rose07

As I read the posting of people who suffer from this illness, my heart goes out to them and I thought I’d share my story to give them hope so they can see that even though it may take some time to figure out the proper balance of medications, lifestyle, food, love, etc., there really, really is hope for a normal and fulfilled life. Today my son is almost 19; he lives a full and healthy life just like any teenager. If I didn’t tell you he was bipolar, you would never know. He is starting college this Fall and graduated from school with a 4.1 weighted GPA and honors. He has a girlfriend that adores him and so many friends, I have trouble keeping up with the names…but it wasn’t always like this; here is my story.

When my son was 9 years old he started running out of the house, acting up, always in trouble at school. At his school I felt like I was singled out as the mom of the “troubled kid”, the one that ended up in CSI almost daily. They kept asking what was wrong with me, why I wasn’t a good parent and the story goes on and on. When my son turned 13, my ex-husband couldn’t deal with it anymore and got himself a bimbo, bailed out on us and rode into the sunset.

Meanwhile, things got worse. I couldn’t understand what it was, I had never dealt with this illness so it was the blind leading the blind and as a single mom of two kids, without any child support…you can only imagine. Things got out of control, my son got into heavily smoking pot (now I understand he was trying to medicate himself), got arrested and things just kept spiraling out of control. His GPA went down to 1.1; he broke the record for skipping school so the school district kept harassing me “to do something about it”.

When my son turned 16, I realize things were going to get worse, not better. He got Baker Acted once by then; the school he attended kept sending him to a school for “troubled” kids…even though that absolutely and complete was the last place for him since it would had made matters worse, not better. So at that point I made a heart braking decision; I closed down my business, laid off 23 people, kept 1 person and moved my business into my house. Withdrew my son from school and decided to home school him…still thinking it was a combination of “bad friends” and a “behavior” problem; that he may be “acting up” because of the divorce.

The next few years were an endless story of therapists, psychiatrists, medications…nothing worked; the bottom line diagnosis was that I wasn’t a good parent (and I know I am a damn good one, so I knew in my heart that was not the reason). I nearly got my house foreclosed; I couldn’t keep up with my work and therefore with my bills since it took so much effort to keep my son safe. I had to file for bankruptcy because my medical bills were out of control…my life was out of control and I could not understand why. No one listened, no one understood, no one knew. Wrong diagnosis, after wrong diagnosis one day I was lucky enough to end up with a therapist that was bipolar himself, this was 2005 and my son was just turning 17. A day after meeting this therapist, my son tried to commit suicide and I Baker Acted him once again.

It took me nearly 5 years to put all the pieces together, saving my son became the meaning of my life. I dedicated endless hours to understand the illness, to accept it and to deal with it. One of the hardest things I had to live with was the fact that I had to understand that when he said hurtful things to me, he did not mean them and not taking them personally was a major, major step in the process. After realizing he was bipolar, I made a commitment to my son and to myself that he was going to live a fulfilled life and that he was not going to be a burden to society or the government; he was not going to live on disability nor was he going to feel sorry for himself. The first step was accepting the illness, then making sure that he accepted it and that it was just that and illness, it could have been diabetes or some other one; in his case it just happened to be that there was a chemical imbalance in his brain and that we simply needed to balance them, simple as that.

I have to tell you, that it takes inhuman amount of love, understanding, time, commitment, learning about the illness and perseverance. Not giving up when everything is going to hell is the key to battling this illness, you will eventually get it right but before getting it right you have to try numerous alternatives, doctors, and most importantly and uncanny decision that it will not defeat you, that you deserve better and that you CAN live a normal and healthy life once you put all the pieces together.

Today my son takes lots of vitamins, especially Omega-3; he eats healthy foods, goes to the gym daily; he has tons and tons of friends; he is drug free and takes 400 mg. of Equetro (200 in the morning and 200 before going to bed); he understand or at least is fully aware of potential triggers and avoids anything that may cause a bipolar episode. He understand his feelings so that when he sees a meltdown coming his way, we rehearsed numerous ways to deal with it and how he should proceed...I am 24/7 on call...but no longer afraid when the phone rings. He is a wonderful, loving son and I am blessed that it took an illness like this to bring the best out of him.