T
tabbycats
Guest
Location: northeast USA
This story is about a nightmarish situation resulting from signing over one's custody to the state, a.k.a. "guardianship" by the state. I know this is long, but please, this is a rare and very emotionally traumatic situation that demands help fast.
I have a family member named Joe. He was born with a genetic condition (chromosome deletion syndrome) that pre-disposes one to various types of mental & developmental illnesses. As a young child it was discovered immediately that he is "partially retarded"; e.g. he has learning disabilities, cannot think abstractly, think logically, however he can carry out a fairly normal conversation about sports, hobbies, food, etc. His face gave his syndrome away, so naturally he was picked on, hit, teased, etc by school peers even though being in special ed (he would interact with mainstream kids in certain classes, the hallway, outside, etc.
Fast-forward to Joe's age of 20/21. Parents divorced at age 12. He lives with his mother and his 'normal' brother (age 17), and his father is mostly out of the picture (poor, non-supportive financially). He shows the first signs of Schizophrenia-related disorder. He has delusions about people attacking him, is paranoid when hearing syrens that the cops are coming for him, and general unrealistic paranoia. After this continues for a while, he begins projecting this paranoia onto other people, he thinks everyone is out to get him, even family members. This turns into violent behavior. Destroying furniture and items. Grabbing knives/weapons and threatening others (despite never lunging at people, just HOLDING the weapons up in an intimidating manner). The police had to show up over 20 separate times and had to restrain him. He was committed to the local psychiatric hospital over 20 times in a span of year or so.
The mother and brother could not handle this trauma anymore, so the mother decided he needed to live in a supported living situation. The family is lower middle-class (less than $40k/year) so the mother cannot afford to rent a house for him and hire a staff. Therefore it was decided to sign a custody agreement, in which the state takes "guardianship" over him. This means he lives in a normal house and is supervised by a state-run staff to restrain him if needed. His mother now has no power of decision. Only his state-employed Guardian (does not live with him) can decide what he eats, what his curfew is, when he visits family, phonecalls etc.
At first it is a relief for his mother and brother that he is in a safe home with staff. We pretty much thought that we could make suggestions here to the guardian regarding Joe (diet, etc), and that he would be cooperative with our desires. Turns out this is far from the case. Eventually the Guardian shows his true colors. He is bitter, has no compassion for Joe at all, and only values Joe for his SSI income that goes to the guardian. Almost every interaction with him on the phone is bitter, he speaks with a mean voice, implies he hates the family, etc. He only allows the mother 10 minutes PER WEEK to talk to Joe on the phone, visits are very limited for Joe, etc. The mother is very knowledgeable about healthy living, eating good, vitamins, food supplements, etc, and wishes for Joe to be on them as well as other healthy foods. She is denied any of this food influence by the guardian.
So after 2 years of living there, it is apparent that the new lifestyle the Guardian assigns Joe can only be described as PASSIVE DESTRUCTION. He does not allow any vitamins which would help his mental symptoms (vitam C, fish oils, etc.). He does not encourage exercise, he is allowing the staff to take him to eat at fast food places like McDonalds nearly EVERYDAY. Worst of all: Joe is drugged up more than is necessary. He is on over 5 extremely powerful sedative medications (klonopin, seroquel, antipsychotics) that are very toxic especially when combined. He shows evidence of permanent nervous system damage from the side-effects (visible, strong leg tremors, involuntary movements, etc.). These are medications the family does NOT want him to be on. The Guardian does not allow him to visit specialists of his genetic syndrome, or try any medications that showed success with his syndrome. There has even been evidence of minor physical abuse by the staff when restraining him, but cannot be proven legally.
Fast-forward to present. Now we initialize legal action. The family hires an inexpensive attorney (< $2000). If we could we would have Joe placed in a staff-environment that is run by the family (e.g. family makes decisions for him) but paid for by the state. We know this is a long shot in court, so we reduce our goals to just having more power of decision over him while he is in that house, like influence over his meals, vitamins, medication, etc.
The outcome is NADA. We don't get any decision-power, and the judge paints a picture that Joe is going to be there a long time, because he "shows no signs of improvement."
This phrase made it dawn upon the family the most horrible nightmare: it is obvious that the Guardian is deliberately preventing Joe from improving by making his health even worse. This is the reason behind all resistance to the family, the horrible diet, the toxic medications, the severely limited socialization with family. The Guardian knows that if Joe shows any substantial signs of improvement, that judge will start considering changing the living circumstances. And the reason the Guardian does not want improvement is because he PROFITS from Joe being there, under his guardianship.
Thank you so much for reading this far, I know it was a lot. Please, any one that can help Joe & our family, we need it desperately! Joe is miserable in this home. He cries everyday that he wants to come home and be with his family, the staff-abuse, and he talks about suicide. Every time the mother sees him, she holds back crying. He looks horrible. He is zombied from the meds. He has gained near 80 POUNDS within 2 years!!!. He has a huge fat stomach because of the horrible diet. His blood shows he is pre-diabetic. If this continues we are going to lose him. I can't see this going on for much longer before it kills him.
Please, the family is broke and cannot afford good attorneys. There are no more hearings with the judge unless we get an attorney. By the time we save up for another cheap one, Joe is going to be in even worse health. Please, give us some way of fighting this situation. We cannot find any legal organizations, or mental health organizations that can help us undue this Guardianship agreement. It is likely that the guardian has strong influence over the court and as of now all court hearings have been and will be an uphill battle. I appreciate you having read this far. Anyone who is knowledgeable about law, please give some suggestions on how we can begin to fix this. At the very least we want to have decision making power over Joey. You will be saving a life.
This story is about a nightmarish situation resulting from signing over one's custody to the state, a.k.a. "guardianship" by the state. I know this is long, but please, this is a rare and very emotionally traumatic situation that demands help fast.
I have a family member named Joe. He was born with a genetic condition (chromosome deletion syndrome) that pre-disposes one to various types of mental & developmental illnesses. As a young child it was discovered immediately that he is "partially retarded"; e.g. he has learning disabilities, cannot think abstractly, think logically, however he can carry out a fairly normal conversation about sports, hobbies, food, etc. His face gave his syndrome away, so naturally he was picked on, hit, teased, etc by school peers even though being in special ed (he would interact with mainstream kids in certain classes, the hallway, outside, etc.
Fast-forward to Joe's age of 20/21. Parents divorced at age 12. He lives with his mother and his 'normal' brother (age 17), and his father is mostly out of the picture (poor, non-supportive financially). He shows the first signs of Schizophrenia-related disorder. He has delusions about people attacking him, is paranoid when hearing syrens that the cops are coming for him, and general unrealistic paranoia. After this continues for a while, he begins projecting this paranoia onto other people, he thinks everyone is out to get him, even family members. This turns into violent behavior. Destroying furniture and items. Grabbing knives/weapons and threatening others (despite never lunging at people, just HOLDING the weapons up in an intimidating manner). The police had to show up over 20 separate times and had to restrain him. He was committed to the local psychiatric hospital over 20 times in a span of year or so.
The mother and brother could not handle this trauma anymore, so the mother decided he needed to live in a supported living situation. The family is lower middle-class (less than $40k/year) so the mother cannot afford to rent a house for him and hire a staff. Therefore it was decided to sign a custody agreement, in which the state takes "guardianship" over him. This means he lives in a normal house and is supervised by a state-run staff to restrain him if needed. His mother now has no power of decision. Only his state-employed Guardian (does not live with him) can decide what he eats, what his curfew is, when he visits family, phonecalls etc.
At first it is a relief for his mother and brother that he is in a safe home with staff. We pretty much thought that we could make suggestions here to the guardian regarding Joe (diet, etc), and that he would be cooperative with our desires. Turns out this is far from the case. Eventually the Guardian shows his true colors. He is bitter, has no compassion for Joe at all, and only values Joe for his SSI income that goes to the guardian. Almost every interaction with him on the phone is bitter, he speaks with a mean voice, implies he hates the family, etc. He only allows the mother 10 minutes PER WEEK to talk to Joe on the phone, visits are very limited for Joe, etc. The mother is very knowledgeable about healthy living, eating good, vitamins, food supplements, etc, and wishes for Joe to be on them as well as other healthy foods. She is denied any of this food influence by the guardian.
So after 2 years of living there, it is apparent that the new lifestyle the Guardian assigns Joe can only be described as PASSIVE DESTRUCTION. He does not allow any vitamins which would help his mental symptoms (vitam C, fish oils, etc.). He does not encourage exercise, he is allowing the staff to take him to eat at fast food places like McDonalds nearly EVERYDAY. Worst of all: Joe is drugged up more than is necessary. He is on over 5 extremely powerful sedative medications (klonopin, seroquel, antipsychotics) that are very toxic especially when combined. He shows evidence of permanent nervous system damage from the side-effects (visible, strong leg tremors, involuntary movements, etc.). These are medications the family does NOT want him to be on. The Guardian does not allow him to visit specialists of his genetic syndrome, or try any medications that showed success with his syndrome. There has even been evidence of minor physical abuse by the staff when restraining him, but cannot be proven legally.
Fast-forward to present. Now we initialize legal action. The family hires an inexpensive attorney (< $2000). If we could we would have Joe placed in a staff-environment that is run by the family (e.g. family makes decisions for him) but paid for by the state. We know this is a long shot in court, so we reduce our goals to just having more power of decision over him while he is in that house, like influence over his meals, vitamins, medication, etc.
The outcome is NADA. We don't get any decision-power, and the judge paints a picture that Joe is going to be there a long time, because he "shows no signs of improvement."
This phrase made it dawn upon the family the most horrible nightmare: it is obvious that the Guardian is deliberately preventing Joe from improving by making his health even worse. This is the reason behind all resistance to the family, the horrible diet, the toxic medications, the severely limited socialization with family. The Guardian knows that if Joe shows any substantial signs of improvement, that judge will start considering changing the living circumstances. And the reason the Guardian does not want improvement is because he PROFITS from Joe being there, under his guardianship.
Thank you so much for reading this far, I know it was a lot. Please, any one that can help Joe & our family, we need it desperately! Joe is miserable in this home. He cries everyday that he wants to come home and be with his family, the staff-abuse, and he talks about suicide. Every time the mother sees him, she holds back crying. He looks horrible. He is zombied from the meds. He has gained near 80 POUNDS within 2 years!!!. He has a huge fat stomach because of the horrible diet. His blood shows he is pre-diabetic. If this continues we are going to lose him. I can't see this going on for much longer before it kills him.
Please, the family is broke and cannot afford good attorneys. There are no more hearings with the judge unless we get an attorney. By the time we save up for another cheap one, Joe is going to be in even worse health. Please, give us some way of fighting this situation. We cannot find any legal organizations, or mental health organizations that can help us undue this Guardianship agreement. It is likely that the guardian has strong influence over the court and as of now all court hearings have been and will be an uphill battle. I appreciate you having read this far. Anyone who is knowledgeable about law, please give some suggestions on how we can begin to fix this. At the very least we want to have decision making power over Joey. You will be saving a life.
