Firstly, after reading the last entry I will do a little report on Monte. He spent just over one week in the hospital psychiatric ward. He had a very scary psychic break, which great parts of it he still doesn't remember. This is what happened:
He visited Vancouver over halloween. While he was here he made pretty definitive plans for making money with a friend of his. He was so excited (to do with internet work) but about a week after getting home, it all fizzled out. I think this was a bit of a last straw for him. He has been feeling huge pressure to find work, and hasn't been able to. Plus he has a foot problem. Due to his tremendous growth sprint in his teens (he went from 5'6 to 6'8 in ten months) his feet were ruined. The tendons didn't grow as quickly as the bones. The bones in his feet are always fracturing, even with orthodics, and the pain is extreme. Other than prednisone (which you can't take all the time) and cortisone shots (which only work for a few days) there is nothing that can be done. He did go to his doctor and seriously asked if they could amputate them and give him those bouncy sport prosthetics. They said no, of course. He became depressed, which coupled with his already diagnosed (sort of) ADHD he started to hermatize in his house. Long story short he ended up in what they call a psychic break (which we used to call nervous breakdown)
This is the part he doesn't remember. He left his house around 7 at night. He got into his truck and he drove to Campbell river (we know from bank statements) filled his truck up and then we don't know. I was frantically looking for him by phone and his friends and the neighbour across the street. I knew something was desperately wrong, which included some bizarre phone calls over the previous week. I have to say I went about 26 hours not knowing what had happened to him. I don't ever want to go through that again. Ever. About 9 oclock the next night I got a phone call from the Nanaimo hospital. He had been picked up by the side of the freeway, sitting, by an ambulance and brought to the hospital. They committed him temporally. I guess he wasn't making sense, couldn't remember anything etc...They let me talk to him on the phone. I calmed him down and got him to take some medicine to make him sleep and I got them to give him some pain killer. All he could talk about was the pain in his feet. Upon xray, they were all broken from walking.
The next day Bill and I went over on the ferry but we didn't get to see him...he slept for 36 hours straight, making up for not sleeping for about 3 weeks. He also had quit eating. I found out that he was picked up at an exit from the freeway near Courtenay. I phoned his brother Kevin, who lives in Courtenay, to see if he could go look around for his truck. They found it, out of gas, on the side of the freeway near the Port Alberni exit...the one he takes to go home. He had gotten out and walked the wrong way...at least 11 kilometres. He remembers that now and finally he just couldn't walk any further on his feet so he sat. A passerby phoned an ambulance. He thought he was going to the hospital to get help for his feet. When they wouldn't let him leave he was confused.
His stay, and complete psychic work up was the best thing that could have happened to him. He enjoyed his stay, they had a guitar and piano, and we got the working diagnosis the morning we took him out. They still can't make a final diagnosis until some more brain mapping is done in January but it looks like bipolar/depression etc. He is on meds to keep the dopamine levels down and I must say, this is the calmest we've ever seen him. Oh, he is still the old talkative correcting Monte, and he is even more creative with his music than before, but there is a sense of calm about him that is new....and awesome.
So, tomorrow I take him back to Port Alberni. I have hired an amazing neighbour (an older man and his wife) whom monte treats like a mentor. This fellow is incredible and is so good for monte and needs the money. He will keep an eye on Monte for us for the next few months until Monte is really back on his feet.
