Maybe we should invite them to our next outing at Applebee’s!
@Missy_Pants That article sum him up perfectly. For a long time my expectation was that after 4-5 years he would get cleaned-up, invent something, start a company and go from living off of handouts to being a millionaire. Meanwhile, I have been working hard for nearly 20 years and have nothing to show for it. But that window of rehabing back to a normal life, I wonder if it has closed.
@popobawa4u Good point. In fact I think part of the reason he initially started using was to try and self treat his sleeping issues. Pet theory is that he might have an undiagnosed case of bipolar disorder that he has been trying to counteract with various drugs. His routine now is to work for weeks on a project (he can build or repair just about anything) followed by weeks of sleep where he only gets up to go to the bathroom and put minimal food into his mouth.
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I bet they wish they’d never watched that trippy 1971 government-sponsored anti-drug film now.
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Well, prolonged drug use can cause brain damage so maybe it’ll bring his IQ down enough that he won’t need the drugs? j/k
But also, people with mental illness often self medicate, that is also very very common.
Also also, it could be both…
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I call the big one “Bitey.”
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Yes, I think his addiction and mental health issues are always fluctuating. Occasionally he has a good day or week where he seems to be the sensitive thoughtful person he was before all of this. Then he sleeps for a week, wakes up and punches his dad in the face. Then later in the day he is in a chipper mood and doesn’t seem to recall what he did. Being around that for even a few days drains the soul in away I didn’t know existed.
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I lived on the outskirts of a family member with borderline personality disorder and the few times I had to deal with that person’s outbursts, I came away completely drained and saddened because they weren’t getting the help they needed (and still aren’t, to my knowledge) and I felt utterly incapable of helping them. I wish your family luck in dealing with his disease.
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Thank you. It’s been a real eye opener. And this is an affluent upper middle class family with resources. I can’t imagine what a family that is struggling would do. I guess the answer is the tent cities full of the homeless.
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Just this morning I was walking through a large parking lot to get to the store, and alternately running and walking through the same area was a man screaming, at the top of his lungs, mostly nonsense with some cursewords interspersed. It was painful to see in that I would expect that the person has some realization that they’re spouting nonsense and people all around them are keeping their distance, and yet the person cannot stop themselves from continuing to do so.
It made me wonder about what I might do for that person, were I in a position of authority to do something, but I didn’t come up with a lot of good answers, unfortunately. Get the cops to come? He’d be put in jail, where he’d probably be hurt by other inmates, if not himself. Which leads me to recall an NPR story on mental health in America’s jails–it’s not a pretty picture.
What’s the quote the goes something like: The measure of a country’s success should not be how well the 1% are doing but rather how the country takes care of it’s weak, sick and elderly,
The system here is largely broken for those with mental issues (including addiction). If you called the cops to help him they might be able to do so if he has broken a law. But as we know around here that has a good chance ending with the cops shooting, tazing or beating the guy to death.
You could take him to an urgent care but are you going to pay his bills. Are you going to follow up every day to make sure he is staying on meds that may have some difficult to handle side effects? There used to be programs to help people with lifelong debilitating diseases stay on their required medical routine but those were gutted long ago.
Often when I see or interact with a homeless person. I think about how this person was once a beautiful newborn baby full of potential. How did this baby grow into this disheveled screaming person? We collectively failed that baby. Each and every one of them.
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That’s the thing. He was being genuine. Weird things were happening in his house. He really believed that. The Unlawful Use of 911 charge is unfair.
I’m kind of disappointed we didn’t have police radio clips “Holy Jeezus! Possums Everywhere! We need backup! Aaaarrrgghh. #blam# #blam#”
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Why is the tag not “meth, not even 460 times”
If somebody lives in a tent city, isn’t that their home?
Dang it, we wuz really lookin’ forward to fixin’ us a mess uh possum stew, too.
Damn, go on and humanize them. I’m not laughing anymore.
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There’s a whole series of these at http://liartownusa.tumblr.com/tagged/law%26ordersvu .
Some of them are “Oh, God, I hope I’m not dribbling pee” funny.
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PROBLEM. SOLVED.
The problem is that it is usually other people who say that it even is a problem. My experience is that people are not very supportive of those who live outside of their preferred pet system, to say the least.
Contrast how popular notions of “helping” LGBT people tends to be fighting for acceptance so that they can better live as LGBT people.
While “helping” homeless people seems to always involve making them not be homeless - regardless of what they may prefer.
I don’t hate possums, but the do creep me right the f out.
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