Day 28

Today we had our second 'family meeting' with the doctor.  This was our second meeting with a psychiatrist since Kit has been in the hospital.  And it was a new doctor.  The past resident is finished his rotation and this doctor is a fellow covering over Christmas break.   Really nice guy - Dr. Kumar.  Spent almost two hours with us.   He asked us for the whole history - back to high school and right up to now.   Very thorough.  We really liked him.  Kit was still in bed when we got there and he didn't join us.  Most of the talk was about meds...  he has had some significant improvement since being on them - but it has not changed his false beliefs about the controller.  He still thinks he is totally controlled by someone/thing else.   He is on rispiridal - a newer antipsychotic both orally and by depot injection.  Because he is on the injectables it takes a little longer to take effect so we need to keep waiting.  The doctor is trying to find out how much of the psychosis is caused by street drugs - cannabis - and how much is the underlying illness.    


Much of the discussion was also about  the plan for the future.  Kit basically has three choices when his form is up  
1)  live in Adam's basement with a support team - case worker, psychiatrist, inject-able meds, go on ODSP and/or get a job.  
 2)  transfer to another facility like Ontario Shores for some more intense rehab.  They have a great program called STEP which is for young schizophrenics to learn about and deal with their illness.  
3) back to the shelter system.  
We would like #2 or #1, but Kit would prefer #3.   So frustrating.  Who spends 28 days in the hospital to be released to the street?  What a waste...  We just have to hope that the next 15 days show Kit some insight into his disease.  


The doctor told us there are some good things - one being that Kit was highly functioning before he got sick.  Was in university, did well in high school and the second being that the first psychosis may have been triggered by street drugs.  (and possibly the following ones).  What is going poorly for him is the lack of insight - that he doesn't see his belief system as being wrong. Also the lack of compliance with his meds.   


We celebrated our Skelly family dinner tonight with Adam & Alison,  Liz & Al, Britt, Molly, Brendan and Eddie and Emma came over as well.   It was awesome to have everyone together tonight with Kit and know that he has people who love him and will be there for him.   Even though at this point Kit can't really see how important these relationships are to him - they are what will make the difference for him.  It really was so great to see Bren, Eddie and Kit together. I hope Kit goes to sleep tonight thinking about this long term friendship that you have all had for so long.  Darn - I wish I had gotten a picture of the three of them together...