(Apr. 25, 2016) My 18-year-old son, Peter, had his first psychotic break in 2006. His sister called me the evening before and said "Peter needs some help, something really weird is going on with him." I told her I would be there the next day to pick him and his dog up and would see how things were then.
The next morning, Peter showed up at my job. He had hitchhiked from his father's house and killed his beloved dog. I called the Crisis and Counseling Center and they said to bring him in. He was admitted, spent six days in the psych ward of the hospital and was released with an $800 prescription and a pamphlet. So began our journey through the broken mental health system.
Peter is now 27 years old, diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia and has been hospitalized more than 10 times in Maine and New Hampshire. New Hampshire was horrible. There was never a bed available and the overworked case management just seemed to want my son gone. Recently, Peter was released after being transferred from jail for an evaluation. After three days, they falsely determined he had no mental illness, just an attitude problem.
For every time Peter was successfully admitted to a psychiatric hospital, there were five times he was turned away. One time, he was convinced his friend's 7-year-old was trying to stab him and, after some persuading, agreed to go to the ER. We waited 14 hours before a crisis team showed up to evaluate him. They were willing to admit him, but there were no available beds.
Once, after he was denied treatment in a hospital, Peter assaulted his father with a bat during a psychotic episode. Because of his aggression while unmedicated, I cannot have my son live with me. I have spent literally thousands of dollars this year alone to keep him alive. He is now fully symptomatic, delusional, angry, hungry, seeing danger everywhere and homeless on the streets in Maine.
As a parent, this is heartbreaking. Peter will be arrested for stealing food because he is hungry, or he will harm himself or someone else. Inpatient beds need to be available for people like my son. We are but 
one example of the thousands of families who cannot get help for their loved one. Something has to change.
The Treatment Advocacy Center has launched a campaign to end this injustice and ensure access to inpatient treatment for people with severe mental illness. Called "#aBedInstead," the campaign draws attention to how the nation's state psychiatric bed shortage has left the most severely mentally ill locked out of psychiatric treatment. The goal is to increase the number of available beds by reforming state and federal policies that created and perpetuate this crisis for people like my son. Visit #aBedInstead for more information.
DARLENE PATRICK - Mother to a son with severe mental illness
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