Dad is Nuts!

He goes from hot to cold and back and forth again when he skips his meds. He loves us one week and hates us and the whole world the next. What makes this unbearable for us is that he acts it out, giving us the cold shoulder and blaming us for his miserable life. It's so hard to not take it personally when it's shot right to me and the rest of the family in personal ways. He'll take his meds then skip them. While on them, he's fine, sort of. But he's not nuts when he (and I believe this) CHOOSES to not bother taking them. I believe it's poor planning, irresponsibility, and immaturity on his part.  I removed him from my FB friends list because he left me a nasty chat message besides speaking to us with hostility. Have you had to deal with this kind of thing?

Your dad sounds more like a Child than a Dad..

Grown-ups don`t blame thier Kids,for thier Life..

                                                            .................... ...OUTLAW

Dear W. Dove,

Your father has bi-polar disorder? Or something similar?

Dumping meds isn't uncommon for those who suffer with bi-polar disorder and some similar problems. Some with temporal lobe seizures do the same thing. For one thing, some of the medications are very hard on those who take them both physically and mentally. Find out what his actual diagnosis is, and read up on it. It helps to know what's going on. It doesn't lessen the hurts they can cause, but it helps to know.

I'm really sorry you're going through this. The person who put our family through similar died a few years ago. Frankly, their death was a relief, though we still loved them and do miss them as they were before they got sick.

There are often support groups for family members of patients such as your father. Check with the local help line.

My profoundest sympathies.

Wow.  I feel for you.  You dad's symptoms remind me of a friend of mine.  She has borderline personality disorder.  Here's a link. 

http://psychcentral.com/lib/2007/symptoms-of-borderline-personality-disorder/

White dove,

How old is your father? This sounds like it could be the onset of Alzheimer's.  Could he be forgetting his medication and then getting mad at others for his symptoms? What kind of meds is he on? There are a lot of different things that could come into play here. Check out all physical before checking the mental. But by all means check the mental if everything else checks out.

MM

I sure feel for you.  It really makes ones heart sink when a dad is like this.

Even on the last night that my dad was alive in the hospital, he told me that I was a failure to him and thus he could not consider me to be his son because I ruined his life.  I couldn't believe it, we were both grown men and I had no control over his life to ruin it.  But it hurt. 

I always try to remember how he brought us up and cared for our needs when I was a child growing up. Then I appreciate the love he extended to me.  I try to forget the times when he got older.

Sounds like bipolar.  I have known a lot of bipolar folks and when they take their meds they "feel better" and then think they dont need them and stop.  Which of course, sets them right back into the illness where they are stubborn and either hyper or depressed and cant be dealt with.

Dont take it personally.  Pretend he is just Down Syndrome and cant help it.

My dad is bipolar with narcisisstic personality disorder.

So, mood swings up and down (mostly down - the manic cycle for him is very short).

The narcisiss stuff makes everything that's wrong totally not his fault.  He can't objectively see his own behavior, the context of outside events, or see he ever does anything wrong.

When he takes his meds, he's ok for a while and then gets to thinking that he's no longer "himself" (and, I guess, he isn't - he's instead pretty reasonable and ok to be around).  So he figures he doesn't need them anymore, stops, and then starts his descent into reacting to everything as if it's directed at him, and being totally oblivious to the impact he has on everyone around him.

Deal with this kind of thing?  For 50 years.

The WTS dogma feeds right into his neuroses: the world is bad, Satan is influencing the world, he's one of the few "good" people because he's a JW.

He has moments of great insight (over the decades), but always comes back to this worlview.

All I can do is respond when he's more stable, encourage his awareness of himself, and let him see how much I love him.  He's actually gotten better in the last 10 or 15 years, overall.

Interesting thread.  I used to think that my dad was mad about everything.  Towards the end of his life, i realised that he was an idiot.  'Course, after he threw me outta da house (me at 16 yrs) i basically never saw him until about 40 yrs later.  I think i had ptsd for at least 10 yrs after leaving home.  For me, being in the wt org was an improvement.

S

VoidEater,

We have the same dad.

Mom's narcisistic and histrionic and loved to beat us with the belt growing up. Dad is possibly bi-polar and, according to VoidEater's experience, may be narcisitic, as well. He sure throws the worst tantrums I've ever seen a sober man throw, all because someone disagrees with him.

Robert King hasnt taken his meds for a long time either

Who's he?