He refuses to believe he has a mental illness and gets violent if it’s ever brought up. He knows something is wrong but thinks it’s physical, even though he’s been to over a thousand doctors and has had thousands of tests and everything comes back normal. At first he “moved something out of place in his chest,” but now his delusions are changing. He demands us to find a doctor for him and get him into a hospital, but it’s not that easy. He’s been down that road and nothing comes out of it because it’s not physical; it’s schizoaffective.
I don’t know what to do. I tried getting him committed as he was a threat to himself and me, but they released him after a week because he complied and “wasn’t a threat.” He doesn’t eat properly and starves himself. He is SO far gone but there is no talking to him about it. I think I have come to the conclusion that he will never get better (since there’s nothing else we can do to help him), but I also can’t give up.
I hate this disease. I just want my brother to be happy. The sad part is he wants to be happy SO bad and screams and cries for help. He KNOWS something is very wrong. But he can’t accept the help that will save his life.