Volatile son making threats

@Hills

My mother endured violent flare ups for about 15 years before she took out the intervention order .. She was almost the same size as my brother. If there is an order in place the police are legally obliged to attend.

However I was upset that she refused to attend counselling with him or my sister when it all began ... because she did not want to have to admit we had been wards of the state.

Your situation is different ... do you know when he is simply being an obnoxious baby dragon ... or when he is under the influence ... pupil size ... slurred speech ... loud laughing conpanions ...wonky gait???

Dont push him when he is ...once they cross a line of violence then it gets harder and harder to come back as a loved family member ... and they harden the wall of words and excuses.

I would discuss legal options with both husband and son ... not as threats or ultimatums ... but as possibilities ... just so they are aware ... and it does not come down too heavily and spark a negative reaction.

To some extent young men have to prove themselves .. but not at your expense .. they need to do it .. in the world.

Hello @winap76 Your story is tragic ... I guess you know the procedures but it still is heart rending. You can slao start a new thread "discussion" and post more about your own circumstances if you wish.

Go gently with yourselves and take care.

Running away, a fantasy of mine, I have developed a few problems myself and the burden of long term care and medical expenses make me feel like im being crushed .. im currently exploring options for myself, but the mum in me always puts my daughters needs (and everybody elses) above my own, like you I can;t find the balance between caring for my daughter and looking after myself, my daughte thank goodness is now stable,no more violence and aggression, but she is flat, apathetic and like your son after droppig out of school a couple of years ago is having trouble finding work and moving on, still psychiatrists and pyschologists and another dbt program starting, but no actual progress that I feel is tangible or measurable or that makes any difference to me, sounds selfish but im very very tired,, sorry, my point was going to be that as a mum and as a carer it is essential to look after yourself, if anyone knows how to do that without feeling like you are abandoning your child (who is almost 19) please let me know.

Hey @Untethered,

im sending you some massive hugs...

I dont have children but my partner was in his early 20's when i suggested he was showing signs of bipolar, through his diagnosis journey we confirmed with his mother he had been showing signs since his early teens and she just lived with his behaviour much to the detriment of her own wellbeing.

I read in your last comment that he self identified his trigger... this is a HUGE step! learning to identify when things arent going well is a big step and it is hard to do "in the moment". Our psych suggested a colour rating system (which admittedly didnt work in its intended form for us, but we still use our own modified version to this day!). What we do is (on a good day) we identified colours and how we could use them as a traffic light warning system. It helped me more than him to help with modifying my behaviour or our environment to calm him. So for example, if i am pushing to hard and he is becoming aggitated he tells me orange, this means we can keep talking but i need to be gentler in my approach, if he cannot continue talking he says red, and i walk away and leave him to calm down (when he was younger he would become violent so this was designed to protect me not him). if we are out in a social setting and he isnt coping, he will tell me yellow, and i make an excuse for us to steal some alone time togther (for ages i pretended to smoke so we could get away outside and he could regroup). Originally there were lots of colours, but he didnt find that he needed a colour to tell me he was sad or angry, he could just tell me. we still use yellow and orange to this day, it is a good way for him to pause our interactions without exploding at me.

it is worth a try if you can catch him on a good day to make the agreement about what colours will be used and what behaviour that will evoke from you.

Tigs

xx

You know what is hard as I read about these difficult young adults who are our offspring?I have been through it all.Smoking pot was a problem when he was a student but he gave up its quite easily very early on.

He is on medication...fortnightly compulsory injections ,under a CTO.But he is still always very unwell.I identify very much with all the things you are describing here .Now after 25 years I wish I could say everything is much better.We have bought him his own dwelling .He pays his rent,drives a car which he resisters himself but he is totally isolated socially,suspicious of everyone,.He was on a research scholarship when he first got sick.Now he won't use a computer or have a phone in his house.He asks us not to visit him unless it is urgent and important because talking to people makes him really sick.

I know we are supposed to take care of ourselves and I try but the sorrow is unending.I have joined local support groups,(even started them over the years ) Some families have managed to get treatment and have a stable situation .In fact most people I know have managed better than us .I guess I have been pretty resilient but now I would love to see him not so withdrawn and ill and able to work with health professionals.

Sorry this is all confusing and disconnected.Reading about other people's difficulties makes me sad because Inwould have hoped getting help was easier now.Drug use is often a symptom of MI and complicates it .