u/SisterRay_says

Hi everyone. As the title states, my brother recently went off his meds and is once again in withdrawing from friends and family. I think I’m looking for a bit of guidance. Or maybe I just want to vent.

Backstory:
My brother had his first psychotic break over 10 years ago at the age of 28. He attacked a family member and was stalking a girl at his work. This led to an arrest and a short stay at a hospital. We thought he was on drugs at the time. The family had an intervention and even tore his room apart looking for meth. He told us he was Mozart and that “he was working for a drug cartel making music.” (He’s a pretty talented guitar player). It’s sad because he was going to school to be a nurse at the time.

When he was released from the hospital he lived out of his car for close to a year. He was paranoid of his family and had little contact with us even though we tried to keep in contact and help him.

Eventually he agreed to take medication which led to a short period of stability living with my mom. Eventually he started drinking and smoking weed which eventually led to him not taking his meds. On two occasions the police were called to their home because he took it over and threatened my mom and her partner. The second time he was forcefully arrested but immediately released. This lead to him living out of his car again for about a year. Again, we tried our best to help him. My mom got a restraining order against him so that seemed to keep him away from their home. My grandmother on the other hand enabled him. She allowed him to shower, fed him, gave him some money occasionally.

It came to a head about three years ago. My brother entered my grandmother’s home with a machete, threatened my grandmother and sister and told them “this is my home now.” He allowed them to leave and so of course they called the police. My family and I then proceeded to watch in horror from the neighbors house across the street as he had a five hour stand off with police. He was hit with multiple rounds of rubber bullets and tear gas was fired into the house. I thought I was going to watch my brother die that day.

I have to admit, the police had a lot of restraint that day. At one point my brother was in the front porch threatening them and waving the machete around. Eventually he was subdued and arrested relatively unharmed. I’ll never forget the look of confusion on his face as they took him away… he truly thought that the home was something owed to him.

This led to about a year of jail time and a hospital stay. I visited as often as I could. Jail was awful… they kept him sedated most of the time and he didn’t get the care he needed. He was eventually convicted of felony assault but given time served and released.

This was followed by two whole years of relative stability and normalcy. He saw a psychiatrist regularly. They put him on clozapine as every other drug was not effective. To the family it was a miracle drug. He wasn’t the same person before his illness but close to it! He was at all family functions… he is great with my kids and love him! I had my brother back! He was living in a sober living facility and doing great.

I always kind of knew he would eventually relapse… I know it’s common with schizophrenics. The clozapine had some side effects… he gained a ton of weight and he was tired all the time. Plus there were the regular blood tests he hated. He requested he go off of clozapine in favor of something else… this was a few months ago. Apparently, they weened him off clozapine and put him on a different drug. Last month I noticed he wasn’t returning my calls or responding to texts. The family was noticing the same thing… very uncharacteristic of him over the last few years. Now he’s withdrawn from most of the family. He still speaks with our mom and told her he is no longer on any medication… “it doesn’t work anyways” … “and he doesn’t need it.”
To my knowledge he is still living in the sober living facility and maintains a part time job… but I believe it is only a matter of time before he is in his car again or on the streets.
The family is at a loss of what to do. We love him so much and would like to get ahead of the situation but don’t know how. Any guidance would be greatly appreciated.

[removed]