Schizophrenia seems to have claimed friend: she's homeless and has lost DD. Why can't she be helped?

[Mentallyillfrienhomless]

This is a very old friend I've personally not spoken too in over a decade.
Her df had schizophrenia and now she seems to have succumbed.
She has lost her Dd and she's in foster care.

She is doing a protest by living on the streets, doing a Hunger strike to punish the evil people who have "kidnapped her Dd" she is writing all sorts of absolutely nonsense stuff, paranoid etc.

I can't understand why she can't be sectioned and medicated?
Her dad seemed to have calmed down and sorted his life out with medication.

She has been left to go absolutely AWOL?
Does anyone have knowledge of what can be/ should be done?
She was abroad and moved back here into council housing and seems to have lost that.
Now her dd is foster care and she's on the streets seemingly with no grasp of reality at all.

Because mental healthcare is terribly in the UK & is criminally underfunded, sadly. There a very few places a patient can be held if sectioned. Medication requires compliance. It's awful.

They will only section her if it is absolutely necessary. Services are over stretched. She is more likely to recieve support from community mental health teams but even that isn’t guaranteed these days.

maybe call your local council and ask for their advice / speak to their mental health team. They might arrange for your friend to be seen by professionals. Or atleast there will be a note on the system of the call so if you have to call again in the future it can only help the case surely?

hope she gets the help she needs soon.

She can't be sectioned unless she's an immediate danger to herself or others. Mental health care in the UK is also extremely stretched and under funded.

1. Being homeless is not a reason to be sectioned
2. Does she agree with the diagnosis?

If she denies she is ill then there's not much anyone can do

Detention under the MHA can be done if necessary for 'your own health or safety'. It's not simply for people suicidal or homicidal.

When schizophrenia is at its worst the person will often refuse to engage with services. This is how stability can be broken down if they refuse to stay on meds things may well go terribly wrong ultimately leading to homelessness. At least not when living independently as it is easy to let things slide.

It is a horrible disease and seemingly many patients have very little insight into their condition. There are too many people left until total crisis point before they get the help they need.

Why can't you go pick her up and let her stay with you?

Have you got any idea where she might be, you could contact the mental health crisis team or there might be a street team but its so difficult to find people and get them the help they needs, sometimes it results in someone concerned ringing the police.

Exactly this. It is absolutely shocking.

This.

I'm a mental health nurse and have been for a number of years. The longstanding underfunding and understaffing is why I'm looking to leave the NHS asap. I can't be doing fighting for people like your friend any more. I'm burnt out.

Be careful about stating people with schizophrenia or other psychotic illness “deny” they are ill
They do not deny

Part of their illness is a condition called Anosognosia. This is a complete pack of insight that their perception of the world is not real and that they are the ones that are rational and logical and everyone else is in denial/ignoring etc the subject of their delusions. They have no awareness of either the “positive “ symptoms (symptoms they get that “normal” people dont) and negative symptoms (cognitive impairment symptoms like Anosognosia and executive thinking skills)

This is why people with such psychotic illnesses are so difficult to treat. Firstly it often takes time for them to trust their care team, and secondly, given medication is the only route for treatment in this country, they often stop their meds as they don’t recognise they’re ill

@ThatGirlInACountrySong is that a serious suggestion? Come on, the OP hasn't seen this person in 10 years and she is schizophrenic, street homeless and by the sounds of it, un- or under-medicated.

I was sectioned because after I was arrested, I started banging my head on the car door. They said if I did it again, I'd be sectioned, so I did it again. I stopped after they said they would be sectioning me. I did have to wait overnight to be placed and the only place available was a private Priory place. I was 17 so social services funded it. I guess me being under 18 made all the difference then. It seems very hard to be sectioned as an adult. It's mightily sad and not acceptable.

I had to be assessed in the overnight place, but I don't think I was an immediate danger at the time at all!

I divorced last year. 30 year marriage. Last 20 of those ex had psychotic illness (various diagnosis around paranoid schizophrenia, then schizoaffective disorder etc)

The first 10 years of his illness no one diagnosed him- despite numerous trips to GP and NHS therepy

he was finally diagnosed after 10 years. at no time was he sectioned - even though he openly discussed abusive episodes and had knives and other weapons in the house at night to use as weapons (delusions), and we had two teens who could have come downstairs at night and been attacked by mistake. I literally had to take ex home that evening, still in significant delusional and agitated state and then try to fund an out of hour pharmacy to fill his prescription for antipsychotics.

he was seen at home under “ care in the community”. That was my awakening to realise that there is literally no care, no community, no professional input, no proper observations to get the right diagnosis (hence why it kept changing)l I was defaulted as his carer. I was encouraged to do “training “ so they could essentially dump all CPN duties onto me. Despite me being sole breadwinner, effectively single parent . He could do nothing at all during the day . He saw a psychiatrist once per year, he got 6 sessions on managing stress in group therapy. That was it

it broke me. I couldn’t force him to take meds. In fairness he did mostly. When he decided he didn’t want to take them any more after 10 years, I can’t say I blamed him- they all have pretty awful physical side affects that are well document3d in PILs etc. I decided that it was best for us to divorce- I couldn’t help him, it was a safeguarding risk as the abuse came back.

Even when he told the crisis team his marriage was breaking up they did nothing. There is no help at all to help families with suffers of these illnesses

its not the staff. There is no money and “care in the community” is a disastrous policy that needs a public enquiry and responsible probably for many many deaths

The NHS is broken. A close relative has been told there is a seven month waiting list for a telephone appointment with a consultant surgeon for an operation that he has been told he needs urgently. Not even a face-to-face appointment, let alone a date for surgery. We are looking at paying for it privately because it could be the difference between life and death if it is left for a year or more.

My mum has the same mental illness and the mental health service in this country is shit.

She was wondering the streets during the night in her dressing gown, carrying a hammer because people where 'in her loft' plotting to kill her or trying to break into schools because she could hear one of us in there screaming for help and generally going awol every day as she was convinced there were people hiding in her house, it still wasn't enough to get her sectioned. This went on for months and we got no help at all.

Because you can't have a low tax economy and good mental health services.

@WithIcePlease and @Zippedydoo123

As far as I am aware she has resisted all attempts by SS to undergo a mental test.

Her writing in sm is clearly absolutely not rooted in reality. She's not been diagnosed nor put on meds yet as far as I am aware.

She is currently on a hunger strikes and living on the streets which I would say is absolutely a danger to hereelf after previously being a normally functioning person!
She used to own her own flat a long time ago.

She was an exceptional loving single mother.

Her dd was frightened of her.

It was she who raised the alarm. ..

@MegaClutterSlut

I'm so sorry that sounds horrendous.

Is she ok now?

@Newlifestartingatlast

Again that is heart breaking.

I've had family members with different mental health issues and I know it's not good.

However with my friend she's a single parent to a young child ( 13) who has very little family, no one at all on her dad's side and very thin on her mum's side.

Surely helping her to sort herself out would be cheaper than paying hundreds to foster care?

I must admit I've not seen a fairly young woman in this state on the streets.
Yes , we have a well known addict...who has had much support from homeless charities and our council and her family but she can't be helped.

@Bunnycat101

She was a good support to her dad who had it.

Her dad stabilised and was ok for a long time.

How much worse can it be she's literally out of her mind, homeless,on hunger strike and has lost her once beloved daughter

@Newlifestartingatlast

Thanks, I wonder if as an old trusted friend if I said something or wrote her a message that she's like her dad would help? And she needs help what she is saying is rubbish?

@HappyHamsters

I'm not 100 sure where she is but I know there has been so much police involvement. This is what I can't understand?nshes clearly so so unwell?