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Daughter won't seek help for mental illness.

HummingbirdContributor23 Nov 2015, 10:50 pm AEDT

Daughter won't seek help for mental illness.

Hi, I'm new to this forum and I'm desperate for some insight on how others might handle my current situation... I have my 30 yr old daughter and 1 year old child living with me and my partner of 17 years. She is a former drug addict and came to live with me 4 years ago while still addicted to ice after a few hospitalisations as result of psychosis. Her partner told her to leave.

I paid off all her debts and set out to get her clean and back to a normal life. She got pregnant during a short term relationship, and ceased using during this time.
Her mental health is greatly affected as a result of drug use and I'm sure from all my research that she has symptoms of schizophrenia. She has a very aggressive nature and if challenged will scream and threaten. The worst she has actually done in the last 6 months, is put her foot through my wall and grabbed her biological dads throat. So basically no one will challenge her behaviour for fear of displays of aggression in the presence of her child.

I come home from work to a messy house, clean it , prepare and feed my granddaughter and my daughter to ensure they have some nutritious food at least once a day. She eats and leaves her dirty plate on the sink. I play with my granddaughter for at least 1-3 hours a night to give her a break and the baby some stimulation, then lock myself in my room around 8-9 pm exhausted.

We don't really speak as I have found it is better not to speak as nearly everything I say has a smart remark following.she is a heavy smoker and goes in and out the front door at least 20-30 times a day, starting many days at 6am and ending around 10 pm. My bedroom is next to the front door. I am mentally and emotionally exhausted.. There have been occasions where I should have called the police or mental health, however I'm so worried as her screaming and threats can be quite verbally violent and I am certain they will seperate her from her child.

I have never witnessed aggression towards her child however she will scream accusations with the baby in her arms. Hence why we do not challenge her deluded thoughts and increase her aggression. She constantly talks to herself as if she is talking to someone, including body gestures. She can be quite calm and act somewhat normal when in the company of others eg: shopping.

She accuses people of events that have not occurred. I used to ask what she was talking about, but don't anymore as it normally ends in argument. She takes the baby in and out all day driving to the shop or wherever at all hours. I went out a few weeks ago and returned at 1 am and she was not home.
She said she went for a drive... Baby was with her... It is currently 9 pm and she is driving around with the baby as I write..

My partner has been working away for months but is due to return at xmas time and I'm so worried as she hates him and I know he will not put up with her aggression towards me or himself. ( she got on very well with him prior to her drug addiction.)
She has no friends at all as her nasty texts and accusations have driven them all away, other family members avoid her as all efforts to help her have been exhausted.

I know my relationship with her is not helping as I don't feel at all close to her which is adding to her social isolation. As it is so stressful at home I will not go out with her as it is the only me time I get. We did have a normal mother daughter relationship prior to her living with us.
I am sad for her but whenever I try to talk to her it ends badly. She refuses to get any help as she believes she is fine and that I am COOKED for suggesting it.

I could go on for hours with stories that have taken place over the previous years, but my whole intention is to gather thoughts of others who may have experienced similar situations and ultimately to steer her in the direction of help without involuntary interventions.

She has applied for housing trust, but that could take years. I am 55 and I don't think my mental health can endure her behaviour for much longer. I think if she had something to do and or people her own age to interact with, it may help her and encourage her to get some medical help.

I do apologise for the novel but wanted to give a good insight to my current situation.

Any suggestions are appreciated.

33 replies

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In response to: Daughter won't seek help for mental illness.

Unknown userMember02 Apr 2016, 9:40 pm AEDT

Re: Daughter won't seek help for mental illness.

Wow - 6ft 5. Big boy. You must have fed him well. But I imagine he could be scary.

I have found mindfullness meditation is helpful with managing suicidal thoughts and depression. (and anxiety). I have PTSD myself, so I HAVE to make sure I manage stress levels. I have never been prescribed medication for it, but have had CBT and did the mindfullness course.

My adult children are well and truly left home so at least I don't have the constant barrage. Having your unwell kids at home must be so totally wearing. And Hummingbird has got the grandchild to think of too. I can only imagine how hard that is, trying to keep things calm to minimise psychological damage to the little one.

Funny how they can be so out of control, but as soon as the CAT team is there or someone else, they become a different person. To me, that is an indicator that they can control their behaviour if they have to, but they choose not to with certain people, such at the mother.

Even though the chaos is not inside my home, it is still really difficult. At the moment the situation is really bad. Hiding somewhere is very appealing right now.

In response to: Daughter won't seek help for mental illness.

HummingbirdContributor02 Apr 2016, 10:35 pm AEDT

Re: Daughter won't seek help for mental illness.

It Has been a while since I last posted and can see there is a growing number that would be on that boat to the North Pole..:

Since my last post, I finally got to the stage of calling mental health triage to request an assessment. I have engaged with mental health on numerous occasions , (Due to outbursts) and all without result. The MH team have come to my home on numerous occasions and have seen my daughters condition and agrees that she needs meds, however , they arranged two emergency psych visits, but she managed to somewhat hold it together while being assessed. Although the psych can see and agrees she needs meds for breakthrough psychosis, she is not detainable for the purpose of enforcing meds. As soon as they leave things return to normal with paranoid accusations and strange behaviour. My partner called the police one evening as she was yelling and banging thing around the house for god knows what for.

The police came but said they can't do anything as it is not a criminal matter. ( they were very nice though)

I get that...but who do you call when things are out of control. Mental health Team also attended, but again, she had calmed by then and nothing could be done.

She did at least come to the dr with me and accepted a script for meds but refuses to take them. So basically unless she threatens with a weapon, we are on our own... So life goes on exactly as it has for the last four years... Walking on eggshells and putting up with her abuse... Why don't I kick her out... Believe me the only reason she has a warm bed and dinner served every night is because she has a gorgeous 18 month old who needs some normality in her life.

Your right blackzena the whole mental health system is broken. We have to endure her behaviour or get her into her own accommodation and wait till she fails( which is a given) as she spends all her money on cigarettes and takeaway.

We look after baby in the evening and on my days off, and I know she will not be able to financially provide for her child or provide any educational stimulation as she is too caught up in her own paranoid selfish world. I know she will not cope with her child it without our constant help.

The mental health system sends a message that they cannot help until the horse has bolted!!! They are very sympathetic but the law does not allow intervention until a person "slips up" . Great.. We just wait till something tips them over the edge then they will act... Meanwhile who cleans up the trail of distruction...

I am not prepared to risk my granddaughters wellbeing for my own peace. God it's been so long since I've had one whole day of peace in our home.... I understand Leigh (contributor) waking up wishing she was dead.. I know it sounds crazy to some but sometimes it seems an option.. If only for a minute... I will admit that I have felt the same on occasions but then remember that I am going through this to be there for my grandchild... and dead.... is not helpful really...to anyone but me... So I divert my attention to something positive and forget that crazy thought. And that is exactly what it is... Just a crazy thought...

Tomorrow we are looking for houses with an attached granny flat, so at least she will have her own space, I can have mine and still keep watch over my granddaughter..

I too could go on with stories forever but it sounds as though a lot have similar or the same life and have had the same experience with the Mental Health system as I. So I will stop here and hope for all, that things will change soon and we can all get some peace in our homes.. 🙏🏻

In response to: Re: Daughter won't seek help for mental illness.

Unknown userMember02 Apr 2016, 10:52 pm AEDT

Re: Daughter won't seek help for mental illness.

Yes Hummingbird, death seems like a good option sometimes. I start looking into prepaid funerals sometimes.

A home with a granny flat sounds like a really good idea. You can still watch over your granddaughter and have some space. I will be interested to know how that works out for you all.

By the way, there are lots of properties on the market at the North Pole. It is a seriously good option if you like the cold.

In response to: Re: Daughter won't seek help for mental illness.

LeighSenior Contributor03 Apr 2016, 11:12 am AEST

Re: Daughter won't seek help for mental illness.

Hummingbird the granny flat sounds like a possibility and I hope it works.

My granddaughter is the only reason I am here as well. She is 8 now and when he has access which is considerable they stay with us. She is a delight and I want to protect her from him when he is not right. He has been a good father until recently and she adores him.

He uses our love for her as a threats,says he will stop us from seeing her or that he will walk way from her and this would break her heart. Her mother is as disturbed as him if not more.

Extreme manipulation. I have not seen him now since Friday night but I still feel abused and exhausted.I too have PTSD and become hypervigilant. He has his own place which he will probably lose as he is behind in mortgage but is frequently here and wants to live back here. I am totally resisting this.

There must be thousands of us feeling like this.The Cat team just say he will have to totally crash before they will help,or to take out an AVO via the police. That would not stop him it would enrage him and make it worse. As well he has not been in trouble with the police and I don't want to ruin the chance that he might get his act together. But at almost 32 I am not feeling optimistic.North pole I'm coming!!

In response to: Re: Daughter won't seek help for mental illness.

AppleblossomSenior Contributor03 Apr 2016, 5:17 pm AEST

Re: Daughter won't seek help for mental illness.

When I visited people doing food vouchers I met a few people caring for grandchildren. The adult children were not capable? My hunch is: Please dont let him in. It wont do either of you any good. His best shot is growing up, paying his mortgage and trying to moderate his relationships. Rightly or wrongly, front doors do help manage boundaries. Encourage him to manage his money and only offer free feeds.

In response to: Daughter won't seek help for mental illness.

GimaqualiNew Contributor20 May 2018, 9:59 pm AEST

Re: Daughter won't seek help for mental illness.

I enjoyed your story so much. I am going thru the same with my 28 year old. She doesn't talk to herself that I know of but there are other things. For example her OCD is so bad it can take her 5-10 minutes to get in the car, everything is rearranged into a uniform pattern in my house even though I have asked her not to rearrange my cabinets, refrigerator and so on. I'm 51 and have had her baby since he was born, she has not been here most of this time. She has been here only a week this time and I'm already not sleeping again and an emotional mess. My husband, not her father, also makes it hard to deal with this. He isn't emotionally connected to her and hates what she does to me. If I didn't know better I would think I had written your story. Thanks for sharing.

In response to: Daughter won't seek help for mental illness.

HummingbirdContributor21 May 2018, 8:43 pm AEST

Re: Daughter won't seek help for mental illness.

Hi Gimaquali
Im pleased you enjoyed reading my story I know how important it is to know there are others out there that understand how you are feeling .. Even though I’m sure, like me you wouldn’t wish your current situation on anyone else , it is somehow comforting to know others are experiencing the same or similar situations..
My situation is different now “thank god” Things got so unbearable at home we eventually purchased a home unit for my daughter and grandchild to live in.. she was doing really well until just prior to Xmas 17’. I’m sure she did drugs again and was in a state of psychosis for around 8 weeks.. Her OCD was out of control... eventually she was picked up by police and placed in a high dependency psych ward for 3 weeks and then placed on a Community treatment order at her home for a further 12 weeks..Child services and the police were not interested in investigating her behaviour as I was her/ granddaughters support person.. so being picked up by police for driving erratically was a godsend... 3 months later She is now 100% back to normal.. our mental health system is very frayed but with constant insistence that she needed intensive treatment “Community treatment order” following discharge I finally got them to listen and it paid off... I feel for you, I really do.. if you ever need to ask a question or just want someone to listen to you rant or offload, you can always send me a message and I will do what I can to help you... I hear you when you say your husband is not emotionally attached (same)and I know it makes things so much harder as they don’t see things in the same perspective... family and friends get tired of listening about our stressy lives or at least we think they do, so we tend to shutdown and keep things to ourself.. don’t do that .. offload as much as you can.. Talking about or writing about your stresses definitely lightens the load..

In response to: Daughter won't seek help for mental illness.

65faithCasual Contributor04 July 2018, 12:12 pm AEST

Re: : Re: Daughter won't seek help for mental illness.

I’ve found my place. It’s like I can breath. People who understand. I

have a 34 year old son who has a brain injury, depression and is an addict. He would never survive on the streets. He has lived with his father and I for 10 years. The past few months have been horrible and getting worse. He doesn’t have a vehicle because he’s wrecked about 4 in the past 5 years. If he wants alcohol, he won’t shut up until someone does and gets it. He’s on disability so he has the money to pay for it. He has no friends anymore. The past few months he’s been really depressed and drinks constantly. I want to just throw him out but I know that with his brain injury, he will never survive. I want a pill

to stop being a mom also.

In response to: Re: : Re: Daughter won't seek help for mental illness.

Unknown userMember04 July 2018, 12:29 pm AEST

Re: : Re: Daughter won't seek help for mental illness.

Hello @65faith

A very warm welcome to the forums, thank you for sharing some of your experiences with your son and his challenging mental health and brain injury symptoms, that is a huge amount to be dealing with, so I am glad you have found the forums for some extra support at the moment.

You might like to also Introduce Yourself Here so that other carer members can get to know you a bit better, let us know if you have any troubles using the forums too okay 🙂

Lunar

In response to: Re: Daughter won't seek help for mental illness.

NorthPoleCasual Contributor29 Aug 2018, 1:52 am AEST

Re: Daughter won't seek help for mental illness.

I keep saying I cannot share space with my daughter, but she cannot financially support herself and two kids. How has the granny flat worked out for you? Has it created other problems?

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