Pets Power!!!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Pets Power! Lesson #1
Watching the interactions between my son and our pets,  I  conclude that this phenomenon has easily scored high in his rehabilitation.
When the medications started improving my son's ability to communicate, our pets took over from there, snuggling to him and making him smile and laugh, pushing him to interact and become more playful.
These are friends with all around benefits, which sometimes we dismiss or disregard.
My son asked if they could sleep with him and the comfort  I witnessed from the closeness and the emotional energy that they gave him; was truly indescribable.
I know that this is a short lesson, but nonetheless, very important: If you happen to have a pet, and your child has a mental illness encourage interaction between them, they are there to encourage and assist in their recovery.
The continuous nurturing and unconditional love can only bring breakthrough and positive vibes.

The return

 

Schizophrenia is a voyage. It is up to the caregiver to help  land that plane in a world of complex reality or be a mere bystander while that plane is fatally crash landing somewhere.
Behind every success story during this illness, there are diligent caregivers, staunch believers in the anguished, were realistically there can't be any belief, and diligence is the key to success.
Yes,  I am patting myself in the back, as well as hugging all my helpers, because today, my son has opened his law books again to study for the bar exam, he spends his weekends with his friends from childhood and college receiving calls and being invited, as if they were welcoming him back from a long journey. Passing the bar exam is not an iffy situation anymore it is a victorious quest supported and hailed by all of us.
Getting to this point wasn't easy. However, with his cooperation and complete candor about his illness, his compliance on trying -oh so many- medications until we finally found the one that had the slightest side's effects, was to say the least, an amazing and courageous diligence.
I have seen him go through a barrage of medications and side effects, from being completely sedated to a simple gastric enteritis.
The most important factor for any and every caregiver, is to love  unconditionally the person they are caring for. It can be difficult at times and extremely trying. Sometimes I had to retract myself physically from a situation and come back later with  renewed energy.
Most importantly, try to separate the person suffering from the illness. They aren't schizophrenics, but they suffer from schizophrenia.
For me, his mother it is worth every effort, every pain and suffering. I never lost hope. I didn't want to lose sight of the light at the end of the tunnel. Sometimes I feel compelled as if driven with nothing other than my son as my objective.
What I wanted, was that if I had to one day depart this life, (please let me assume in a hundred years)!!! I wanted to leave my son in good hands, his own, totally capable of managing any  and every symptom.
 Today, while I am enjoying my son, his laughter, and his wise jokes, while we decide on a dinner menu together, or which movie, he will see with his friends, I understand that this illness is physical with psychological ramifications, I also understand that nobody -including my son's psychotic events-, and nothing could have deviated me from my mission to successfully bring him back, to help land his plane safely and surely after a stormy flight.

The learning curve and the gene factor

 

 

 

The learning Curve and the Genes Factor
During the early stages of my son's illness , I often wondered if his affliction was emotional, and if he could  control it. When my son took his medication, there was no indication after a few weeks of any traces of his illness. One could easily carry a conversation with him, ask his opinion, and he would give you a clear, intelligent answer. When he was in total denial of his illness and stopped taking his medication it was because he truly believed  he was cured unfortunately,  it was a matter of time until all  symptoms resurfaced again.
Now that he takes his medication willingly, I always watch for the plateau, when his medication dosage needs to be adjusted or changed. And I have become an expert on the  precursors' signs, the little indications that if not addressed immediately could become an obstruction to his therapy.
Since I am well read on the subject, I know that it is an inherited hibernating gene that is awakened by many factors. " A dormant gene"? This was extremely intriguing to me. My son's illness was gradual. And first I thought that his paranoid megalomania wasn't so bad until it became full-blown. These are big names for a big affliction. I couldn't find any comparison to his illness in my  family until a recent event did wake me up from hibernation and opened my eyes on a fact that my family and myself kept hidden, undisclosed and neatly tucked away where nobody could see it.  

Heartfelt blessings to my parents,

a senior generation which strongly believed that revealing a case of mental illness

 in my direct family would destroy our social standing within our society. 

I could see the resemblance between my son's illness and my sister's claim to fame when she felt entitled to all my parent's estate.   

Blinded with anger at first, it wasn't  until recently, given that I am caring for my son,  and slowly unraveling the truth of it all that I have come to pity her for living with an unassisted mental illness, and driving away chords of us who couldn't understand and still can't why my father a physician  didn't hospitalize her before she totally and truly became dreadfully malevolent living with them at an older age and shattering their lifestyles.

 Was it because my parents were trying to hide the truth from us and their society, were they so mortified that they couldn't bring themselves to seek proper assistance to her illness? Obviously, it was a question of culture society, and time.... As we all know, time doesn't cure all in this instance. We surely  know  that if not cared for properly, this infliction progresses beyond the point where the  mind could become completely distorted, and only forcing therapy would  help salvage it.
As far as I can remember, we always walked on egg shells around my sister, dreading her wrath if we didn't agree with her opinion or unjustified feelings for such and such... we avoided facing a reality that was too cruel to unravel, this didn't make our lives any easier. We all suffered and still do from  seeing her face distorted almost inhumanely grimacing with anger, when we didn't concede or say the right thing around her. 

We knew that we all  were  in as much denial as she was, as my parents were. It could have and would have been a much better life for all of us if we simply tackled the fact that she  needed hospitalization and intense therapy to prevent and avert such suffering among all of us.