Choosing between the safety of the child you are trying to protect and the survival of the one who is tearing your home apart is a nightmare no parent should ever have to face.
This 43-year-old woman has a 22-year-old son with a lengthy history of mental illness, and he also has high-functioning autism.
“He has been hospitalized in a facility 15+ times since the age of 12. Both inpatient and residential. I have done my absolute best to support him this entire time,” she explained.
“I’ve taken off work to get him to appointments and to the hospital, whenever he needs it. I have, for a decade, dropped everything whenever he feels upset or overwhelmed. In this time, he has done nothing to help himself.”
“I dispensed his medications when he was a kid, but since he’s been an adult, he’s insisted on handling his meds and appointments himself. However, he’s only done so sporadically. Over the years, he has become increasingly volatile.”
Her son has shoved and hit her a number of times. He yells at everyone and instantly turns aggressive when he does not get what he wants.
Her son has evolved into becoming emotionally manipulative. He threatens to hurt himself if she doesn’t give in to his requests for money or fast food, or if she asks him to do something he doesn’t want to.
She stops trying to rein him in because she’s terrified of losing him. Her son has damaged her financially as well as mentally.
“On Thursday, after I had told him to clean his room, he got upset. I was at work, but at some point, in his distress at being asked to clean up after himself, he beat up his 20-year-old sister. He then left the house, blocked my phone number and social media,” she added.
“In the intervening week, he has managed to burn every familial bridge he had. He’s been couch surfing, and his dad, both grandmothers, grandfather, and uncle all cannot let him stay. He turned up on my brother’s doorstep on Sunday.”
“My brother agreed he could stay, as long as he had a plan by Wednesday. Apparently, this morning (Wednesday), he had done nothing. He made no calls. Looked into no options. He simply texted me at 6:00 a.m. to ask me what time he could come home.”
She informed her son that he is not allowed to come home. Considering he has no other options and that she is forcing him to be homeless, her brother is bringing him to a shelter.
She still loves her son, don’t get her wrong, and she is deeply saddened by where he has ended up, but she can’t make her daughter live with someone who is unsafe, even if this is a person she gave birth to.
Knowing that her son’s only option is to sleep outside or stay in a homeless shelter breaks her heart, but she is completely done with him.
“I know he can’t come home, and I cannot afford to get him another place to be. It’s terrible, but grown-up decisions have grown-up consequences,” she continued.
She’s left wondering if she’s a jerk now that her son very well may have to resort to sleeping beneath a bridge.
She and her daughter shouldn’t be constantly living in fear of her son, so no, he can’t come home. It’s not her fault that he’s failing to learn how to deal with his emotions.
Her son’s disabilities don’t automatically give him permission to be dangerous, and that’s what he is: a danger to her and her daughter.
Hopefully, forcing her son to be all alone without help will make him get his act together. It’s on him to do better from here on out, and if he can’t, that’s not her fault.
What do you think?
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By Bre Avery Zacharski
Hi, I'm Bre, Chip Chick's CEO! I have a degree in Textile/Surface Design from The Fashion Institute of Technology, and... More about Bre Avery Zacharski
