Crisis

Urgh. Son 1 had a crisis on Friday, or rather one had been building up, slowly but surely for a month. On Friday he realised he couldn't go on, he finally admitted (to a good friend of mine) that he needed serious help and was willing to be admitted to hospital in order to get that.

She immediately took action, we all ended up at the hospital and six stressful hours later, son 1 was found a place at an adolescent psychiatric unit in Central London. It is in a private clinic used by the stars, but is being paid for by the NHS, so how long he will be able to remain there is questionable, still at least for now he is safe and we can relax a little more in that knowledge.

There is a real lack of hospital facilities for children and adolescents with mental health problems. At first they tried to have him admitted to the local children's ward but, because they would have had to hire trained mental health nurses to be with him there 24/7, the consultants refused to have him. Our local children's mental health team works 9-5, Monday to Friday, with virtually no emergency cover even in those hours, so when something like this happens the child is assessed by the adult services based at the hospital. Although son 1 is 16, all were thankfully agreed that placement on the adult ward would be highly unsuitable.

So, we wait for tomorrow, and the return of his own local consultant to find out what the future holds...

Three notable things:

1. I bought myself a bright new handbag yesterday. Well, what else is a girl supposed to do in a time of crisis?

2. Son 2 hardly seems to have noticed his brother's absence. After all, Son 1 did spend most of his time in his bedroom...

3. ...talking of which we are in the process of cleaning out and fumigating said bedroom!