More then we bargained for......
Well here I am with a "twist". It was the beginning of May and I started noticing that things were changing, not for the better.
He had been sober for almost 5 1/2 months. He had picked up a job patching and painting the inside of a farm house for someone we knew. He was doing well, actually seemed to enjoy what he was doing, received work driving privileges to get the materials he needed and to get to the farm house and back. In the latter part of April he said that he was having a hard time concentrating on what he was doing, he would start one thing and not be able to finish it. He said his mind would go blank, the only thing he knew to do was start drinking again.
He decided that maybe he needed a AA sponsor, so he asked someone. They talked and went to meetings, but there was something different this time. I couldn't put my finger on it, but this was not the same as before. I became very, very sure of that when he started telling me that things were outside and if I opened the door they would get in. I told him that I would shut the door, but he said that it did not matter, they were already inside. No elaboration on what the "things" were. I came in the living room later that same day and he was in the recliner and he would not move or answer me even though I shook him. My first thought was low blood sugar, and grabbed the meter, stuck in a test strip, poked his finger until I got a drop of blood. He still did not move, or speak. The meter gave me a reading in the 200's so I knew that he was OK that way. I thought he was drunk and decided I would just let him "sleep it off". 5 minutes later I came in the room he was awake I told him that I thought he was passed out and he explained to me that he was being invisible, so no one was able to see him. After he told me that started my search for help for him, as I did before. This time I knew that I was dealing with more then alcoholism, what I was seeing was totally different from anything I had been through with him before.
When I got home from work that Monday, he was over emotional, swinging from one mood to another and back again. The decision was made that he needed more help then what was available in the town we live in so I dialed the number, but he had to be the one to the speak to the the person at on the crisis line. He tried to talk the lady on the line with him, but he could not understand what she was saying to him, so I took over the phone and finished out the questions while I packed a bag for him. He paced and cried and paced and smoked and I had to get him alcohol because he was starting to vomit. Detox would have to be let up to the professionals.
On the ride to the treatment center he would be coherent one minute, another he was hiding his eyes because he couldn't handle looking out the window as we were driving down the road. Once we got to where we were going his emotions increased and the people there told him that he went off his medication. He was not on medication! They tested his blood sugar and it was over 300 so they would not take him. We did not bring his meter nor his insulin because he could not use it. Boy were we stupid. We ended going to a hospital ER to get insulin to bring him down, this took over 5 hours, during which time he paced and paced in the room and the halls. A security guard ended up stationed at the door. We entered the lobby of the ER at 11:30 PM and I finally left there at 4:30 PM after we found out that someone from the center he was to go back to would come and get him. I was told by the security guard that the would call the police to come get him if I just left. He kept saying that he didn't know anything about transportation from the ER back to the center. I never got to sleep that night and he never got back to the center until after 6 AM and then it was decided that he could not stay there and that he would be transported to another hospital for care. The one that they should have sent us to in the first place.
Finally!!!!!!
We went the long way around, 2 hospitals and one mental health center, but he finally found the help he should have had in the first place. At the 2nd hospital he was monitored in the psychiatric area until the got him calmed down. They actually listened when he told them that he had problems with the Serotonin based medication and got him on one that worked for him instead of against him. He did eventually go into the dependency part of the hospital and saw people in worse shape then he. People coming in with nothing more then the clothes, or lack there of, on their backs. He was finally coming around enough to see other's need for help and gave some of his clothing to those who were in need. He told of meeting people that had dehydrated themselves so bad they were on IV and were finally able to keep food and drink down. Ones that were so bruised that their care givers thought that some one had beaten them, when come to find out that they were so drunk they fell over, on, down and into all sorts of things and what they hit left colorful, painful reminders. No one ever touched them. I told him how I had put bath towels on the side of the bathtub because he kept falling , into or on it. One time he hit pretty hard on the edge of the bath tub, really cut his lip and bled pretty bad. His parents probably thought I hit him, when they saw him with the "fat lip". I spent most of my time either catching him or padding what ever I thought he would come in contact with if he fell.
The staff and facilities have been cut down and what used to be 2 floors is now one. They still are very through and help patients with following through on treatment and all the paper work that accompanies it. They also believed in bring people in to talk to the patients, some found their recovery through that very hospital and return to help others as in need as they were. They do include the families in a Sunday meeting that they hold. This is something that is very important, especially patients with spouses and children who need an outlet and maybe some insight to what is going one. I have had too much experience, more then I care to have had. Now another door has opened that I am just beginning to learn about. Remember when I indicated that there could be underlying causes to alcoholism. Sobriety can bring that out. When self medicating with alcohol or drugs it removed from the picture, new things can enter. This is what happened in our case.
Upon his release from the hospital he was given enough prescriptions to hold him until he could get in to see our family doctor. I told him to take everything he had received from the hospital and to explain that he had appointments with a counselor and psychiatrist. I wanted the doctor to understand that this was nothing to dismiss, nor fool around with. I had not been happy with the doctor since he seemed not to care about what was going on, branded my husband as an alcoholic and dismissed the confusion and racing thoughts. He could have referred my husband to a psychiatrist for depression if nothing else, but he chose not too. That became a mistake, by this time I was tired of mistakes. This was real and treatment is needed. I was pleased that, for what ever reason the doctor followed through with the prescriptions for treatment and this time gave my husband his full and undivided attention. I was truly prepared to through a fit, if this did not happen. There is a time when "the care taker" has had enough and I was there and then some. He saw the counselor first and he basically told him that he was a "poster child" for Bipolar Disorder and the description of his hyper, sleepless, youth gave the first clues. He had his first appointment with the psychiatrist and treatment is being based on bipolar. There are different types and combinations to the types. It is up to the psychiatrist to diagnose what all the signs and symptoms are and the correct treatment for them.
We had another wrinkle with the counselor seems that they want to take advantage of those who have health insurance. On the first visit the wanted to him to pay more then the co-payment for paperwork. This is a no-no according to the provider we have. We are to pay no more then the co-payment and anything else billed above that we are not responsible for. Well these people wanted us to pay the amount up front before the paper work was sent in to the insurance company. I believe that if they did not negotiate high enough with the insurance company that is there fault and the patient should not be penalized for that. This is a Christian counseling center to boot. I think they need to rethink their mission and how to implement it correctly. The Psychiatrist told my husband that she did not think that he needed to go to them. Her office gave him a list of what the co-payments are so that we would know if we were being billed for the correct amounts.
He is working. Going through a temporary service. It is repetitive and he does not have to rely on concentrating too much. This is a good starting job, get his feet wet again, but he is only earning half of what he is worth in his true trade. I want to put all those tool and tool boxes back to work that are sitting in my garage taking up space.
I hate to say this, but Workers Rehab also has let the ball drop. I don't know quite what happened, but it seems to me from what I saw going on the case worker might have written off a recovering alcoholic as a lost cause and not worth his time and effort. Even after he took all the paper work showing the newly found cause, Bipolar, for the problem the case worker did not change the orders and continued to use the old order, but he did call the Physiatrist and inquire about the amount of concentration was or was lacking if he would get my husband a job. A month later a letter was received, when it was found out that he was no longer seeing the counselor, saying that the he no longer was within the counseling agreement and they would not continue to help him find employment if he did not return to counseling. My husband refused to reply to the letter I though that he should have. I even compiled a reply and he just dismissed the whole thing. I felt that the case worker was not doing his job he needed someone to tell him so and to point out that maybe he had a problem with the case from the start, but my husband, for some reason did not want to do that.
I guess you could say that so far the moral of our story is "it may not appear as it seems". There maybe more to alcoholism then what most professionals and organizations believe. A different approach is called for. Not everyone that walks into an AA meeting or doctors office has the same condition. It is more individualized then what has been stereotyped. Just think of the lives that could have been improved or even saved if a closer look would have been taken
