Drug Abuse or Paranoia?

Hello all,

I'm writing here for two reasons - the first being I need to vent, and the second being my mom is flying off the rails.

I'm not looking for anything other than an outlet to express my frustration, and possibly gain some affirmation that this is most likely PPD and not drug abuse. You are not obligated to chime in.

Here's the background info:

My mom just turned 60. She has done every drug ever made, most notably cocaine, which she sold through the largest operation in the Midwest until the feds busted her in 1987 - S.W.A.T. team and all, right through our living room window while I ate cereal and watched cartoons. With the help of some fantastic lawyers and lots of cash hidden in the walls, she eluded prison time and moved us to another state. There, she sold only petty amounts, and began using heavily until 1996 when she was busted again and given an ultimatum - get clean or serve time.

To my knowledge, she has only smoked marijuana (heavily for the past two years) and occasionally drank alcohol since that time. She swears she can't imagine doing cocaine again. I have to believe her.

Around the time when the courts were forcing her to "get clean", she became suicidal, wound up in a psych ward, and was diagnosed as bipolar, something she claims was a bogus diagnosis. She also developed heart failure, which she was heavily medicated for, and it is now almost non-existent. All of her doctors suspect her enlarged heart could have been attributed to decades of cocaine abuse. She's as healthy as an ox now...physically speaking.

Here's the present-day info:

Mentally speaking, I don't know what planet she's on. In the past 13 months, she has separated from her on-again/off-again husband of 30 years (AKA my father), called the FBI no fewer than a dozen times regarding her suspicions, changed her phone number at least 25 times, changed every lock imaginable, installed $10,000 worth of security equipment, covered all her windows with paper, begun supplying food and water dishes to "the thugs in the attic", and taken countless other alarming, embarrassing, and unbelievable actions - all because she claims my dad is this monster with millions of dollars worth of real estate, off-shore accounts, internet businesses, and child sex trafficking networks, plus numerous secret families all over the United States, complete with wives and children.

She also believes he intercepts her phone messages and has hacked every machine in the house, including her phones, the furnace, the A/C, the stove, the water supply, the electricity, and even the locks on her car. She insists she "just wants her fair share of his money and justice for his victims."

I have spoken to him twice since this all began over Easter brunch of 2012. In that time, he has moved out, allowed their home to fall into foreclosure, filed bankruptcy, and aged about twenty years. He's living in a retirement community with his sister.

Yes, we've tried suggesting help. Yes, we've tried local mental health organizations (they never follow through - too busy), and yes, we've tried the police.

The upstairs of her home is a giant spider web of rope tying each door handle to another as an amateur security measure. Every window and door in the house is lined with packaging tape as a tamper-evident seal. There is duct tape on every light switch and all the knobs on the stove because "the thugs turn the lights and gas on just to run up the bills." Two days ago, she texted me saying her basement was flooded because "the thugs left the water running."

I used to visit my mom four times a week for lunch. Our relationship has become so estranged that I haven't seen her more than four times since last summer. I stopped over on Mother's Day to bring her flowers and take her for ice cream. She was surprised, of course, and I had to explain to her that none of the dozens of phone numbers I have for her work anymore. She conceded and decided ice cream sounded good. Moments later, she's lugging two large suitcases out to my car, insisting my dad's "thugs" will try to take all of her "evidence against them" if she leaves it behind.

She has most recently tacked handmade posters all over her house with pictures of my dad that read, "If you see this monster here, call the police!"

Each day, she spends hours refinishing the trim around the windows because "the thugs tore it all up trying to break in the night before."

I've also been informed that she has reconnected with nearly every person she used to traffic cocaine with, and she is also once again speaking to a man she dated for six years - a man who made my life a living hell, but that's another story and a different forum.

I'm trying to make light of all this, but I'm incredibly frustrated and our entire family is now in tattered shambles. I am the only one she will still speak to, though she's beginning to suspect I am just a spy for these "thugs." My time with her is running out, I feel.

She insists she isn't using any drugs, and I'm not sure I believe her. Why else is she speaking to all of her coke buddies after almost 20 years of silence? Then again, what if she isn't paranoid - what if she's right and my dad really is trafficking children?

I truly believe she's paranoid/bipolar, but I have these very fleeting moments of doubt that are driving me insane.

I don't know where to go from here.

Thanks for your time.

Peace.

I'm sorry she is having these problems and you are having to deal with them. Could her drug use have damaged her brain over time? Is your dad truly likely to abuse her or be destructive?

Hello,

Thanks for taking the time to read and reply.

I suspected drug use may have damaged her brain over time. I've been reaching out to some people who've known her all her life, and I'm now under the impression she has a history of sporadic and paranoid behavior, though it was never to this extent until recently. And now, as I look at my experiences with her as a child, I see things differently. For instance, there was a period when she insisted she was talking to aliens. I was only ten at the time, so I just thought she was being goofy. I haven't heard her speak of aliens since then. There are many of these bizarre episodes that are now coming back to me in a new light, and I'm really just becoming more and more confused.

Regarding my dad, I consider myself a pretty solid judge of character, and I honestly can't bring even the smallest part of me to believe he is capable and/or wanting of any of the allegations my mom is imposing upon him.