I picked her up from the airport at midnight and offered to take her home for a good night’s sleep. Instead, she quietly asked to go straight to the hospital emergency room.
She wanted to be admitted for her recurring suicidal thoughts. So I pointed my car towards that exit and sat quietly with my thoughts for the 30 minute drive.
My daughter’s horrific anger outbursts began in January 2012. It was her Junior year. She was 16, smart, and beautiful. She had a supporting role in the school musical and seemed to thrive in that setting. Her straight A grades never plummeted. At home, she was a different creature. She could be verbally cruel and physically threatening to her 14 year old sister. Other times, she was thoughtful, sweet and caring. We thought she was just a very moody teenage girl. My heart ached when she handed me a letter one night begging “I need help. I’m sorry. I hate myself. Please help me.” We took her to the doctor to discuss possible anxiety disorder. He prescribed Zoloft and urged her to start therapy. She started it within eight weeks. Eight months later, I found the awful scars on her upper thighs. She had worn shorts that evening and they glared at me from under her hemline. She was cutting. I freaked and lost my breath.
I bundled her into the car and we called our county’s crisis number. I could only fathom that she was suicidal. If she was a danger to herself, then I needed to know and take her to the ER. My lesson in teen cutting started on that summer evening. According to the crisis specialist, self-mutilation does not necessarily mean a person is suicidal. It’s a means to dealing with stress and emotional pain. It’s a habit that can become an overwhelming addiction. That October, I caught sight of her inner arm at a bridal shower. The word WHORE was carved on her young flesh. When asked, she denied feeling like a whore exactly, just feeling nothing.
This beautiful child that I brought into our world and raised in a loving environment was angrily pushing away from me. Did I mess up with parenting? Did we provide too much and spoil her in our determination to be “better” than our parents? Or did she inherit my mental illness genes?
During her senior year, she maintained grades above a 4.0. When life got hard though, she just lost control and threw massive fits at home. It was a daily struggle. She spent more than the normal teen time in bed, and this was a red flag. We got her in with an adolescent psychiatrist who changed her diagnosis to depression and oppositional defiant disorder.
After 18 months of meeting with our daughter, the therapist suggested her illness might include bipolar and urged us to keep charts on her moods and behaviors. We collected data, marked charts, took notes and used an app to keep track of her moods. If she was manic, it wasn’t a regular cycle. The psychiatrist stuck to the original diagnosis. In August of 2013, hoping we had equipped her for managing her mental health, we moved her to college.
She confessed later that she started smoking pot almost immediately and daily. We found out the last week of that first semester. This is significant to her current diagnosis. She won’t call it self-medicating, but that’s the truth of it. Her GPA for her first semester was a .8. She failed three of her five classes.
We yearned to yank her out and bring her home. We could see her self-destruction. She fought and insisted no: She was determined to show that she could do it. The psychiatrist proposed a plan: Our daughter would return to college and submit to random drug tests and earn at least a 3.0 the second semester. We barely agreed, but drove her back after winter break.
My daughter cut less during her first semester. Then she burnt a few “smiley” scars into her arm with a lighter during the second. Her pot-smoking cut down from every day to only three-four times the second semester.
I’d like to say she achieved the necessary grades, but that didn’t happen. She held her shit together and had straight A’s through mid-terms. Then, it all went south again. She now refuses to go to ANY college in the fall. She feels unsure, not confused, about her future. She doesn’t see a future for herself.
She sent me a text this Monday from my sister’s house out-of-state, “I need to come home. I’m sicker mentally than I thought I was. I’ve been semi-suicidal for months now with only the thought of family grieving to keep me from doing it.”
When we got to the hospital, she wasn’t completely honest during the intake interview that night. She left out the risky and self-destructing behaviors that indicated bipolar. She was admitted at 4:00am. Eight hours later she called home demanding to be let out; that I didn’t know what it’s like there. I did. I’d been hospitalized off and on for 12 years for my depression and bipolar II. She told the psychiatrist that morning NOTHING about her scary behaviors, insisted she wasn’t suicidal. She refused to take the increased meds or attend the group therapy sessions. She wanted discharged NOW and threw a tantrum during a conference call that included the social worker.
She came home this afternoon and I’m scared to go back to my own house now that she is there. It’s likely that she has Borderline Personality Disorder, whose only treatment is therapy, no medication. She could also have bipolar disorder. I’m scared that I don’t have the coping skills to keep me healthy and help her. I’m afraid of the negative dynamic she creates in our home. It’s all an unknown, intangible mess.
This wannabe author has chosen to publish anonymously, we at Blunt Moms wish her the best with her daughter. If you are having suicidal thoughts or just need someone to talk to, the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline can be reached 24/7.
10 Comments
I am thinking of you and I am sorry. Please remember that you are en excellent Mom and you have and are doing the best you can for your child. There is a limit to what we can do and also what we can tolerate as human beings, be gentle with yourself. Don’t forget to love yourself. Keep doing your best, she needs you even though she pushes you the hardest. All of my best wishes and thoughts for a brighter tomorrow.
C.
This must be so difficult for you. Stay strong and thanks for sharing.
You need help too-we just admitted out almost 19 year old to a facility in Texas – we live in Ga. It may break us financially but we needed big time help and after research phone calls and more we made her go. She was cutting smoking pot had dropped out of high school and was just turning a scary corner to bigger stuff. She’s very intelligent and none of her docs or therapists will put a name on her depression but just threw meds at her.
Take care of her but take care of you and your family too – more of us are out there than you know –
I wish I had any useful words of advice to share with you, but I don’t feel qualified. I hope that, with time, she is able to open up more during her therapy sessions and make some positive progress there. I imagine it must be very, very difficult to share things with a psychiatrist; partly because it could be felt as a sign of personal weakness, but also because there is still such a stigma attached to mental illness in general. It’s sometimes hard to ask for and accept help when we need it. I hope that your daughter is able to find a way to better health. In the meantime, you do the best that you can for her and for your family. You’re stronger than you know, and your daughter is lucky to have you and your support.
I went through this with my daughter when she was 13. She was hospitalized twice-once for 10 days and a year later for 2months. She is severely depressed, ultra-rapid bipolar. She cut terribly at first. That took about a year of therapy and several doctors (to get on the right meds). Don’t stop. Admit her to a facility of good repute. She will hate it but it will be helpful in the end. It is a daily struggle. I don’t want to tell you of the fights and nasty opposition/defiant behavior in the beginning, her older sister barely talks to her now even 4 years later. My daughter is 17 now, kind and loving, hates herself, an extremely talented sax player, (it saved her life), some days she can’t get out of bed and other days she is just a bubbly teen-then ten minutes later she is crawling on my lap because she is so down. She takes several meds twice a day but without it she would not be here now. You did nothing wrong for her to be like this, but get the help of several experts and do what they say. She does not know how dangerous her behavior is to herself and the trauma to her family. Get her to a daily therapist and make appointments for yourself. This is a long, tough road. I am not at the end, but I am still on it with no end in sight. It is so hard for your daughter to see herself as valuable-but that is not your fault. Sometimes it just happens like cancer or some other disease. It is so much harder to deal with because it is the brain and chemistry and it is a mystery. There is no “bad cell” to point to. It is a personality altering affliction. I understand and know the anguish you face. Cry when you have to. It is okay. Be sure you find a friend who will listen and support-not judge. Good luck
Thank you for sharing such a moving story. My thoughts are with your daughter, but also with you as you try to navigate through this. I hope that you take the time to take care of yourself and get the support that you need!
I am so sorry that this is your path. It’s hard, it’s long and it’s scary. I know from personal experience. But it can also get better. I hope you all get the peace that you need.
To this mother and all moms whose children suffer with mental illness, my love and thanks to you. I was one of these children and my mom started her journey into the terror of mental illness with a cross-country drive to my college dorm when I was afraid I might kill myself. I credit my mother for everything I’ve done in the world that is positive, and I thank her for the gift of her love and persistence and strength. I wish you the same.
Hoping that, it being 2 years later now, it got better..
Reading all these comments I so can relate. We have a 14-year old daughter, Tess, who was severely bullied in 7th and 8th grade. It was so bad that we actually chose to home school her the last half of her 8th grade year. She was severely depressed , self harming, and her self confidence was at an all time low. A good friend of mine is a well known therapist in the area where we live and she recommended the most incredible summer program called Amplify Sleep Away Camp for Girls . Its a music and arts camp for teen girls located in the mountains in Ojai, California. Tess had never played an instrument before – but over the course of two weeks she was playing the drums like she had been taking lessons for years. The entire program focuses on building girls self esteem, mentorship, and lifting each other up. I’ve got to say I was terrified to send her away after the year we’d had, but after reading so many positive reviews online and talking with another family who had a daughter in a similar situation to ours, we decided to go for it. It was seriously the best decision we could have made. I know people talk about things ” changing” their kids – and I know as a parent, a mom, you’d do anything to see your kid happy and making positive strides in life – this is what this program gave to Tess. When I came to pick her up and see her band perform their original song and all her new friends chanting her name during her drum solo – her smile was the biggest I’d seen since she was a kid!! She feels like this community of girls and incredible staff ( which included therapists on site) are like a second family to her. This year she started high school and has been making friends and getting better grades. She is in love with playing the drums and she talks with her ” best friends” from summer camp every week – some of them nightly. Anyway – I just thought I’d put in my two sense about what really helped our family. Sending love to all.
http://www.girlsrocksb.org/summer-music-camps/