[mishka7777]

I have the most beautiful friend with a severe psychiatric illness. He has a ***** of a mother that he lives with but she is so self-absorbed that i had to take guardianship so he had some help. His psychiatrist was treating him with wrong meds that were making him worse he came to my place completely psychotic and i called his mother to help me hospitalise him. He told the staff that I was his primary carer and he didn't want them to talk to her only me they said i could sit in on the family meeting which i did. I was shocked that his mother told such crap to the doctors that they asked her why he was in hospital i had some personal information that was pertinent and had arranged with his mother for her to leave so i could speak to the drs in private. she refused and the drs tried to bully me into talking infront of her - i stood up for myself and at the end of the meeting quickly told them what is was about. they asked me to come back next day - gave me 1 and 1/2 hours because his history was totally wrong they didn't know he was abused at boarding school and that changed everything. Everytime he is sick his mother puts on the biggest 'poor me' act. I have been forced into looking after him because there isn't anyone else and i care too much about him to let things go on he was going to end up permanently psychotic or killing himself. I never got on with his mother but the mind games she plays makes it very hard for me to care for him. She doesn't want to do it (i tested her when drs had to get involved she said it wasn't my business so i gave her all my information i had to be his carer and sat back and watched her do nothing for a whole month - unfortunately he became full-on psychotic before i could get help). She tries to undermine me all the time. he is in hospital for suicide after he had to withdraw from studies cause he wasn't coping and she was saying that she "knew he could succeed she had faith that he would do well and prove to his father he wasn't a loser" - me and his therapist are fighting an uphill battle everytime he makes a breakthrough and improves one of his parents destroys him!

She was actually angry that he tried to write me a suicide note and not her. The hospital let him go home for a couple of hours easter and she has gone on and on about how the stress of his suicide attempt has made her lose sleep and have to be put on valium and that he had better keep his room tidier when he gets out. I ignore her now but she treats me like %#@&#! his sister warned me about how i would need to manage her. Plus she keeps telling him that i'm going to hell cause i don't have the same religious beliefs as her. He has decided that he can't stand the idea and will swap his soul with the devil for mine. Like he needs extra stress!!!!

I am the one who he called and had to talk out of doing it and found him and admitted him to hospital and takes him to doctors and tries to help him. I do all this while being physically disabled in chronic pain and trying to do an honours research thesis. She has never asked me once how i am going - even tried to say that i'm emotionally detached from it all and thats why i can cope. I cope by doing what has to be done then offloading onto anyone who will listen and having a damn good cry. If he wasn't such a good mate (he helped me when i was at my lowest after the car accident) and so grateful for my help i wouldn't be able to do what i need to do. His grandmother who is the only family member that has been constantly there for him is stuck in a nursing home and keeps reminding me to take care of myself so i don't go under then he has noone.

It is so hard to keep cool around his mother. I don't want to put him in the middle and to survive living with her he has to pretend she is the best mother in the world. Sometimes he tries to tell her how he is feeling and she does this big dramatic act about how she would end up a pile on the floor if she knows where he is at does he want to do that to her where would he be if she was a pile on the floor. she reduces him from a man to a little boy within seconds it makes me angry. Then she says she is scared of him hitting her but ive seen her hit him when he has been psychotic (ie not in control of his actions) and he doesn't know it but she has called emergency psychiatric and told them crap about him threatening her and me - he didn't!!!! They told her to wait till he got home and call police and ambulance to collect him - she didn't but had a big emotional scene about how she couldn't do that to him. I understand that she obviously has gone through her life with untreated, unrecognised mental problems to act like this but i get seriously angry with her.

sorry for this epic rant.

[Lorisauntie]

Boy do I understand. Don't know what to tell you as my sister is making it equally difficult for me to take care of her daughter. I'd be happy to talk with you, sorry I can't really help, but maybe something in our rants will reveal an answer.