Help struggling with my 14 year old son

[Elliebean035]

I need some help/advice because I am at my lowest point in a while at the moment.
My son is 14 years old. For the last couple
of years we have had problems. Mood swings and things. He then made a friend and for 6 months would go missing for days at a time. During these times I would receive abuse from him and he behaved in a completly different manner than what I was used to. In the last time he went missing he decided to go to his dads ( who he hadn’t seen for 8 years). He made the choice to live there which supported and went missing once whilst there. During this time the rented property I was in was put up for sale and I had to move out. I made the choice to move back in with my parents in order to save money. My parents are both retired and found the ordeal with my son going missing very stressful as they are quite involved in his life. A week before I was due to move out my son went missing again and this time came to my house. He told me he didn’t want to live at his dad’s anymore. It put me in a difficult position as my parents had said they couldn’t deal with the stress of my son also living with them. After speaking to them they agreed he could also move in on the understanding that things would change. My son is home schooled as doesn’t fit in with main stream schooling and is currently being diagnosed for ADHD. Since moving in it has been challenging. 60% of the time my son is kind and caring and a pleasure to be around, however he has what I can only describe as complete personality changes in which he is emotionally abusive to not just me but also my parents. He has threatened to hit my parents. After a couple of days he will go back to his normal self and apologise but not be able to explain why he behaved like this. There is no triggers and it can happen in the space of an hour. I just don’t know what to do anymore. My mental health is at its lowest and I am extremely down. What’s worse is the added stress of my parents finding the whole ordeal really stressful. I’m just at a completly loss. When he is having these episodes I really do feel like I can’t cope.

I think op I'd be trying to link him in with a youth worker in your area. Something may be going on with him that he's not able to tell you as his parent but they might be able to get through to him. Are social services involved? If he's regularly going missing I'd be very concerned about him being high risk for grooming/exploitation so I'd be taking any and all family support available.

When you say missing, did you ever find out where he was, with who? This sounds terrifying.

He went missing a lot last year, police were called each time and family services were involved. Him and his friend slept in toilets or in the woods. He would either come back on his own exhausted or be bought back by the police. The last time he went missing was September last year. He has not made an attempt to do it since. But we are now having these very intense out of no where personality changes.

Are you on the CAMHS waiting list? Does he have any hobbies? I wonder if getting him busy might help? My son is the same age, and although never went missing, had mood swings. It is age related I would say but I suppose it can get worse according to the child. Things that seemed to help are joining a gym (luckily he can fund it himself) and he now has a girlfriend. He is much easier to live with. He also is doing DOFE which includes volunteering at his local National Trust Park. Does he like animals? You could both volunteer together at cat charities. He wouldn’t be able to do it on his own.

How are things now?
Has he tried ADHD medication?