Instances where adult children pose a threat to parents

[Anonymous]

My nephew developed a drug addiction by 15 years old, he has Anxiety and ADHD. He's also highly sensitive and, because they medicated late, he would refuse his ADHD meds and you can't make a high school kid take a pill. He is in his mid 20s now, has been in 2 or 3 different lockdown and out patient (ha, those are useless) drug programs, has been sober, then descended back into using, causing psychosis and SEVERE aggression and hallucinations - that was scary and he had to be removed from one parents' home to another due to fear of what he'd do. (Holes in walls, benches and tables destroyed, but no humans or animals physically injured) (divorce was thrown in for funsies somewhere in the middle of all of this)

He is clean now, and starting to pick up the pieces, but it hasn't been a year since he's been sober, so we are all hoping, waiting with baited breath, and hoping some more. And the Reiners could have been my family, and that's very scary. I think we won't let our breath out until he's been sober for 3 years.

[Anonymous]

Someone in our neighborhood was stabbed by their adult son. He survived and I believe the son is still living with them. I cannot imagine.

I work in an elementary school (sped) and I've seen multiple instances of kids making death threats against other students, teachers, admin or parents. It's honestly terrifying.

[Anonymous]

Pray that kind of unstable adult child never finds us.

[Anonymous]

I’ll make a comment that NoVa city governments provide zero, I mean zero, help for families struggling with violent adult children with mental illness. No training, no support, nothing. Just call the police and hope for an arrest. You can’t even call 988 and get help—the ill person is supposed to request aid themselves.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:https://www.theguardian.com/film/2025/dec/15/who-is-nick-rob-reiner-son

I've read some DCUM posts in the past about parents being worried for their own safety or feeling threatened by their adult children and seeing more comments on some of the news articles reporting the son's arrest. Does anyone have other examples or experiences and when do you know that the child is capable of such violence?

Yes, unfortunately, in our old neighborhood, a son killed his father.

And another boy killed his psychiatrist.

Both were mental illnesses.

Also the Hoggle mother who killed both her own children. She was sick way before becoming an adult.

Our mental health system sucks and now there is zero hope for that system given the current administration.

Can you elaborate on what is needed to improve the health system?

DP. There are two large issues: accessibility and funding. There are too few programs and providers to accommodate the existing needs. And it is difficult to get funding to pay for care if you can find it.

A third issue is that it’s hard to find appropriate care in that people don’t have a sense of what is out there but are often left to their own devices to find what’s necessary. It’s completely unlike other areas of medicine. I mean when you get cancer, a doctor determines your treatment protocol. With MH care, you’re on your own. For example, when mine needed a long term inpatient, the psychiatrist told me that but had no list of programs for me to look at - I was on my own. If you’re not resourceful, you might not find what you need.

Fourth issue is that so much with psychiatry is trial and error. It can take six weeks for medication to work and if it doesn’t you move on to the next. In one year my child had 13 different medication combos and none worked. Plus if the mental illness manifests young, there are whole classes of medication that can’t be prescribed due to age.

We live in FFX county, and our psychiatrist called the hospitals to find a bed. I am not diminishing your struggles, but it is all very specific to a doctor and a patient.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My dear friend has a violent teen. I fear for her safety. The police have been called multiple times to school and home but he is never removed from the home. He gets referred to juvenile justice and attends an online class or does some community service hours and there are no real consequences.

I’ve been there. Here is what I did. I dropped mine off at hospitals and refused to take them back. I informed law enforcement that I intended to press charges and they were removed. (I never do press charges but I needed to be safe). They always asked if I would agree to hospitalization, which I do. So they would drop them off at the closest hospital and we would not pick them up when the hospital calls. It is unbelievably difficult and heartbreaking to do this. But it got us the help that was needed.

I am really sorry about this situation.

Can you explain how it works with the hospital bill? Did you have to pay, or does the hospital bill the mentally ill individual and not expect payment?

I was at the ER in a room next to a young woman who was experiencing some sort of breakdown or psychoses and ran down the hall screaming and attacked a nurse. It seemed like the goal of treatment was to drug her so she would stop being violent. (I heard them yelling at her to take the shot they were attempting to administer.) I

[Anonymous]

My parents have friends who are still supporting their adult boys.

Both boys were the type who made weed their main hobby and personality in high school. My parents used to tell me that it wasn't their/our place to tell the parents. But no surprise that both struggled to finish college or establish themselves as adults. One is now working as a UPS driver and living at home, and I haven't asked recently where the other is, but I know his parents repeatedly had to go collect him in other states when he had weird mental breakdowns and did things like wander around in the snow in inappropriate clothes muttering to himself and scaring kids until police got involved, and another occasion where he had some kind of job in Colorado and his boss called his parents to say he was having a mental break and they needed to come get him immediately. I think it was pretty clear he had schizophrenia or was using hard drugs, or both, and I remember my parents talking about how amazed they were that his parents weren't having him do some kind of inpatient treatment or at least encouraging him to stay with them too. He was a scary guy and always looked a little bit crazed in the eyes in high school, and I could see him doing something like this.

[Anonymous]

I do think more cameras in psychiatric facilities would be very helpful. Even a body cam for staff. Most people in psychosis have no memory or distorted memories of their psychotic state. There definitely can be abuse of patients. However they’re lousy witnesses of any problems.

Psychosis can also include delusions or false thoughts of child abuse, theft, and rape. Or maybe it happened? It’s very hard to determine true memories from delusions.

[Anonymous]

There is a Substack by Ann Bauer that shares the journey a family goes through in a situation like this. Can’t get it to link, but excellent essay.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My parents have friends who are still supporting their adult boys.

Both boys were the type who made weed their main hobby and personality in high school. My parents used to tell me that it wasn't their/our place to tell the parents. But no surprise that both struggled to finish college or establish themselves as adults. One is now working as a UPS driver and living at home, and I haven't asked recently where the other is, but I know his parents repeatedly had to go collect him in other states when he had weird mental breakdowns and did things like wander around in the snow in inappropriate clothes muttering to himself and scaring kids until police got involved, and another occasion where he had some kind of job in Colorado and his boss called his parents to say he was having a mental break and they needed to come get him immediately. I think it was pretty clear he had schizophrenia or was using hard drugs, or both, and I remember my parents talking about how amazed they were that his parents weren't having him do some kind of inpatient treatment or at least encouraging him to stay with them too. He was a scary guy and always looked a little bit crazed in the eyes in high school, and I could see him doing something like this.

Maybe you could recommend a place to “help”? You do understand that Medicaid and Medicare do not pay for psychiatric stays?

You may be surprised to learn that current treatments are not very effective and completely don’t work well for those with schizophrenia. The meds may help with paranoia and hallucinations, but 75% of patients struggle with severe ADHD, tiredness, and confusion. Current treatments suck.

The Prozac family of drugs has stopped the lie on the ground depressed persons that used to be in mental institutions. Science is behind on bipolar and schizophrenia unfortunately.

[Anonymous]

I have a sister who is an assistant professor at a very high ranking University. She has stalked an old BF. She has tried to hurt others on her dorm floor her freshman year. I can not be certain but I am pretty sure she pushed my mother down a flight of stairs. My mother claims she fell but my mother never admitted anything about my sister.

We are very far apart in age. By the time she was 8 I was already married and out of my parents home.

My parents were against getting her any help so I stopped talking to them because I was afriad for my family.

[Anonymous]

5150 holds
https://www.ochealthinfo.com/sites/hca/files/import/data/files/39874.pdf

take care of yourselves

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My parents have friends who are still supporting their adult boys.

Both boys were the type who made weed their main hobby and personality in high school. My parents used to tell me that it wasn't their/our place to tell the parents. But no surprise that both struggled to finish college or establish themselves as adults. One is now working as a UPS driver and living at home, and I haven't asked recently where the other is, but I know his parents repeatedly had to go collect him in other states when he had weird mental breakdowns and did things like wander around in the snow in inappropriate clothes muttering to himself and scaring kids until police got involved, and another occasion where he had some kind of job in Colorado and his boss called his parents to say he was having a mental break and they needed to come get him immediately. I think it was pretty clear he had schizophrenia or was using hard drugs, or both, and I remember my parents talking about how amazed they were that his parents weren't having him do some kind of inpatient treatment or at least encouraging him to stay with them too. He was a scary guy and always looked a little bit crazed in the eyes in high school, and I could see him doing something like this.

Maybe you could recommend a place to “help”? You do understand that Medicaid and Medicare do not pay for psychiatric stays?

You may be surprised to learn that current treatments are not very effective and completely don’t work well for those with schizophrenia. The meds may help with paranoia and hallucinations, but 75% of patients struggle with severe ADHD, tiredness, and confusion. Current treatments suck.

The Prozac family of drugs has stopped the lie on the ground depressed persons that used to be in mental institutions. Science is behind on bipolar and schizophrenia unfortunately.

You are gravely misinformed about Medicare and Medicaid and should not be giving advice about them.

Medicare:

https://www.aarp.org/medicare/faq/does-medicare-cover-mental-health/

Medicaid is the single largest payer for mental health and substance abuse treatment in the US. This includes inpatient treatment.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Very common.

My stepsister was so violent that at 16/17, she had broken her mom’s bone. Caused tens of thousands of dollars of damage to our house, had multiple pregnancy scares, and became an alcoholic.

It was just a bad time period in her life. Thankfully, she’s 24 now, college educated, engaged, and doing well.

[Anonymous]

Yes, I have and I still experience this.