Schizophrenia: The Perspective of a Father & Brother-in-Law

In 2005 my mother-in-law passed away at the age of 85. She had been in poor health since at least 2001, we
suspect since her sister-in-law died the same year, they had been very close, she started going downhill after
that. By 2003 she was in a nursing home and had been diagnosed with dementia, another devastating mental
illness characterized by severe loss of memory and not being able to care for herself anymore. This was es-
pecially hard on my wife and her oldest brother. My wife's sister has always been too busy to be involved in
anything but her son and her grandaughters to care about her mother. I would think it isn't true but she has
given no indication otherwise. It appears she has no feelings or heart. Recently she claims to have called her
brother who has schizophrenia to check on him, I can tell you that is a lie for caller id does not lie. My wife is
really upset by this and it's really a sore spot with her, and remains so, we don't know why. Maybe she should
have her had examined as well as her husband's. If whoeve reads this wonders why my latest entry began this
way do the math: All the above scenarios have on common thread: Mental illness, mainly schizophrenia which
I am dealing with on two fronts. My son called me last night at work and said my brother-in-law came out of his
room and went off, he said he could understand him. After a few moments he was back in his room and nothing further happened. We really don't think he would do any harm to anyone but himself. What I've noticed lately is he appears to be more withdrawn than ever, he has taken lately to keeping food in his room, for several months when he makes tea he keep two pitchers on plates in his room. He has a small fridge and presumeably has items in there. It seems very strange to me. We found he had run out of one of
his meds last week, which explains his behavior. Till next time. -30-