Our son is 17 ( 18 in November). Two years ago he was a very social teen, nice group of friends, part time job and girlfriend. Then April last year he lost his job and the girl, he became very moody and his friends went away from him saying he had became too dark and negative. There were talks and “jokes” about suicide. Mid last year we took him to Headspace and then our biggest nightmare began, our son decided to take his treatment into his own hands and didn’t sign the consent form we were kept totally in the dark. It was extremely hard for us to accept he was going to be medicated without knowing the right diagnostic and no one was talking to us, our son didn’t allow anyone ( psychiatrist, psychologist and school counsel). I saw a letter from the GP that said he was suffering from severe depression and that is how I found out. We had no saying on anything that was happening with our son. He sees a psychiatrist and a psychologist but he doesn’t put in practice anything that they suggest. His sleep pattern is shocking he stays up until all hours of the night and then doesn’t get up for school. He doesn’t eat properly and doesn’t exercise. He doesn’t do the basics to look after himself. He takes the tablets and nothing else, but i don’t even think the tablets are working. This year has been even worse with him refusing to go to school. He was on a ATAR pathway (his choice) and we had a few meetings with the school and other pathways were presented to him but he didn’t want to change even though it was obvious he was going to fail and not get his HSCs. Whenever we or the school ask what he is doing or wants to do he says “I don’t know” Last month he hardly attended school and has been very disrespectful towards us. We tried to talk to him and we got “ I don’t even respect myself how do you expect me to respect anything or you guys” He told his dad that he is one of the reasons he thinks about suicide. Whenever we try to get him to do anything he doesn’t want to do he blames the depression. He throws tantrums and tell us we denied him treatment even though we know well that is not true, he was the one who left us out. Last year we even had to call Lifeline during one of his episodes. We feel he is sabotaging all the helps that professionals have offered to him. He is not going back to school to finish year 12 and he isn’t doing anything to find a job or do to TAFE. He doesn’t or doesn’t want to understand that he can’t just lay around the house and do nothing and be disrespectful with us. We feel he is using the depression to avoid responsibilities and to avoid growing up he is a very immature person and I am scared that if he doesn’t start showing that he is willing to change very soon his dad when will ask him to leave the house when he turns 18 and.
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