Fighting for Answers | Category Archives: Mental Health – Child | Page 49Mental Health - Child Archives - Page 49 of 122

A letter to my son. David.

David, As I write this I am faced with the reality that you are being moved further from our home. From your family. I wish that things could be different. David, you have a multifaceted mental illness. As a result of this, we do not feel that it is safe for you to live at home. It isn’t that we don’t love you or want you. We need for you to be safe from harm. We need for others to be safe from harm. It has been difficult to make the decisions to place you in residential psychiatric care. We took you in. We adopted you into our home and our hearts. I could never be prouder than I am of you, and all that you have accomplished in your short life. I wish that I could undo the life you had before you were born. Undo the hardships that

David is worried

David called. I could sense the worry in his voice. The first thing he asked about was what goals he needed to have so that he could stay at his current location rather than being moved to the new facility. Rather than going elsewhere, he would rather come home. David is still too volatile to bring home. We don’t know from minute to minute how he is going to be. He can be good for a week or two, and then turn violent or aggressive with little notice. He needs so much attention that they have one person staffing him. They change this person roughly every three hours. If that is the case, how could I possibly hope to handle him at home? So we talked about goals. I told him that he needs to develop his own goals. I could offer advice, but ultimately the goals are his. In

Facility Transfer and Medication Changes

Today we had our visit with David. He was uncooperative at first. So mom and I explained to him that his transfer to a facility out of state is pending. He asked us why. So we explained that since he is not listening, not working his program, antagonistic to his peers and generally uncooperative, that the current facility wants us to transfer him to another more restrictive facility. He said he doesn’t want to move. For the record, we don’t want him to move either. More on that in a bit. We asked him what he wants for Christmas, as we may need to celebrate Christmas early with him if the transfer goes through before Christmas. His response broke our hearts. “I want to stay here, I don’t want to move there.” All in all, it ended up being a positive visit. As we returned him to the residence, I