In the US, health care in general is a mess. Health care for mentally ill people varies from state to state but has obvious deficiencies.
In Illinois, state facilities are abysmal dungeons. The one thing Billy was afraid of was going back to Madden. I know those places are awful and not at all safe. It was frightening for us to know he was in that place. Anything could happen and there would be zero accountability.
My parents got suckered into putting Billy into a very expensive private facility. I don’t know what they did (except keep him very well medicated) but he didn’t get any better and that’s a fact. Meanwhile my parents took out a second mortgage on the house to pay for this scam. Once that money was gone Billy was summarily evicted, certainly no better than when he went in. This all happened while I was very busy at school and believe me, it didn’t help me focus on my studies.
I’ve been schizophrenic since I was 19 in 1980, 46 years. I’ve never laid a hand on anybody even though I should have defended myself a couple of times. It’s obvious that some schizophrenics are violent but you make it sound like a 100% of us are violent. That’s as much bullshit as saying no schizophrenics are violent. I’ve had friends who were schizophrenic and I’ve worked with and I’ve been in programs with other schizophrenics.
I was scared of a few of them but most of the ones I dealt with never got violent, they were too passive if anything. I said this to you before, I’m not discounting your experiences with your schizophrenic brother but it seems like he was just a generally bad person and would have been a bad person if he had never had schizophrenia. The story of the original poster is horrible and tragic and the murder of the father was the ultimate betrayal of the father and the family by the brother and maybe this is the wrong place for me to defend schizophrenics but whenever I see posts such as yours I feel I have to say something.
There’s something like 2 million schizophrenics living in the U.S. and many are like me and live or at least try to live normal lives. I understand Billy was a monster but to disparage all schizophrenics is unfair and your assessment of all schizophrenics as ‘ticking time bombs’ is inaccurate. I’m on the other forum that is just for people who are diagnosed with schizophrenia and many of them are not out causing trouble, on the contrary they are often isolated, lonely, often poor people who are just trying to survive and to tell the truth, we are often afraid of a lot of you so called "normies’ from the abuse some of us get from you. I understand that people are people and some schizophrenics can be troublemakers or disrupt their families but the folks on the diagnosed forum are mostly as nice as you folk here.
We are no more or just slightly more apt to get violent then the average guy walking around, in fact we have a greater chance of being the victim of violence or crime than the average non schizophrenic. When schizophrenics do get violent it is usually from one of three reasons: they were violent before they became schizophrenic, they were using illicit substances or they are off their medication. Some do get violent and when they do the media often sensationalizes the story and for a lot of the population all they know about schizophrenics is these sensationalized stories so they naturally assume all schizophrenics are violent and to be feared which fuels the all to often, real stigma for schizophrenics.
Again, I’m sorry you went through all that with your brother but I am not remotely like him. It makes headline news when someone with schizophrenia kills a famous person or commits some grisly murder but what doesn’t get reported, and maybe it should, is that I’ve worked for most of the last 43 years or lived on my own for 25 years and got my Associates of Arts degree three years ago at age 63. I just felt I had to say something, I’m not discounting the original posters experience either with her brother but I feel I had to just list some facts about an often misunderstood disease that causes much mental distress for the sufferer and by the same token I am also well aware of all the suffering it can cause the loved ones of people with schizophrenia.
The family forum, unfortunately, isn’t a place for good balance. The forum is more about people sharing their personal experiences - sometimes to educate - sometimes to be heard - sometimes to empathize.
Being a family caregiver is a learning process and a journey. The hope is that we all move forward with our own journey, just as we hope to help our family members move forward in their lives. (Personally, I had to figure a way to get out of my son’s way while still helping when help was required.)
The subject of violence always brings high emotions into play. My understanding is that the other forum is composed of people who are aware of their neurodiversity and many are on supportive meds? By contrast, this forum tends to be composed of people dealing with people who are often not aware of their neurodiversity and are not taking supportive meds. Sadly, we also have to be a place where people who have encountered personal tragedies are always welcome and understood. Where else can we be found? These experiences don’t create great conversations at the office or at the gym.
At times, things can look pretty dreary on this forum. We should maybe plant more flowers around the entrance - or draw happy cartoon figures on the walls like they do in the children’s hospitals. Our members are often the people dealing with the trickiest situations, this can makes our forum appear out of balance. We have had many success stories, they tend to move on and we celebrate for them.
I thought of you Eddie1 when I recently watched an old movie on Netflix called “Mass”. If you do watch it, don’t give up on it, watch the entire movie.
Agreed. I was a scared, nervous wreck trying to make sure hospitals didn’t just let my son walk. What are some of your additional ideas on changes to the mental health system?
One that comes to mind for me is having better coordination in crisis intervention training (CIT) across local law enforcement jurisdictions.
(Sadly, we also have to be a place where people who have encountered personal tragedies are always welcome and understood. Where else can we be found? )
Hope exactly this ! My own counselor just asked the question where else do I have support from for
I felt very lucky to say Im a member of support forum , I searched for years for a place like this !
Yeah, when I was in the hospital for 8 months I used to get passes to visit my parents for the weekend. On Sunday nights my dad would drive me back and we would go in the front door and then the nurses would buzz us in to the little hallway right before the door to the ward. An orderly would let me in and there was a little window on the door where you could see the inside of the ward and see all the patients walking around. There was lot of bedraggled, formerly homeless people and hard looking people who had been in jail or prison. My dad would watch as they let me in and I would go down the hallway to my room and my dad told me later that he always felt like crying when he saw me shuffle off down the dimly lit hallway among all those other patients.