Three days before 20-year-old Adam Lanza killed his mother, then opened fire on a classroom full of Connecticut kindergartners, my 13-year-old son Michael (name changed) missed his bus because he was wearing the wrong color pants.Thanks to Brandon for sharing.
"I can wear these pants," he said, his tone increasingly belligerent, the black-hole pupils of his eyes swallowing the blue irises.
"They are navy blue," I told him. "Your school's dress code says black or khaki pants only."
"They told me I could wear these," he insisted. "You're a stupid bitch. I can wear whatever pants I want to. This is America. I have rights!"
"You can't wear whatever pants you want to," I said, my tone affable, reasonable. "And you definitely cannot call me a stupid bitch. You're grounded from electronics for the rest of the day. Now get in the car, and I will take you to school."
I live with a son who is mentally ill. I love my son. But he terrifies me.
The thing is, mental illness is a horrible thing. I know--I am bipolar and in the course of trying to get the right diagnosis and medication I racked up a whole slew of secondary diagnoses--social anxiety, OCD, borderline personality, among others. I went through two psychiatrists before a mental health nurse practitioner, of all people, sat down and said, I think you have this, and need this, and I've been on an even keel now for years. It wasn't just hell for me, but for the people around me. Just the other day, my closest friend, who went through hell and high water when I was at my worst, told me he could never go through that again. Through it all, I kept a job, but had emotional storms where I didn't care whether I lived or died, and constantly found ways to hurt myself financially, physically, and emotionally. But most of my rage was turned inward. For some, it goes out to others.
The majority of the mentally ill are not violent--they're actually more likely to be victims than perpetrators, from what I've read, but those who are can be terrifying. Our health system in this country is broken, and the mental health aspect of it is just as broken as the rest. There have been some good things over the years that have helped. Mental health awareness is increasing. Groups like NAMI: the National Alliance on Mental Illness lend support. I remember when I first went to a psychiatrist, my co-pay was much higher than a regular doctor not because she was a specialist, but because it was mental health. Now that's not the case.
But the mental health world is very convoluted. There are parents, loved ones, spouses, children, friends, all hoping they can find help for a loved one, and often at the end of the day, even with what help they can get, they feel at the mercy of the mental illness. Also, mental illness often means that the person is increasingly shunned, becomes a loner, or drops off the map in some way, so in some cases, there is no safety net of loved ones to help.
I don't have solutions, really. I do have a great deal of empathy for this woman and for the people out there everywhere who are dealing with loved ones who scare them. I hope "Michael" gets the help he needs. But we must work together to provide services to the mentally ill and identify those who are actually a danger to others, keep them from having guns, help protect them and society as much as possible. In the meantime, I take care of me--take my meds, fall back on past counseling when needed, and try to keep some insight into my daily mental health so that my friends don't have to worry about me, because those of us with mental illness also have a responsibility to ourselves and others to seek help and foster treatment if we're functioning enough to do so, and because I love the people in my life and never want to scare them again.
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