I think of my brother every day. Mainly because he calls me every fucking day, but on days like this I think of the brother I had when I was young.
He was four before they began trying to determine what was wrong with him. He met with some specialist who was so impressed with Dave’s dyspraxia that he published an account.
In kindergarten he was diagnosed as “hyperactive.” (No one used the initials in the early 60’s.)
In grade school they pegged him as learning disabled. On top of that he could not control his temper, or any emotion, really. He was scary, especially in my emotionally repressed household. No one could tell when Dave began drinking at fourteen. I don’t think he was an angry drunk: he was an angry sober. In junior high he began attending a special school for the emotionally disturbed.
He began bringing home the friends he made at the School for the Disturbed, and his friends were scary. One tried to break our front door down once when Mom and Dad were out.
The new school lasted a few years until Dave hit high school (and one of his friends asked me if I slept naked). Then he went to a day program at Our Lady of Grace, a local child center for emotionally disturbed kids. They use the term “psychiatric care” now, of course at the time there were no drugs for emotional problems. We had six months of family therapy visits. I only cried once. The doctor wanted to discuss what was wrong. Really? My brother has no emotional self control and you want to analyze my feelings? Really?
Then he got violent, ran away from home (yay!), found Jerry, threatened a family friend, was thrown out, lived in his car, sobered up, moved back, got married for six months until he was diagnosed as manic depressive and she got a restraining order.
“So then I’m manic-depressive?” Dave asked his doctor. “I’m not learning disabled or hyperactive or emotionally disturbed?”
Sorry, the doctor said, you’re all those things. Plus, manic-depressive. Full-on, the hard-core delusional type. Paranoid delusions. It was nice that he turned his anger on the spies at the Phone Company who were bugging his apartment, because until then I was sure he’d be coming after some member of our family. Sure. We all were sure.
Eventually, after years and years of self-medicating and prescription medicating he found a drug that seems to work. (An Abilify-based cocktail of meds.) He still loses his temper (he just cussed out his insurance agent) but his anger is moderate and directed at actual slights, not perceived slights, or perceived murder attempts by the upstairs neighbor.
The sad thing is, on days like today, and so many other days this year, people think, “Why didn’t the family do something? Surely they must have known.” And of course they did know, and surely they did something, there were probably special schools and counseling and family therapy. Like any other illness, you have to be sick enough to be diagnosed, and with mental illness that means sick enough to kill your mother and a classroom of children.
15 responses to “Brothers and Sisters”
I had a psychotic father. I knew he was nuts enough to kill us all in our sleep all through my growing up years. He had serious anger control issues and would blow his top unexpectedly over something as minor as not being able to open a box of cereal.
One day he finally snapped and killed his mother-in-law and then himself. By that time I was a young adult in my last week of undergrad school.
Yes I knew he was nuts but he was also huge and scary and held tremendous psychological power over everyone. There was not one fucking thing that could be done to stop him preemptively.
It takes the snap to confirm that they are nuts and by then it is too late.
It is to your mother’s credit that you came out so … sane … and to your credit that you have stayed in touch with your brother, and still care.
Yes, I agree that families try so hard, but support, the *right* support, is so difficult to find. What my family ran into is the attitude that since our family member is “capable” of making decisions, we cannot make decisions for them. Nobody seems to consider that “capable” is relative. Add the attitude that “dangerous to self or others” cannot be proven until someone is actually hurt.
Zayrina – Plus, think about the Aurora killer. He made threats.
~~Silk – Yes. Until it is too late, that’s the thing.
All – Someone made a point on facebook – with a crazy prson in your house, would you have guns in there too? Our knives weren’t even sharp.
Our house was wall to wall guns, all purchased by the resident crazy person. I have no idea why my mother stayed with him. She had supportive parents.
Zayrina – Maybe she was THAT afraid. She’d have to do a Sleeping With the Enemy disappearance.
God!
Violence in America (all caps) is the new category just added to my blog. Covers much territory: spouse/child abuse, war on women’s reproductive rights…the list goes on. A young man, survivor of Aurora massacre on UP with Chris Hayes made this point: we have to talk about these issues ALL the time. Not only when the next event occurs.
Many videos on Mayors against Illegal Guns to post on your blogs or forward to people in power. Your Mayor signed on?
Thanks for the space. Naomi, another grandmother against war (and related violence at home)
Hattie – Thank you for the link. Naomi came by.
Naomi Dagen Bloom (Hello Naomi) – Nice to meet you! Your Elderblogging category interests me too.
Naomi is a great person and a friend I met on the Internet. We have met in Portland and Seattle and enjoy each other’s company very much.
Hattie – No war, no guns, what’s not to like?
Ug,
Mrs. hall – Is that your professional opinion?
my professional opinion is that people bring me your brother and say FIX HIM and sadly, it doesn’t work. then i get sad because he causing pain for the family and i get pain too. sometimes it works, most of the time it doesn’t. i mean, my means of ‘fixing’ involves giving medications that alter the way people think/feel and who would voluntarily cooperate with that? sigh. ug. hugs!
wait, i meant to say sometimes it doesn’t work.
also, i still stand by the hugs. having a psycho brother sucks. hugs. glad he is better. age makes the biggest difference. as we age we slow down, our tempers are tempered. hopefully anyway.
hugs.
Mrs hall- I am proud of Dave of taking the drugs. He’s not taking them for himself, but for other people.