Reply to 19-year-old college student befriended classmate with schizophrenia

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Is there someone at your DD’s college you can reach out to and raise concerns? Ideally even order him to stop contacting her, but at least monitor the situation? 
Also can you distract her? Take her on a trip maybe? She needs to find other ways to feel important and loved besides helping all sorts of problematic people [/quote]

I don’t even now who I contacted.  She’s an adult.  If I crossed that boundary she’d probably be incredibly angry with me and feel betrayed. [/quote]

Justifiably so. [/quote]

Maybe not. Both of my kids colleges (one public, one private) have a mechanism by which *anyone* with a relationship to a kid— parent, roommate, friend, professor, RA, etc, can do an anonymous referral to the counseling center for a wellness/mental health check. Mom would not get any feedback, obviously, because the kid is an adult.  But, given the level of student suicides, most colleges have these. As a last resort, it’s something.

But you seem to have a relationship where you can talk to your DD. I agree that that her current counselor is the way in.  Give DD the stats and info on schizophrenia. Make sure she knows that no matter what she does, he will more likely than not be homeless and  take his own life.  That he has a likely fatal disease and she needs to understand that.  Then ask if she will talk to her counselor about how she can best support him with such a difficult disease.  Don’t even add— without getting yourself pulled in to far.  Come from the angle of her talking with someone with experience treating schizophrenia being the best way to learn how to help him.  And make her aware that her counselor may be able to tell her how this young man can get SSI, medical care, group housing, etc (and the counselor should do this by helping her get a referral to a case manager.  Applying for benefits is not DD’s job).

If she explains this situation, trust that any decent therapist will work with her to draw boundaries and do things like call mobile emergency mental health rather than taking him to the ER, set him up with a case worker. Get real supports in place with people who do this for a living. And take that responsibility off her plate.

And PPs are right.  She needs to learn to drawn boundaries now, before she makes decisions about jobs and marriage and kids.

Good luck. It’s a terrible disease with a very sad progression. [/quote]

Have you ever tried to do any of these services? It’s unbelievably difficult to even get Medicaid. And I’m not sure what mental health homes and services you think are available, but this is a total fantasy land of government help. And the fellow doesn’t have a family to help wade through the paperwork.

Finally, it’d be nice to stop the doom and gloom. It’s is a disease that gets worse without treatment. But help in the first two years can really turn things around fast. Yes many go downhill. But there is a number who can manage this illness. [/quote]

+1. It is not in any way inevitable that this young man will become homeless and the PP is actually wrong about the odds that he will die by suicide. It’s a serious illness; there’s not need to make up figures that are worse than the facts.[/quote]

Lifespan shorter by 19 year for men.  Earlier death most often cardiovascular due to to treatment non-compliance, homelessness and drug addiction. 3.5 times more likely to die in a given year than a healthy peer.  20% suicide rate.

It’s a terrible and sad disease. Telling OP it’s not and her kid can save this boy is ultimately helps no one. Not even the boy, who needs real help. Not a college kid out to save him. [/quote]

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