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44-year-old Joely Hignett has been taking care of her 24-year-old son, Kyle, and her 22-year-old daughter, Tyler – both of whom have mental disorders – for several years now.
She has become intimately familiar with son’s mood swings, bipolar tendencies, and outbursts, but a recent series of events prompted her to film one of these incidences and share it on Facebook.
When Kyle learns that he has to be discharged from his doctors, he breaks down crying, screaming for someone to “put a bullet in [him].” In the video, Joely’s hand can be seen, rubbing her son’s head and neck as she speaks to him in a calm voice, “Kyle, please…”
But Kyle’s pleads don’t stop.
Joely’s video has been viewed almost one million times and shared over 5,000 times on Facebook.
In her post, she wrote, “My son has agreed with me to show this and for everybody who cares about mental health to spread it.” She continues by describing the long, harrowing experience she and Kyle have had with the mental health system.
The doctors no longer want to support Kyle through therapy and have opted to treat him with medication.
Kyle, however, has taken drugs in the past and responded badly to them. They made him gain over 80 pounds, prompting him to opt for therapy treatment in the future.
But despite Joely’s long journey to support her son – comforting him through mood swings from his borderline personality disorder, calming his screamed pleas for death, even handcuffing his hands together so he won’t hurt or kill himself – the mental health system still isn’t offering Kyle adequate treatment.
Joely includes in her post, “…thank you mental health system for letting my son down,” and asks any Facebook user to “like and share” the page, in hopes of garnering enough attention to change the system for her son and others who are also suffering.
Joely and Kyle’s family has started a petition – that has collected almost 2,000 signatures so far – to call on Jeremy Hunt and the Department of Health to increase funding in medical health systems and research on borderline personality disorder.
