How to Involuntarily Commit a Psychotic Person

All good ... I snuck in the group hugz lol

You were not harsh, I could have been more helpful. I just have strong views on psychiatric care, that's all. I need to be more objective.

Sorry.

I don't know if this will help or not, but you can also be involuntarily committed in my state if you're considered gravely disabled, which means unable to provide food, shelter, and/or adequate clothing for yourself due to an acute mental illness. Even if you deny suicidal/homicidal ideation, you can be committed if they find you to be gravely disabled. I have schizoaffective disorder and denied suicidal and homicidal ideation to the ER psychiatrist when I was taken there, but because the ER pdoc felt I was gravely disabled based on the info he got from my friends/primary care doctor, I was involuntarily committed. It wasn't exactly the best experience ever, but when it was all said and done, I was relieved I'd gotten the help, and my friendships are still intact--maybe even stronger than before, actually. I would think that if your sister was kicked out of her previous housing, that would count toward gravely disabled. I'm in Pennsylvania, by the way--not sure how things work in other states. I really hope this helps, and I am so sorry you're in the situation you're in!
Best Wishes,
Hope

Do they have MHAs = mental health advocates is the US? I'm training to be one in the UK to help with situations like this. My training involves a lot of learning about the law and who can do what, and what a person's rights are.

That sounds like pseudo/quasi psychosis, which comes and goes. Someone with psychosis wouldn't be able to cop that they've gone too far and backpedal as you say. Not a doctor or anything but I've seen it in people and asked about it, usually associated with personality problems. Not invalidating what she's going through it just might be an avenue to research, I'm not sure someone can be committed with that.

Hope I'm not bringing the thread off course, this paragraph just stood out for me.

Well that's the thing, quasi psychosis comes and goes like that, but the psychosis seen in psychotic disorders doesn't come and go that frequently.

Update: my mom got a hold of her nurse friend who is director of behavioral heath of the hospital my sister would be admitted to.

She assured my.mom that the commitment is needed and they can force meds
She said she 99.9% sure she will be admitted.

We are going forth with the commitment tomorrow morning

Please think of us during this incredibly hard time
My sister especially. I can assume this might be traumatic for her.

Sent from my SM-G900V using Tapatalk

ok well today is the day. havent heard from my mom yet. kinda too scared to text her and ask whats going on...

When will you know?

im going to text my mom in abt an hour to see whats going on

edit: its only 9 30 am here

The magistrate refused to order a commitment. Back to square one.

Upset

Sent from my SM-G900V using Tapatalk

Sorry Junk, just seeing this now, what happened? What were their reasonings for refusing the committal order?

I'm sorry. You must be really worried about her.

I'm sorry that didn't go well. Do you know the grounds for the denial, i.e., why? Or was it just "Denied."

he said shes not suicidal or homicidal so its a no go

we are at a loss

I'm so sorry you are going through this....

I'm sorry your sister is so troubled. Getting her committed on a 72 hr hold may not turn things around, as much as you are hoping. What happens after the 72 hours? Also, forced medicating is not so easy to achieve as you might think.

While she is in a psych facility, if she becomes disruptive, a doctor can order an I/M dose (shot) of a major tranquilizer, like Haldol, should she refuse oral medication. But what will your mom do at home?

Eventually, if your mom is going to have any kind of a life, it may be necessary to get your sister placed in a group home. However, I don't think these sort of places are locked down like jails.

I would recommend that you see if your sister might be interested in applying for SSDI/SSI. That might be a motivator to get her to allow formal psych assessments. In the meantime, your mom might tell your sister that a condition of her staying at your mom's place is that she get appropriate health care.

It's a tough situation. The next time she becomes unruly, you or your mom might call the police and ask that they take her for a mental health eval. If she's clearly been acting up, I think the cops would be willing to do that.

Here you can't approach their doctor. But you can call 911. I believe too the mobile crisis or crisis networks can be of assistance to you. They can send out a team with or without the police. Finally, have you approached your Mental Health Association/Society? They would likely have a list of 1) resources for your self regarding supports of your own and 2) some sort of course of action to assist you.

Unfortunately, unless the individual is at risk of harming themselves or others they cannot be commited without their consent.

Finally I applaud you for having the will and wherewithall to help your family member.

hi guys. thanks for the feedback. as i said, we couldn't get thru the magistrate. as far as mobile crisis teams, we have looked into that. my sister absolutely will NOT see anyone about her issues as she doesnt think she has any. we've given her countless resources to pdocs and therapists. she always says thanks, ill call them, but she never does. my sister has always been irritable at a baseline. now it is extremely apparent. she is emotionally and verbally abusive to my mom which breaks my heart. as far as SSI/SSDI- i highly doubt she would agree to that either. it might be worth a shot, though. the issue with that is that she has not earned enough income to warrant getting disability under her own social security number. I have SSDI under my father's social security number (survivor's benefits) because he died when i was 10, my sister was 11. if she drew SSDI under his number we would both get like 350 dollars a month because they limit what they give out under 1 persons SS number.

anyway, we are still trying to think of options. my mom said she was going to try to talk to her yesterday about everything, but when i asked her later how things are going she just said things have been good.

a big fear of mine is that my sister might hurt or try to hurt my mom. i want to say no, she would never do that. but you just never know when someone is being so unpredictable and not like themselves. i text my mom every day just to make sure she is ok. when she doesnt respond right away i freak out and get really scared.

i want to thank you all for responding to my thread and giving me support and advice. it is greatly appreciated

SSI is not dependant upon ones work history. SSDI is,

My point though you go through the same application process people with no work history of their own and of their relatives can still get SSI. the only requirement for SSI is that a person is disabled, blind or 65 years or older with limited income and resources, and legal resident\citizenship of america.

Survivors benefits have a time limit usually when the child reaches 18 or 21. then if they are disabled, blind and a USA citizen social security transfers them over to the adult SSI system which is not dependent upon parents social security.

my point if you are an adult your sister may be able to get her survivors benefits without impacting yours. Im a bit confused though as to why they gave you survivors benefits but not your sister. usually when a parent dies all minor children in the household are automatically put on the survivors benefits even when a parent applied for one child.

https://www.ssa.gov/ssi/text-over-ussi.htm
https://www.ssa.gov/ssi/text-eligibility-ussi.htm

Hi DNA. I'm not surprised to hear that your sister does not have enough of a work history to qualify for SSSI. Most likely, she never will have. She is exactly the sort of person that SSI was set up for. Unless your mother has oodles of money, it should not be totally on your mother to provide for all of your sister's material needs. I'm assuming she is over the age of 18. But to get SSI, she would first have to be found by the SSA to be incapable of working, due to mental disability. It sounds to me like that is the case.

Your mom is in danger of becoming her own worse enemy by not calling police when it is appropriate to do so, under the misguided notion that she shouldn't do that to her daughter. Another agency she might appeal to is "Adult Protection Services." Every locality has such an agency.

Now I'm not going to tell you that it's easy to get the authorities to do what should be done. It isn't. You have to push. You may have to be very persistant. You might help your mom by keeping a journal in which you make detailed notes describing every episode of disturbing behavior that your sister engages in. (Include dates, times, winesses.) Your mom and you may have to call the police repeatedly. Squeaky wheels get the grease.

"The System's" default response is apt to be: "If your family member is difficult to have around, then simply tell her she can't live there any more. Get a restraining order, if you need to - to keep her away. Then let the chips fall where they may.

That puts you and your mother in an awful position. You don't want to turn a young woman into the street where God knows what might happen to her. You feel that, as a mentally disturbed person, she can't just be thrown onto her own resources like that. Unfortunately, there is no ideal way to proceed.

I would stop trying to tell your sister that she is "mentally ill." Leave the diagnosing to the physicians. What you are legitimately able to discern is that she cannot cope properly with her life and that she cannot behave in such a way as to have it make sense for her to be living with your mother. I think you are clinging very desperately - and somewhat misguidedly - to the notion that, if your sister can just be kept medicated, she will be manageable living with your mother. Lay people tend to believe that modern medicine has come up with drugs that basically "control" psychiatric disorders. The common belief is that it's because of disturbed people being "off their medication" that they get into trouble. No such wonder drugs have ever been formulated, despite the popular hype about these miracle agents correcting people's chemical imbalances and rendering them fine to live normally in the community. I've worked with psych patients in jails, prisons, psych hospitals, nursing homes and in community med-dispensing venues. There are no magic bullets in the form of pills or shots. Those things can help. But, when a person is prone to actual psychosis, even getting their meds hand-fed to them everyday, and even when they get scheduled long-acting "depot shots" of I/M antipsychotic medication administered, they still decompensate.

In the case of a person like your sister who displays frightening hostility, there is probably no way that her care can be adequately managed under your mother's roof. Their relationship, itself, is dysfunctional. And that probably won't change.

I, myself, have no first hand familiarity with group homes. They are what, nowadays, replaces the old state hospital system - I guess. Clients of psych services, like your sister, (now called "consumers") are also assisted by The System to reside independently in apartments with support from case managers and "support workers" who come round to do lots of things, like even house cleaning.

Getting access to that level of support takes a lot of pushing. It actually would come about more easily, if your sister were ending up in jail frequently for anti-social behavior. I believe you're hoping to arrange some viable care set-up for your sister, without her having to go through a lot of hell first, like homelessness, jail, and, possibly, her being abused and exploited on the street.

It's sad that a person who is mentally ill with psychotic features and disruptive behavior kind of has to get abandoned by their family and left to get themselves in desperate straights before The System intervenes in a meaningful way . . . but that's kind of how it is.

Try and convince your mother to not tolerate hostile behavior from your sister, but to call cops immediately when that starts. Your sister has to become a problem to someone other than you and your mother, before there is any incentive for anyone else to arrange any intervention.

Also, you may not be able to dissuade your mother from continuing to enable a bad situation. This is way worse than just somebody needs to make your sister take her meds.

amanda louise: i applied for disability when i was 23. i was deemed disabled since the age of 16. my survivors benefits ARE under my dad's SS number. not sure what you are talking about. my mom applied for widow's benefits and this is how i know it affected my SSDI, because they took $120 out of my disability check each month stating they limit what one gets under 1 person's SS number. my sister has been mostly healthy up until 6 years ago. she has never applied for SSDI which is why she never got survivor's benefits.

rose: my sister was on abilify and was doing much better when she would take it. im aware that meds are not miracle cures. i wish she would get in therapy. in the state i am in (NC) they make it hard to commit someone who is not actively sui or homicidal. other states it is easier to do. i want to say that until 2010-2011 my sister was normal. she was herself. up until this has happened she had a healthy life- friends, job, independent, living on her own, went to college and got a bachelor's degree. she is 30 years old now and has none of that due to her coming off her meds. i fear the longer she goes in this psychotic state the worse it will get, and might cause irreparable damage. i know it might seem like im saying the meds will 100% fix this but thats not what im saying. she does need to at least get a therapeutic dose of meds in her in order to break free from the psychosis and then hopefully seek support elsewhere, like therapy or something like that

Hugds JunkDNA. I can't begin to imagine the major disappointment you and your mom feel about the judge's horrible decision. Are you familiar with the Family Mental Health Bill now passed in the US Senate. Its by Republican PA Congressman Tim Murphy. I am in no way a Republican but I think his bill may be of interest to you. I figure you can find out about it at the Treatment Advocacy Center. Director E. Fuller Torrey MD. or mentalhealthpolicy.org. DJ Jaffe Director. Best of luck to you.

That's a very reasonable fear to have. So, having gotten the responses above, do you have any idea about how your mother and you can proceed?

My mom told me the other day that my sister called her pdoc and made an appointment for 9/7. The thing is my sister has been lying a lot so we don't know if this is true and don't have a way to check bc the pdoc office can't confirm or deny being as my sister is over 18 and we are not on a consent form to release information