We never knew what to ask for. They won't want you to try it until you have tried at least two other standard antipsychotic medicines. Some doctors will not prescribe it. The warning is pretty serious and they say it should be used only for severely ill patients who have failed to respond to other therapies.
When I see a schizophrenic on the street, I wonder what wonderful person is trapped inside there. I would bet that 99% of them could resume sanity if they were on CLOZAPINE. They won't even get to try it, though, with the way our medical system works.
Thursday, December 25, 2008
Saturday, August 4, 2007
You Were Absent That Day
We have dealt with many doctors and therapists since my son got sick and the majority, well... all but the last one, have been either overworked or idiots. Sometimes both.
The first psychiatrist our son was assigned to, did not see him until many weeks after he was released from the hospital, and then saw him once a month for approximately 15 minutes each visit, at which time she would write his prescriptions for the coming month. This was very different from what we imagined his treatment would be, especially because he was still extremely psychotic. We were completely freaked out at the condition he was in and couldn't believe that we were supposed to take care of him at home.
After years of experience at this, we now know that he should never have been out of the hospital in that condition. The medication he was prescribed did not giving him sanity. But, we were new at this. The doctor that saw him during his first hospital stay told us he was bipolar. I had studied enough psychology to know that the diagnosis sounded incorrect, but, he was the one with the medical degree. So, he was put on a mood stabilizer and an anti-psychotic. Mental hospitals have a habit of releasing patients as soon as they possibly can, particularly if they are on Medicare or Medicaid. So if they can find a clueless relative to take over, all the better for them, regardless of the sanity level achieved.
The psychiatrist he saw, after he left the hospital, said he seemed more schizoaffective than bipolar, to her, and changed his medication. He became a bit more lucid, but nowhere near normal. The doctor set him up with once-a-week sessions with a therapist in the office. The sessions did not provide any road map for living-while-insane to my son and it frustrated him having to spend time with this stranger that he did not want to talk to. My husband and I were stressed beyond belief, as was our son. When we met with the doctor to discuss our frustrations with the lack of real treatment for our son, the doctor told us that she had a huge case load, as one of the very few doctors in the state who would accept the (short lived) State's insurance program (which our son was put on because we did not have any health insurance at the time) and so we were introduced to the "tag the loony, collect a check" branch of American psychiatry.
All along this journey, with frequent changes of doctors, diagnosis, counselors, clinics, hospitals, and medication, we were led to believe that they were doing all they could for him. Some months were better than others, but he was continually delusional, sometimes severely, but we thought that was as good as it was going to get, and at least he could speak sentences instead of the word salad he used in his deepest psychosis, and seemed to know where he was and who we were, and only sometimes thought we were evil impostors. His diagnosis quickly changed to schizophrenia, because he had a persistent psychotic state, which became severe when he would go off his medication.
He became thin, his hair grew long and unkempt, his clothes were rarely changed. He and his clothes were perpetually in need of a good scrubbing. He became fearful about his safety and would hear noises that frightened him especially at night, making him afraid that he would be harmed somehow if he dropped his guard and slept. Sometimes he would become argumentative when someone tried to reason with him, but usually he was very meek and quiet, preferring to be alone in his room writing, writing, writing, filling little notebooks with????, or riding his bicycle around town taking pictures with his camera, or working on his digital art on his computer. For a long while, he would not wear a shirt or shoes and would write on his stomach and arms in ball-point pen.
He started smoking cigarettes during his first stay in a mental hospital. The staff would announce that it was time to go outside to smoke, and he would line up with everyone. It was a chance to go outside into the courtyard and he didn't know he didn't smoke. He's a chain smoker now.
That first hospital, the State Hospital, let us visit him every day. It is fairly new and cleverly designed. Visitors come in through the front entrance, patients are admitted at a different wing of the hospital that has holding rooms that can be locked, but have large windows so they can be seen and there is no feeling of claustrophobia. There may be a "padded room" somewhere, but we didn't see it. It was very late at night by the time we arrived there from the emergency room where we had spent most of the day. Our son was brought from the emergency room by the police as is required with involuntary committals. We didn't know then, that this committal was officially involuntary, we were so tired and frightened by our son's mental and physical state that we didn't care how it was classified; anything, just so he would get help.
We were allowed to be with him while the doctor that was in admitting tried to interview him. He had been speaking in "word salad", phrases and groups of words that didn't seem to have any connection to each other and made little, if any, sense to us. In the emergency room he had mentioned a mole several times, and I was really puzzled by the importance he seemed to be placing on a fuzzy little tunnel digger. Sprinkled in were things I recognized like literary references, movie references, mathematics, physics, messages to him that were written on the walls in the jail, Buddha, Jesus, Seven Years in Tibet... I was amazed that the doctor was able to connect with him. She picked up on obscure physic and graphic novel references, and a bizarre and fascinating conversation ensued. It turns out that "mole" is a word with many meanings, and he was talking about the molecular weight of a substance expressed in grams, and the doctor discerned that this was the meaning he meant. They jumped from subject to subject in a rapid fire verbal shorthand that was understood by only the two of them. The doctor, a woman of Indian descent, said she had teenagers, so she was familiar with the obscure comic book references he included in his tangled speech. She told us that it was particularly sad when it was one of the smart ones. We told her that he had not eaten all day and she had a sandwich and drink brought in for him. He tried to fit the whole sandwich into his mouth and I said something typical like, "You'll choke on it if you do that" and he looked at me like he didn't understand. She was ready to admit him and gave us the sheets of paper that had the visiting hours, hospital map, rules, phone number to call for information and to locate his room, and we went home.
I was impressed with the design of the hospital. Once you got your visitor's badge from the guard inside the front door, at the waiting room, the plan looked a bit like a lizard that had swallowed a few rocks. It was vaguely mall-like. One of the "rocks" was a court room where a judge met, once a week, with patients who were involuntarily committed, and other legal business was conducted there without having to transport anyone off the grounds. Another of the rocks appeared to be a dining/meeting room. I never saw anyone eating meals there, but once I did see a few people there participating in a sparsely attended Karaoke night. The wide corridor split around these rooms and met again on the other side. There were offices, a library, a beauty/barber shop, snack shop, vending machines, etc.. Almost all of these rooms had windows that looked out onto the corridor and open doors, adding to the mall affect. Along the hall, at intervals off to each side, would be the locked doors to the pods where the patients stayed.
Visiting hours were in the evening and the hall was empty except for other people going to visit someone, and a few patients who were allowed to spend time out in the corridor. They were usually sitting on the benches that were placed against the walls. One of the women asked me for money. I had trouble understanding what she said, but her outstretched hand, palm up, cleared up my confusion. I gave her some quarters and she smiled and gave me a hug. It became a routine we were both pleased with. She would start to smile when she saw me coming down the hall. I always had a little money for her and she had a hug for me. The last time I saw her, she was curled up on the bench, sleeping. I folded up a dollar and slipped it into her hand. She didn't really wake up, but she whispered, "money", and returned to sleep. I supposed that she had spent a long time living on the street in her life.
Once an old fellow standing outside the hospital entrance asked me if I could hear the voices coming out of the speaker. He indicated a surveillance camera above the front door. I told him that I couldn't, but I thought my son might be able to now. I was beginning to lose my fear of crazy people, at least in this controlled environment. If my son was going to be one now, then there was the possibility that these were also wonderful people who were trying their best to make sense out of the faulty information their brains were sending them.
The door to the pod my son was in stayed locked and you had to be let in by one of the employees inside. Most of these employees had no special training, but were there to watch the patients and keep peace. There was a living room, a dining room, a meeting room, a completely walled outdoor courtyard, a nurses station, a few offices for social workers, nurses and miscellaneous staff. There were two hallways with patient rooms, two to a room. We were supposed to stay in the small dining room for our visits.
*
I would ask him to take a shower and to put on the clean clothes we had brought for him when I would visit, because he was quite dirty and had not been clean before he was admitted to the hospital.
See: The Weekend's Entertainment (schizophrenia in jail)
He would ignore me at first, then one day, after a week or so, when I got there for my daily visit, he noticed me in the hall and turned around and left in another direction. After about twenty minutes I asked one of the staff where he was and I was told that he was in the shower. He may not have known who I was, but he remembered that I was the person who always asked him to take a shower. A little while later I spotted him, as rumpled and dirty as he was before. I told him that someone told me that he was in the shower and I asked him what had happened. He said, "There are no holes in the shower head. They are fucking with me." I suggested that sometime he might take a leap of faith and try turning the faucet handle to see what would happen. He reiterated that there were no holes in the shower head, to make it clear that a shower was impossible.
He had lost so much weight that his pants would not stay up. They take belts and shoe strings away from the patients. I was told that he would dance to the music and forget about holding up his pants, and that he would be oblivious to the fact that he was naked below the waist. The staff thought it was really funny, but it made me angry at them. This was a young person who had always been modest before his illness, and it just seemed wrong that they would not help him preserve his dignity by finding a way to make his pants stay up or help him into the smaller clothes that we had brought for him. They managed to "lose" them. Their explanation for the disappearance was that he might have given them away. That made me angry with the staff, because he was so guileless and vulnerable, that the concept of ownership meant little to him in the condition he was in. They let him wear some pants from the lost and found bin, and a few days later his clean clothes reappeared. The day he finally took a shower, his father dressed him in them.
He hasn't been back there, partly because it is far away from where we live and most doctors use other hospitals. Sometimes there is no bed available at the hospital used by the doctor he is seeing, so he is taken to a different hospital. That is one of the ways he ends up with a new doctor. All of the hospitals he has been in usually only keep him for two or three weeks, change his medicine, and only let us visit him once or twice a week. One way we can tell that the medication is beginning to work is when he starts saying that he wants to leave. Before that, he is a bit too messed up to care.
to be continued..
The first psychiatrist our son was assigned to, did not see him until many weeks after he was released from the hospital, and then saw him once a month for approximately 15 minutes each visit, at which time she would write his prescriptions for the coming month. This was very different from what we imagined his treatment would be, especially because he was still extremely psychotic. We were completely freaked out at the condition he was in and couldn't believe that we were supposed to take care of him at home.
After years of experience at this, we now know that he should never have been out of the hospital in that condition. The medication he was prescribed did not giving him sanity. But, we were new at this. The doctor that saw him during his first hospital stay told us he was bipolar. I had studied enough psychology to know that the diagnosis sounded incorrect, but, he was the one with the medical degree. So, he was put on a mood stabilizer and an anti-psychotic. Mental hospitals have a habit of releasing patients as soon as they possibly can, particularly if they are on Medicare or Medicaid. So if they can find a clueless relative to take over, all the better for them, regardless of the sanity level achieved.
The psychiatrist he saw, after he left the hospital, said he seemed more schizoaffective than bipolar, to her, and changed his medication. He became a bit more lucid, but nowhere near normal. The doctor set him up with once-a-week sessions with a therapist in the office. The sessions did not provide any road map for living-while-insane to my son and it frustrated him having to spend time with this stranger that he did not want to talk to. My husband and I were stressed beyond belief, as was our son. When we met with the doctor to discuss our frustrations with the lack of real treatment for our son, the doctor told us that she had a huge case load, as one of the very few doctors in the state who would accept the (short lived) State's insurance program (which our son was put on because we did not have any health insurance at the time) and so we were introduced to the "tag the loony, collect a check" branch of American psychiatry.
All along this journey, with frequent changes of doctors, diagnosis, counselors, clinics, hospitals, and medication, we were led to believe that they were doing all they could for him. Some months were better than others, but he was continually delusional, sometimes severely, but we thought that was as good as it was going to get, and at least he could speak sentences instead of the word salad he used in his deepest psychosis, and seemed to know where he was and who we were, and only sometimes thought we were evil impostors. His diagnosis quickly changed to schizophrenia, because he had a persistent psychotic state, which became severe when he would go off his medication.
He became thin, his hair grew long and unkempt, his clothes were rarely changed. He and his clothes were perpetually in need of a good scrubbing. He became fearful about his safety and would hear noises that frightened him especially at night, making him afraid that he would be harmed somehow if he dropped his guard and slept. Sometimes he would become argumentative when someone tried to reason with him, but usually he was very meek and quiet, preferring to be alone in his room writing, writing, writing, filling little notebooks with????, or riding his bicycle around town taking pictures with his camera, or working on his digital art on his computer. For a long while, he would not wear a shirt or shoes and would write on his stomach and arms in ball-point pen.
He started smoking cigarettes during his first stay in a mental hospital. The staff would announce that it was time to go outside to smoke, and he would line up with everyone. It was a chance to go outside into the courtyard and he didn't know he didn't smoke. He's a chain smoker now.
That first hospital, the State Hospital, let us visit him every day. It is fairly new and cleverly designed. Visitors come in through the front entrance, patients are admitted at a different wing of the hospital that has holding rooms that can be locked, but have large windows so they can be seen and there is no feeling of claustrophobia. There may be a "padded room" somewhere, but we didn't see it. It was very late at night by the time we arrived there from the emergency room where we had spent most of the day. Our son was brought from the emergency room by the police as is required with involuntary committals. We didn't know then, that this committal was officially involuntary, we were so tired and frightened by our son's mental and physical state that we didn't care how it was classified; anything, just so he would get help.
We were allowed to be with him while the doctor that was in admitting tried to interview him. He had been speaking in "word salad", phrases and groups of words that didn't seem to have any connection to each other and made little, if any, sense to us. In the emergency room he had mentioned a mole several times, and I was really puzzled by the importance he seemed to be placing on a fuzzy little tunnel digger. Sprinkled in were things I recognized like literary references, movie references, mathematics, physics, messages to him that were written on the walls in the jail, Buddha, Jesus, Seven Years in Tibet... I was amazed that the doctor was able to connect with him. She picked up on obscure physic and graphic novel references, and a bizarre and fascinating conversation ensued. It turns out that "mole" is a word with many meanings, and he was talking about the molecular weight of a substance expressed in grams, and the doctor discerned that this was the meaning he meant. They jumped from subject to subject in a rapid fire verbal shorthand that was understood by only the two of them. The doctor, a woman of Indian descent, said she had teenagers, so she was familiar with the obscure comic book references he included in his tangled speech. She told us that it was particularly sad when it was one of the smart ones. We told her that he had not eaten all day and she had a sandwich and drink brought in for him. He tried to fit the whole sandwich into his mouth and I said something typical like, "You'll choke on it if you do that" and he looked at me like he didn't understand. She was ready to admit him and gave us the sheets of paper that had the visiting hours, hospital map, rules, phone number to call for information and to locate his room, and we went home.
I was impressed with the design of the hospital. Once you got your visitor's badge from the guard inside the front door, at the waiting room, the plan looked a bit like a lizard that had swallowed a few rocks. It was vaguely mall-like. One of the "rocks" was a court room where a judge met, once a week, with patients who were involuntarily committed, and other legal business was conducted there without having to transport anyone off the grounds. Another of the rocks appeared to be a dining/meeting room. I never saw anyone eating meals there, but once I did see a few people there participating in a sparsely attended Karaoke night. The wide corridor split around these rooms and met again on the other side. There were offices, a library, a beauty/barber shop, snack shop, vending machines, etc.. Almost all of these rooms had windows that looked out onto the corridor and open doors, adding to the mall affect. Along the hall, at intervals off to each side, would be the locked doors to the pods where the patients stayed.
Visiting hours were in the evening and the hall was empty except for other people going to visit someone, and a few patients who were allowed to spend time out in the corridor. They were usually sitting on the benches that were placed against the walls. One of the women asked me for money. I had trouble understanding what she said, but her outstretched hand, palm up, cleared up my confusion. I gave her some quarters and she smiled and gave me a hug. It became a routine we were both pleased with. She would start to smile when she saw me coming down the hall. I always had a little money for her and she had a hug for me. The last time I saw her, she was curled up on the bench, sleeping. I folded up a dollar and slipped it into her hand. She didn't really wake up, but she whispered, "money", and returned to sleep. I supposed that she had spent a long time living on the street in her life.
Once an old fellow standing outside the hospital entrance asked me if I could hear the voices coming out of the speaker. He indicated a surveillance camera above the front door. I told him that I couldn't, but I thought my son might be able to now. I was beginning to lose my fear of crazy people, at least in this controlled environment. If my son was going to be one now, then there was the possibility that these were also wonderful people who were trying their best to make sense out of the faulty information their brains were sending them.
The door to the pod my son was in stayed locked and you had to be let in by one of the employees inside. Most of these employees had no special training, but were there to watch the patients and keep peace. There was a living room, a dining room, a meeting room, a completely walled outdoor courtyard, a nurses station, a few offices for social workers, nurses and miscellaneous staff. There were two hallways with patient rooms, two to a room. We were supposed to stay in the small dining room for our visits.
*
I would ask him to take a shower and to put on the clean clothes we had brought for him when I would visit, because he was quite dirty and had not been clean before he was admitted to the hospital.
See: The Weekend's Entertainment (schizophrenia in jail)
He would ignore me at first, then one day, after a week or so, when I got there for my daily visit, he noticed me in the hall and turned around and left in another direction. After about twenty minutes I asked one of the staff where he was and I was told that he was in the shower. He may not have known who I was, but he remembered that I was the person who always asked him to take a shower. A little while later I spotted him, as rumpled and dirty as he was before. I told him that someone told me that he was in the shower and I asked him what had happened. He said, "There are no holes in the shower head. They are fucking with me." I suggested that sometime he might take a leap of faith and try turning the faucet handle to see what would happen. He reiterated that there were no holes in the shower head, to make it clear that a shower was impossible.
He had lost so much weight that his pants would not stay up. They take belts and shoe strings away from the patients. I was told that he would dance to the music and forget about holding up his pants, and that he would be oblivious to the fact that he was naked below the waist. The staff thought it was really funny, but it made me angry at them. This was a young person who had always been modest before his illness, and it just seemed wrong that they would not help him preserve his dignity by finding a way to make his pants stay up or help him into the smaller clothes that we had brought for him. They managed to "lose" them. Their explanation for the disappearance was that he might have given them away. That made me angry with the staff, because he was so guileless and vulnerable, that the concept of ownership meant little to him in the condition he was in. They let him wear some pants from the lost and found bin, and a few days later his clean clothes reappeared. The day he finally took a shower, his father dressed him in them.
He hasn't been back there, partly because it is far away from where we live and most doctors use other hospitals. Sometimes there is no bed available at the hospital used by the doctor he is seeing, so he is taken to a different hospital. That is one of the ways he ends up with a new doctor. All of the hospitals he has been in usually only keep him for two or three weeks, change his medicine, and only let us visit him once or twice a week. One way we can tell that the medication is beginning to work is when he starts saying that he wants to leave. Before that, he is a bit too messed up to care.
to be continued..
Sunday, July 22, 2007
Pain Exceeded Maximum Capacity
1-15-2007
My son's mental pain has exceeded its maximum capacity. A few days ago, on Sunday, he attempted to be permanently pain free. We had no idea. He didn't tell us until Monday evening that he wasn't sure if he was dead or not, because he overdosed on medication the night before.
Though I write about some little insights he has shared with me or that I have observed, and may delude myself into thinking that I know whether he is doing well or poorly, I have no idea. No idea what is going on in that handsome head.
Monday, if seen on a movie screen, would be surreal. Picture a kitchen at night with the father sitting at the table wearing protective goggles because he had Lasik eye surgery that morning. The 22 year old son is very confused about reality and he and his father have spent the previous half hour in his bedroom in private conversation. The son has left the kitchen to check some medical information on the internet. He re-enters the room just before his mother enters the kitchen from a different door.
Father: What did you decide?
Son: I might be in a coma.
Father: This is quite a coma.
Mother: Thank you for letting us be in your coma.
He was actually more inclined to believe that he was dead. He asked me earlier if he was a ghost and I said no, that he was not dead. I didn't convince him.
Also earlier, just after they left Savant's room:
Savant: Did I hurt your eyes by making you cry?
Father: No. (followed by many assurances, meant to be comforting, that he had not hurt his eyes.)
I was too upset to remember the many questions and answers we spoke. It is difficult enough to recall a regular conversation, but one with a person who is irrational and suffering and trying his hardest to make rational sense out of the faulty information his brain provides to him, can only be remembered in bits and pieces. Most of it is lost from memory because your own emotional overload of heartbreak and helplessness and fear for this lost boy, is so profoundly strong.
I did not sleep that night. My job is to keep the *elephants away. I would not be able to forgive myself if one got through. My son did not sleep either. I crawled into bed at about 5:00 AM and his father got up soon after that.
So this is how Tuesday was spent. My husband left to see the eye doctor and then on to work. I spent the day trying to answer unanswerable questions as best I could. I telephoned his doctor's office from my closet so my son wouldn't hear me. He would not have believed that I was making a harmless call. He is terrified of police, and fears they want him to spend his life behind bars. No amount of reassurance from us calms this fear. His doctor is on vacation for the next three weeks and I hoped to speak to whomever was on call for her. The secretary said that I was correct to think that an attempt at suicide was a huge justification for hospitalization and to check him in there, as soon as possible. Easier said than done.
An involuntary committal involves police, handcuffing my terrified son and being his escorts until he is admitted into the hospital. This process can sometimes take an entire day. I was not going to do that this time. So I spent the day trying to get him into the truck. To agree to go to the hospital. We made it into the truck once and sat there with the heater on, the engine going, Savant so frightened. Then back into the house... I think it was 4:00 PM when we finally left the house, with his consent. I had not realized, until he told me, that he was just as afraid of staying home as he was of going to the hospital. What did not sink in until he said that, was that he needed me to take control of the situation, be the parent, and say that he was going to the hospital and that was final. I'm not comfortable being bossy, so I had assumed that he would react badly if I made an ultimatum that he go with me to the hospital and the result would be that I'd never get him into the truck again. His paranoia makes him believe that he can't trust anyone. Everyone's motives for everything they say or do, are suspect in his eyes. Where would I really be taking him? What bad intent might really be motivating me to be so determined to take him somewhere in the truck?
So today, Wednesday, I hope the hospital and the staff can work some magic and take away his pain and fear and confusion. Help him find, in himself, a reason to stay alive. He says there is no hope for him, no need for him to go on living; he has become obsessed with the idea of his own death. It would break our hearts forever. I don't want it to happen. I'm too exhausted to write this out, any more, for now.
I just got a call from him. He didn't have anything to say, but it was good to hear his voice. I think he just wanted to hear mine.
* this is a reference to an old joke that goes somewhat as follows:
Person 1: What are you doing?
Person 2: Keeping the elephants away.
Person 1: That's crazy! There aren't any elephants around here!
Person 2: Then I'm doing a good job.
My son's mental pain has exceeded its maximum capacity. A few days ago, on Sunday, he attempted to be permanently pain free. We had no idea. He didn't tell us until Monday evening that he wasn't sure if he was dead or not, because he overdosed on medication the night before.
Though I write about some little insights he has shared with me or that I have observed, and may delude myself into thinking that I know whether he is doing well or poorly, I have no idea. No idea what is going on in that handsome head.
Monday, if seen on a movie screen, would be surreal. Picture a kitchen at night with the father sitting at the table wearing protective goggles because he had Lasik eye surgery that morning. The 22 year old son is very confused about reality and he and his father have spent the previous half hour in his bedroom in private conversation. The son has left the kitchen to check some medical information on the internet. He re-enters the room just before his mother enters the kitchen from a different door.
Father: What did you decide?
Son: I might be in a coma.
Father: This is quite a coma.
Mother: Thank you for letting us be in your coma.
He was actually more inclined to believe that he was dead. He asked me earlier if he was a ghost and I said no, that he was not dead. I didn't convince him.
Also earlier, just after they left Savant's room:
Savant: Did I hurt your eyes by making you cry?
Father: No. (followed by many assurances, meant to be comforting, that he had not hurt his eyes.)
I was too upset to remember the many questions and answers we spoke. It is difficult enough to recall a regular conversation, but one with a person who is irrational and suffering and trying his hardest to make rational sense out of the faulty information his brain provides to him, can only be remembered in bits and pieces. Most of it is lost from memory because your own emotional overload of heartbreak and helplessness and fear for this lost boy, is so profoundly strong.
I did not sleep that night. My job is to keep the *elephants away. I would not be able to forgive myself if one got through. My son did not sleep either. I crawled into bed at about 5:00 AM and his father got up soon after that.
So this is how Tuesday was spent. My husband left to see the eye doctor and then on to work. I spent the day trying to answer unanswerable questions as best I could. I telephoned his doctor's office from my closet so my son wouldn't hear me. He would not have believed that I was making a harmless call. He is terrified of police, and fears they want him to spend his life behind bars. No amount of reassurance from us calms this fear. His doctor is on vacation for the next three weeks and I hoped to speak to whomever was on call for her. The secretary said that I was correct to think that an attempt at suicide was a huge justification for hospitalization and to check him in there, as soon as possible. Easier said than done.
An involuntary committal involves police, handcuffing my terrified son and being his escorts until he is admitted into the hospital. This process can sometimes take an entire day. I was not going to do that this time. So I spent the day trying to get him into the truck. To agree to go to the hospital. We made it into the truck once and sat there with the heater on, the engine going, Savant so frightened. Then back into the house... I think it was 4:00 PM when we finally left the house, with his consent. I had not realized, until he told me, that he was just as afraid of staying home as he was of going to the hospital. What did not sink in until he said that, was that he needed me to take control of the situation, be the parent, and say that he was going to the hospital and that was final. I'm not comfortable being bossy, so I had assumed that he would react badly if I made an ultimatum that he go with me to the hospital and the result would be that I'd never get him into the truck again. His paranoia makes him believe that he can't trust anyone. Everyone's motives for everything they say or do, are suspect in his eyes. Where would I really be taking him? What bad intent might really be motivating me to be so determined to take him somewhere in the truck?
So today, Wednesday, I hope the hospital and the staff can work some magic and take away his pain and fear and confusion. Help him find, in himself, a reason to stay alive. He says there is no hope for him, no need for him to go on living; he has become obsessed with the idea of his own death. It would break our hearts forever. I don't want it to happen. I'm too exhausted to write this out, any more, for now.
I just got a call from him. He didn't have anything to say, but it was good to hear his voice. I think he just wanted to hear mine.
* this is a reference to an old joke that goes somewhat as follows:
Person 1: What are you doing?
Person 2: Keeping the elephants away.
Person 1: That's crazy! There aren't any elephants around here!
Person 2: Then I'm doing a good job.
Wednesday, July 4, 2007
"Homeless Person" means what?
While I was watching a comedian recently, I heard it again, that reference to a homeless person, followed by a demonstration that clearly indicated that the person was "not all there". Whether by addiction or mental illness, we accept the idea that those are who the majority of the homeless are.
And that says what about our country?
If you are sick with a mental illness or addiction, there is no place to go. Sure, sometimes there will be a homeless shelter in most large cities; but following directions, to find it and showing up on time to get a bed, requires more organized thought than an insufficiently medicated or unmedicated mentally ill person is capable of mustering. And maybe for a week here or there, a couple of times a year, some may end up in a hospital or jail, but they are still homeless when the stay is over. Hospitals won't keep them for long because of the way our medical system works and the patient has the right to sign himself out if he wants to leave. Leave to go where?
I talked to an old friend who has a sibling that signed herself out of the mental hospital and since she is an adult, the privacy laws prohibit the staff from contacting anyone to let them know; unless the patient has signed something giving permission. It didn't seem to matter that she didn't even live in that city. When he found out she was no longer at the hospital, he and a friend had to drive for hours, checking every street, starting near the hospital, until they found her sitting on a porch early the next morning. Her rights were protected but her safety was not.
It doesn't seem to matter that their form was signed by someone who was "not of sound mind".
And that says what about our country?
If you are sick with a mental illness or addiction, there is no place to go. Sure, sometimes there will be a homeless shelter in most large cities; but following directions, to find it and showing up on time to get a bed, requires more organized thought than an insufficiently medicated or unmedicated mentally ill person is capable of mustering. And maybe for a week here or there, a couple of times a year, some may end up in a hospital or jail, but they are still homeless when the stay is over. Hospitals won't keep them for long because of the way our medical system works and the patient has the right to sign himself out if he wants to leave. Leave to go where?
I talked to an old friend who has a sibling that signed herself out of the mental hospital and since she is an adult, the privacy laws prohibit the staff from contacting anyone to let them know; unless the patient has signed something giving permission. It didn't seem to matter that she didn't even live in that city. When he found out she was no longer at the hospital, he and a friend had to drive for hours, checking every street, starting near the hospital, until they found her sitting on a porch early the next morning. Her rights were protected but her safety was not.
It doesn't seem to matter that their form was signed by someone who was "not of sound mind".
Sunday, April 15, 2007
Situation Normal - All Fouled Up
I thought we had finally found a doctor, Dr. M., that would continue to see my son permanently. He was hospitalized twice during her three month vacation, and when she returned, she told him that he would have to find a new doctor*!
Our understanding of the reason he was told to find a new doctor was that Dr. M. would not have prescribed him the medication he was put on in the hospital while she was on vacation, and she would not prescribe it to him, as an outpatient, ever. This medication has brought him more sanity than he has had in four and a half years, so we were very alarmed. We talked to the secretary about transferring his care to the doctor in that practice who had seen him in the hospital and who was the one who put him on this medication, Dr. O.. The next week we were told that he had agreed to take my son as a patient. Well, things have been ducky for a few weeks, until this Thursday.
In the crowded waiting room, I was concentrating on my sudoku, trying to keep my focus off of the screaming torture taking place in a sadistic movie on the blaring television in the waiting room. My son was across the room with his head phones on. I was marveling that, though this was the movie channel the TV was always tuned to, the employees did not seem to be worried about it's effect on the mentally ill people in the waiting room; or me for that matter. I was debating about whether I was going to get up and change the channel, when noticed that my son was standing in front of me, holding out a fat envelope. I asked him what it was and he nodded toward the secretary, who was licking another envelope flap, and said, I think it's a bill. I took it and he went back to his seat.
A bill!!? A huge bill! He is on Medicare and has our state's insurance as his secondary coverage; his co-pay is zero and he is considered disabled by the government. Inside the envelope is a multi-page print-out of a predictably obtuse billing history for my son. He doesn't get billed, Medicare and the state insurance system do. I tell the secretary that they must have made a mistake and she tells me to talk to the billing person.
What ensued in his office was very disturbing to me. The man in billing, pulls out his stack of EOB's and points to each column; to the amount that was billed which was bigger than the amount allowed, which was bigger than the amount Medicare paid, which was bigger than the amount owed by the state insurance program..... and then that's when the shake-down started. He said that my son owed them that amount for every visit he had made to Dr. M. at their practice. I point out that is the column belonging to the state program. He said yes, but the state program had not paid them for ANY of their patients, so the patients must pay it!
I suddenly thought of all the schizophrenics trying to hold on to a shred of sanity, trying to survive in this world with severely faulty perceptions of reality, being handed a bill for something they would not know that they didn't owe. Most of these people don't have any money, or barely enough for subsistence living, and the clinic they are depending on, for their prescriptions, has the gall to trick them into thinking they must pay or lose their access to the clinic; or worse fear that they will be thrown into jail for not paying their bill.
I told the billing man that he had a problem with the state program that he needed to resolve, and that that he should not try to make the patients pay the state's portion. I told him that our son had full coverage, and that if he contacted the state program they would verify that. He then said, "Yes, they tell you that you are covered, but they haven't sent us any money." I pointed out, again, that it was a problem between him and the state, and that for them to expect the patients to pay that amount was wrong. Expecting their patients to be his liaison between their office and the state was absurd. Even if they had the clarity of mind to look into the problem, it was not their job! And, that some quantity of their patients would not know that the office had no right to make them pay it.
He then wanted to know if my son was the one who had to have the weekly blood tests. -Yes. (The blood tests are not done at their office, and we don't even know if they ever look at the results. The pharmacist where we get his medicine is the one who tells us the results.)
Were we happy with the doctor he was seeing? -Yes.
Was the medicine helping him? -Yes.
Do we want him to continue to see this doctor? -Yes.
Well then, why would we refuse to pay the bill? After all they filed the bills with the insurance company for us, as a favor. -Huh?!!
Once again, I say that my son's co-pay is zero, he does not owe them this money, the state does. And, was that a veiled threat about whether my son could continue to see his doctor? The billing guy's response is to show me a sentence on his print-out that says patients are responsible for the bill if their insurance does not pay it. I responded that the state has always paid in the past and that my son had been assigned to this practice based on the fact that they were one of the providers on the state's list. The doctors agree to accept the amount allowed for the service, as determined by medicare and the state's insurance program. And, again, it was not the responsibility of mentally ill patients to be his go-between with this problem he was having with the portion owed by the state insurance program.
This is not a verbatim transcript of what was said, but you probably get the idea. My son walked in after the billing guy and I had been arguing for quite a while, and he became upset that, by making the billing guy angry, I may have just gotten him kicked out of that psychiatrist's practice. I couldn't continue it any longer, and my son and I left the building. I collapsed into tears outside, thinking that by trying to stand up for not only my son's rights, but for the rights of all of their patients who could not stand up for themselves, that I may have just gotten my son booted out from the best psychiatrist we'd seen yet.
I don't know why they are having trouble getting their money from the state insurance program. The state should not be stiffing doctors when they submit bills to them. It will make the few doctors that participate in the program, want to leave it. We may have found the ONE good doctor that will participate. The state's negligence is hurting the people who need help the most.
I wonder if the non-payment by the state insurance was another reason the other doctor refused to see him any more. They might be trying to cull government insured patients from their patient list. They certainly wouldn't be the first ones to do it.
*[Here is where, if you are sick, you have no clue how to find a new doctor. This might be your seventeenth doctor in four years. Most of them were assigned to you when you were released from the hospital.
If you can remember that you might be able to get another doctor by calling the state insurance program's toll free number and call it, you will be confronted with an automated answering system that is confusing, convoluted, and even pressing zero won't get you a human. You might have a friend or relative call for you, but the answering system will be just as confusing and impenetrable for them. Some of their systems cut right to the part where, if you don't enter the extension for the person you wish to talk to, it ends the call automatically. How do you know whom you wish to talk to?
If you remembered to save your book that lists doctors who will accept your state medical insurance, medicaid or medicare, you will discover that many of them dropped out of the program after the directory was printed.
If you have access to a telephone during doctors' hours, you can leave messages on many answering machines. Odds are against any of them returning your call, but if one might, how do you get a returned call if you don't have a phone?
Let's say you are lucky enough to find a doctor who will see you, and their next available appointment is two months from now. How are you going to get your medication between now and then? What if the doctor will not see patients who take the medication you are on?
Next you'll realize that the doctor's office is so far away from where you live, that you have no way to get there. Never fear, they will tell you that there is a free service especially for taking people to their appointments. You are supposed to call the state insurance program's phone number (see above) a few days before your appointment so they will put you on their schedule. Just because you are on their schedule does not mean they drop you off just before your appointment and pick you up just after it. Partly because you can wait for hours beyond the time your appointment was for, to actually get in to see the doctor. Your time spent with the doctor will be about ten minutes.
We haven't used this service yet, partly because my son has frequently been terrified of strangers and would not have gone with them. But another big reason is that I talked to people and watched others, in doctor's waiting rooms, who depend on this service. I have seen people who wait in the waiting room all day. I have also seen some very rude drivers.]
Our understanding of the reason he was told to find a new doctor was that Dr. M. would not have prescribed him the medication he was put on in the hospital while she was on vacation, and she would not prescribe it to him, as an outpatient, ever. This medication has brought him more sanity than he has had in four and a half years, so we were very alarmed. We talked to the secretary about transferring his care to the doctor in that practice who had seen him in the hospital and who was the one who put him on this medication, Dr. O.. The next week we were told that he had agreed to take my son as a patient. Well, things have been ducky for a few weeks, until this Thursday.
In the crowded waiting room, I was concentrating on my sudoku, trying to keep my focus off of the screaming torture taking place in a sadistic movie on the blaring television in the waiting room. My son was across the room with his head phones on. I was marveling that, though this was the movie channel the TV was always tuned to, the employees did not seem to be worried about it's effect on the mentally ill people in the waiting room; or me for that matter. I was debating about whether I was going to get up and change the channel, when noticed that my son was standing in front of me, holding out a fat envelope. I asked him what it was and he nodded toward the secretary, who was licking another envelope flap, and said, I think it's a bill. I took it and he went back to his seat.
A bill!!? A huge bill! He is on Medicare and has our state's insurance as his secondary coverage; his co-pay is zero and he is considered disabled by the government. Inside the envelope is a multi-page print-out of a predictably obtuse billing history for my son. He doesn't get billed, Medicare and the state insurance system do. I tell the secretary that they must have made a mistake and she tells me to talk to the billing person.
What ensued in his office was very disturbing to me. The man in billing, pulls out his stack of EOB's and points to each column; to the amount that was billed which was bigger than the amount allowed, which was bigger than the amount Medicare paid, which was bigger than the amount owed by the state insurance program..... and then that's when the shake-down started. He said that my son owed them that amount for every visit he had made to Dr. M. at their practice. I point out that is the column belonging to the state program. He said yes, but the state program had not paid them for ANY of their patients, so the patients must pay it!
I suddenly thought of all the schizophrenics trying to hold on to a shred of sanity, trying to survive in this world with severely faulty perceptions of reality, being handed a bill for something they would not know that they didn't owe. Most of these people don't have any money, or barely enough for subsistence living, and the clinic they are depending on, for their prescriptions, has the gall to trick them into thinking they must pay or lose their access to the clinic; or worse fear that they will be thrown into jail for not paying their bill.
I told the billing man that he had a problem with the state program that he needed to resolve, and that that he should not try to make the patients pay the state's portion. I told him that our son had full coverage, and that if he contacted the state program they would verify that. He then said, "Yes, they tell you that you are covered, but they haven't sent us any money." I pointed out, again, that it was a problem between him and the state, and that for them to expect the patients to pay that amount was wrong. Expecting their patients to be his liaison between their office and the state was absurd. Even if they had the clarity of mind to look into the problem, it was not their job! And, that some quantity of their patients would not know that the office had no right to make them pay it.
He then wanted to know if my son was the one who had to have the weekly blood tests. -Yes. (The blood tests are not done at their office, and we don't even know if they ever look at the results. The pharmacist where we get his medicine is the one who tells us the results.)
Were we happy with the doctor he was seeing? -Yes.
Was the medicine helping him? -Yes.
Do we want him to continue to see this doctor? -Yes.
Well then, why would we refuse to pay the bill? After all they filed the bills with the insurance company for us, as a favor. -Huh?!!
Once again, I say that my son's co-pay is zero, he does not owe them this money, the state does. And, was that a veiled threat about whether my son could continue to see his doctor? The billing guy's response is to show me a sentence on his print-out that says patients are responsible for the bill if their insurance does not pay it. I responded that the state has always paid in the past and that my son had been assigned to this practice based on the fact that they were one of the providers on the state's list. The doctors agree to accept the amount allowed for the service, as determined by medicare and the state's insurance program. And, again, it was not the responsibility of mentally ill patients to be his go-between with this problem he was having with the portion owed by the state insurance program.
This is not a verbatim transcript of what was said, but you probably get the idea. My son walked in after the billing guy and I had been arguing for quite a while, and he became upset that, by making the billing guy angry, I may have just gotten him kicked out of that psychiatrist's practice. I couldn't continue it any longer, and my son and I left the building. I collapsed into tears outside, thinking that by trying to stand up for not only my son's rights, but for the rights of all of their patients who could not stand up for themselves, that I may have just gotten my son booted out from the best psychiatrist we'd seen yet.
I don't know why they are having trouble getting their money from the state insurance program. The state should not be stiffing doctors when they submit bills to them. It will make the few doctors that participate in the program, want to leave it. We may have found the ONE good doctor that will participate. The state's negligence is hurting the people who need help the most.
I wonder if the non-payment by the state insurance was another reason the other doctor refused to see him any more. They might be trying to cull government insured patients from their patient list. They certainly wouldn't be the first ones to do it.
*[Here is where, if you are sick, you have no clue how to find a new doctor. This might be your seventeenth doctor in four years. Most of them were assigned to you when you were released from the hospital.
If you can remember that you might be able to get another doctor by calling the state insurance program's toll free number and call it, you will be confronted with an automated answering system that is confusing, convoluted, and even pressing zero won't get you a human. You might have a friend or relative call for you, but the answering system will be just as confusing and impenetrable for them. Some of their systems cut right to the part where, if you don't enter the extension for the person you wish to talk to, it ends the call automatically. How do you know whom you wish to talk to?
If you remembered to save your book that lists doctors who will accept your state medical insurance, medicaid or medicare, you will discover that many of them dropped out of the program after the directory was printed.
If you have access to a telephone during doctors' hours, you can leave messages on many answering machines. Odds are against any of them returning your call, but if one might, how do you get a returned call if you don't have a phone?
Let's say you are lucky enough to find a doctor who will see you, and their next available appointment is two months from now. How are you going to get your medication between now and then? What if the doctor will not see patients who take the medication you are on?
Next you'll realize that the doctor's office is so far away from where you live, that you have no way to get there. Never fear, they will tell you that there is a free service especially for taking people to their appointments. You are supposed to call the state insurance program's phone number (see above) a few days before your appointment so they will put you on their schedule. Just because you are on their schedule does not mean they drop you off just before your appointment and pick you up just after it. Partly because you can wait for hours beyond the time your appointment was for, to actually get in to see the doctor. Your time spent with the doctor will be about ten minutes.
We haven't used this service yet, partly because my son has frequently been terrified of strangers and would not have gone with them. But another big reason is that I talked to people and watched others, in doctor's waiting rooms, who depend on this service. I have seen people who wait in the waiting room all day. I have also seen some very rude drivers.]
Monday, April 2, 2007
The Weekend's Entertainment (schizophrenia in jail)
The Weekend's Entertainment
The weekend's entertainment has just been shoved inside the door.
His hands and feet are shackled as he stumbles to the floor.
Well now, what we got here?
When he talks it don't make no sense; why, is hard to tell.
We gonna do us some correctin' and some guardin'.
Throw him in a cell.
He yells gibberish at us all day long and won't shut up at night.
We strapped him to a chair and made sure that it was tight.
Defiant fucker pissed hisself, we love to watch him fight.
Got no respect for authority, man, we doin' some correctin' tonight!
He's loosing all his privileges, being such a prick.
The up-side is, he's so crazy, we can beat him all to shit,
we'll say he did it to hisself, the charges will never stick.
His upset Momma and his Daddy say their boy is sick;
Say call a doctor or ambulance, get him some help quick!
We tell them he's misbehaving and he's ours for a couple more days.
Judge don't work on weekends.
We ain't listenin' to you cry and yell.
So piss off now, we're busy correctin', or we'll put you in a cell.
"The Weekend's Entertainment" happened at the onset of my son's schizophrenia.
He was 18 and attending college about 30 miles from us. The week before, he totaled his car in a fender-bender and began sending us odd, difficult to understand emails. He called us with a tangled set of plans for a trip he wanted to take, and instructions for us to attend Thanksgiving dinner at his ex-girlfriend's parent's house, even though they had not invited any of us, not even him. His father and I were worried that he was messed up on drugs, so we planned to get to the bottom of it when I picked him up on Friday.
In the car, the radio was on and this normally inhibited kid was flinging his head, arms and body around to the music the whole way home. When we got to the house, I was relieved because his dad would be with us now. But when I parked next to my husband's truck, my son got out, opened the driver's side door on the truck and began loading everything he had brought with him into the truck. Then he took my gym bag that had some of my clothes in it and my boots and put those into the truck too. Then he got in the truck and drove away! I was stunned, wondering what just happened, why would he do that?
I rushed inside and told his father that he just left in the truck with his things and mine, and he seemed very wasted on something and definitely shouldn't be driving. We tried his cell phone, but he didn't answer. I decided to drive to his ex-girlfriend's apartment to see if that was where he went, but the truck wasn't there. I drove back to the house and my husband was waiting outside. He said the police just called and had him under arrest for trying to steal a truck! They wanted us to come right away. They said he had stopped at an oil change place and the guys inside saw him open the door to one of their trucks and he began loading all of the stuff he had with him into the truck. He was trying to start the truck with his father's key when the guys pulled him out and held him down until the police got there. The police thought, since he had so much stuff with him that he was packed for a trip, they didn't know that half of the stuff was mine.
Mental illness was not on our minds, and I think we both assumed he was high on something. The whole thing made no sense, he was already in a truck, why steal one? He was handcuffed and being put into the police car when we got there. We asked, Why?, but he had no answer. I angrily asked what drugs he was on, but he had no answer. He looked sick and confused. We felt sick and confused. They said that they had to question him at the police station before he would be put into the county jail and since it was about 5:00 PM, we wouldn't be able to see him until the next day. We were frightened; the charges against him were serious.
The next day his father went alone to see him. When he returned he was visibly shaken. He said that the things our son said to him made no sense. He could not explain why he was trying to take someones truck. If he had been high the day before, it would have worn off by now. He remembered him saying something about going to New York City to visit his ex-girl friend and her grandfather, because he was in the hospital. He also said he was taking on the sins of the world. A definite Christ reference. We had usually only attended church for weddings and funerals, so the hyper-religiosity was a surprise and a huge tip off that his mental state was not returning to normal. He also did not think our son had slept and he looked awful. My husband tried to get some answers from someone about how to get him out. He was told that the first chance our son could see a judge would be on Monday. We were both seriously alarmed and wondered how to go about finding a lawyer. Do they see people on weekends? I called his ex-girlfriend and she said her grandparents are all dead. She was at home, not in New York, and told me that he had been calling and sending odd emails to her the week before.
The next visiting time, they refused to let his father see him. He was told that our son was misbehaving and tried to flood his cell, so he wouldn't be allowed to see any visitors. He came home, picked me up and we both went back to the jail to get them to have a doctor see him. I was panicking at the thought that he was perhaps insane and that they wouldn't let anyone see him. The guard that came out to talk to us was a gigantic man with an attitude. He did not have any intention of calling a doctor or the Mobile Crisis team. We had never heard of the Mobile Crisis team, so I wrongly assumed it was part of the law enforcement system, like a SWAT team is. But I thought if they could help my son, then call them! He wouldn't and didn't. I was pleading with him that our son was exhibiting signs that he might be insane and he needed to be seen by a doctor. The guard kept loudly repeating, Mam, to me, becoming more angry each time he said it. It finally sunk in that Mam meant SHUT UP, when he said if I didn't shut up and leave, he was going to throw me in a cell! I was already crying and begged again, most obsequiously, asking if there was at least a nurse on their staff who could see him. The guard went through the mighty glass doors and came back a few minutes later and said that our son was with the nurse. That was all he could do and we needed to leave. I found out later from the staff nurse that she never saw him; no medical professional saw him.
We went home and my husband called lawyers until he found one who would meet with us immediately even though it was Sunday. He agreed to go with us to court the next day to try to get the judge to release our son to our custody, to take him to the hospital. The next day in the court room, we were horrified when the prisoners were brought into the room. Our son was shackled hands and feet, hair wild, dead eyes, head down, not walking, but being pushed each stumbling step by a guard. How? What? What had happened to our son? He didn't see us. He didn't look up. Once they were seated, a guard would periodical poke him to make him quit leaning toward the floor. When his turn came, the lawyer made the request to take him to the hospital and the judge agreed, though the charges would still be pending.
It took us three days to get him out of there and into the hospital. It was a total nightmare. His brain was on another planet and his body was bleeding, dehydrated, starved and bruised all over. What he was put through during his time in our county jail was torture. When he could speak a bit more clearly, many weeks later, he told of being tied or strapped to a chair that was then turned to face a wall. He was just left there; his pleas were ignored, they left him there to wet himself and rave in his madness.
I didn't know people were treated so badly in this country, until I saw what their combination of punishment and neglect had done to my son. There could not have been any doubt that there was something seriously wrong with him. They could have called for the mobile crisis team to medically evaluate him, but they never did.
Ironical, it has recently come to light, that our sheriff has been filling huge numbers of fake prescriptions for narcotics for himself, over at least the past few years, but he's still on the job because that's how our system works. He's the man I spoke to on the phone to report the deplorable treatment our son had received in his jail. He didn't know anything about it, but I had the feeling he also didn't care and nothing would be done about it.
I talked to one of the arresting officers while my son was in the hospital, to see if he knew what had happened to his glasses, because they were not returned to us at the jail. He didn't know, but he did solve one mystery for us, he said our son told them that he was trying to take the other truck because a child on the side of the road sent him a telepathic message, to change trucks, as he drove by.
Monday, March 19, 2007
My Son's Story as of Today (schizophrenia)
My son has been home from the psychiatric hospital for two weeks, after a three week stay. The doctor he saw there, Dr. O., put him on a new medication, one that seems to have brought him back to his old self! It is amazing to see. He is smiling, wanting to get out and do things, is aware of his appearance. The voices are quiet. I asked him if he is noticing any of the old symptoms, and he said that sometimes he does, but they are faint and manageable, not overwhelming and constant. No matter how bad the disease gets, the whole well person is still in there.
There is a drawback. Why must there always be a drawback?
The medicine that is helping him so much, has such dangerous side effects that his doctor, Dr. M., who did not treat him when he was in the hospital because she went home to India for three months, has said that she will not treat him any more because she does not want the responsibility and has never used it for outpatients. He must get weekly blood tests. The pharmacy had to get authorization to dispense it and must have the blood test results faxed to them before they can fill the prescription, one week at a time. I know it has gotten to be a joke that death is always listed as a potential side effect on medication, but they really mean it on this one.
We had not tried this hospital before. There were no available beds at the hospital that released him two weeks before. The first of these two stays was for two weeks, and was precipitated by a suicide attempt and by the severity of his symptoms. We were not aware that he had overdosed, because he kept to himself most of the time and we just assumed he was sleeping. When he emerged from his room, the next day, he was very confused about whether he was dead or not. He had not been very verbal about his delusions, but later that night he asked me if he was a ghost or not. Weeks later he explained that he thought he was in Hell and that his punishment for committing suicide was to wake up right back in the situation he couldn't bear to exist in. His father and I got him to agree to go to the hospital; not an easy thing, but much better than involuntary committal, which I will discuss at another time. As always, new medication was added, old medication was eliminated, dosages were changed.
He was still experiencing severe symptoms when he was released. You wonder in these circumstances, if this is the best they can do or if the doctor just doesn't care. Either way it is very common, and sometimes it is because the patient does not want to be there any more and insists on leaving. And they have that right if the committal was voluntary. If it was involuntary, they arrange a hearing before a judge to evaluate the patient's request. This is a safeguard against false committals and a protection of the individuals rights. At the state hospital, there is a court room right inside the hospital complex.
Watching his terror and confusion was awful, and his delusions were overwhelming him. The changes in medication, made during the last hospital stay, did not produce any positive changes that we could observe, so after two weeks, we found a bed for him at the new hospital. It was a God-send that his regular doctor, Dr. M., was in India , otherwise, he would not have seen Dr. O., and have been put on the new medication, Closaril (closapine). Dr. M. had kept him on medicine that did not give him freedom from his powerful, frightening delusions, though it was better than most the other medicines he had tried over the years. We are much happier with his new doctor and the new medicine.
Some of the Psychiatrists we have dealt with seem to have developed a real contempt for mentally ill people. You need to change jobs if you expect schizophrenics to be polite and make you feel good about yourself. Why would a doctor want to keep a patient on medicine that isn't giving the person a chance to have the best life possible, given the living Hell that mental illness is? You'd have to ask Dr. M., and all the other doctors he's seen, before now. We don't know.
There is a drawback. Why must there always be a drawback?
The medicine that is helping him so much, has such dangerous side effects that his doctor, Dr. M., who did not treat him when he was in the hospital because she went home to India for three months, has said that she will not treat him any more because she does not want the responsibility and has never used it for outpatients. He must get weekly blood tests. The pharmacy had to get authorization to dispense it and must have the blood test results faxed to them before they can fill the prescription, one week at a time. I know it has gotten to be a joke that death is always listed as a potential side effect on medication, but they really mean it on this one.
We had not tried this hospital before. There were no available beds at the hospital that released him two weeks before. The first of these two stays was for two weeks, and was precipitated by a suicide attempt and by the severity of his symptoms. We were not aware that he had overdosed, because he kept to himself most of the time and we just assumed he was sleeping. When he emerged from his room, the next day, he was very confused about whether he was dead or not. He had not been very verbal about his delusions, but later that night he asked me if he was a ghost or not. Weeks later he explained that he thought he was in Hell and that his punishment for committing suicide was to wake up right back in the situation he couldn't bear to exist in. His father and I got him to agree to go to the hospital; not an easy thing, but much better than involuntary committal, which I will discuss at another time. As always, new medication was added, old medication was eliminated, dosages were changed.
He was still experiencing severe symptoms when he was released. You wonder in these circumstances, if this is the best they can do or if the doctor just doesn't care. Either way it is very common, and sometimes it is because the patient does not want to be there any more and insists on leaving. And they have that right if the committal was voluntary. If it was involuntary, they arrange a hearing before a judge to evaluate the patient's request. This is a safeguard against false committals and a protection of the individuals rights. At the state hospital, there is a court room right inside the hospital complex.
Watching his terror and confusion was awful, and his delusions were overwhelming him. The changes in medication, made during the last hospital stay, did not produce any positive changes that we could observe, so after two weeks, we found a bed for him at the new hospital. It was a God-send that his regular doctor, Dr. M., was in India , otherwise, he would not have seen Dr. O., and have been put on the new medication, Closaril (closapine). Dr. M. had kept him on medicine that did not give him freedom from his powerful, frightening delusions, though it was better than most the other medicines he had tried over the years. We are much happier with his new doctor and the new medicine.
Some of the Psychiatrists we have dealt with seem to have developed a real contempt for mentally ill people. You need to change jobs if you expect schizophrenics to be polite and make you feel good about yourself. Why would a doctor want to keep a patient on medicine that isn't giving the person a chance to have the best life possible, given the living Hell that mental illness is? You'd have to ask Dr. M., and all the other doctors he's seen, before now. We don't know.
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