Our beautiful, loving, sensitive, smart son began to have symptoms of schizophrenia 10 years ago at the age of 17. We sought professional help immediately from a therapist/PhD who had worked with our son after our move from one side of the nation to the other during middle school. The reason I mention was that we knew our son's behavior was drastically changing, but this therapist did not offer us answers or support when we were searching for answers and help for our son.
When pressed, his only solution was for us to go to NAMI.
Sadly, for the past 7 of the 9 years since our son was diagnosed with schizophrenia, we began to fear hospitals because after the age of 18, several times our son was released to the streets, homeless shelters, put on a bus where he ended up in the wrong state, and the traumas he has endured only further complicated his declining mental state. We have always been 100% involved, seeking good doctors, good care, and effective treatment. Our son has always lived at home, and we provide a loving, supportive environment for him, but we have had to do all the reading and learning about severe mental illness on our own. It took us 7 years and many, many hospitalizations, treatment facilities, and crisis interventions before we found a truly caring, committed doctor who meets with our son, offers us hope, guidance, and medical advice that is actually making positive changes in our son's health and life.
The mental health system is so afraid of liability that they do not provide the kind, caring, compassionate care that is needed in a mental health crisis...for the patient, or the worried patient's family. We are often treated with suspicion and kept at arm's length, even when our loved ones sign the HIPAA Waiver. Medications are stopped, started, and adjusted quickly in hospitals without much thought to the kind of aftermath that leaves for the patient's body and brain to handle those changes. Patients are released when they are not getting better without suggestions for further treatment or advice. Sadly, severe mental illness falls to the parents or caretakers to "figure out on their own", and so often good care and treatment facilities do not take insurance so only those who can afford outrageous monthly fees can get treatment. I know this is partially due to the system not having the answers to SMI, but it is also due to funding cuts, cuts to Medicaid, and insurance companies making decisions on hospital stays rather than the attending doctors and nurses.
Each story is shared by someone impacted by untreated SMI,
lightly edited for clarity, never for meaning.
Do you have an ask? If you were sitting down with your legislator, how would you ask them to help you?
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Please look at the statistics for SMI as well as the funding that is granted to care for this very vulnerable population. Individuals with SMI often cannot work and therefore have no other access to healthcare other than Medicaid.
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Study these rising statistics and the high overall cost of homelessness and prisons, that has become the answers for people who do not have families that can provide life-saving care.
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Please do this as you decide where you stand on Medicaid cuts and funding for beds at Mental Health Hospitals. There is such a growing need and by ignoring this problem, we are "kicking the can down the road" and making a much bigger problem not only for individuals and families that struggle with the challenges of SMI, but also for our society as we build more prisons, more homeless shelters, and increase emergency response.
