My son, 31, has passed the bar exam in two states and holds a masters in mathematics. He recently joined a law firm in Michigan and he came to California to visit me before starting and to get his wardrobe updated and ready. For the first few weeks in his job, he was happy and secure. Then, he met a young girl of 20 and everything changed. I went to Michigan to visit him and meet her and she clung to him and completely took charge of everything and has encouraged him to leave the law firm and either go into art (!) while pursuing a PhD in higher math, which will take 4-6 years and no guarantee of a job at the end. I will agree, that teaching was his comfort zone during the dry period when he couldn't find a position in a law firm. He taught math at the local university. However, since meeting this young lady his apartment is a hell hole, with her pet mink running up and down and her tarantula in the kitchen. He has become cruel in his attitude towards me and told me that he no longer loves me or his own family; that it's just the two of them now and pretty much threw me out of his apartment. He is on the verge of making the biggest mistake of his life and I am obviously helpless. What I have done, since returning to California, is do everything I can to keep the lines of communication open and told him that he is an adult and I respect his intelligence and trust him to make the right decision, but to consider that he has to live with that decision, I do not. I also made it clear that it's a two-way street. That I, too, have boundaries and will not tolerate any disrespect but will love him unconditionally. He's somewhat emotionally young, clearly, but this woman has completely taken over his life. It's almost cultish and no one, not even his brother can get through to him that this is a temporary (hopefully) relationship, she's young and will change in the next decade and to keep his feet on the ground. No dice. At one point, my troubled son even told me that he never loved me (hurt like daggers) and that when my husband died, he felt nothing and for me to move on. Should I do just that or continue to let him know that I'm there if he needs me. Everything he worked for is ready to go down the drain because of one young woman and a ridiculous relationship of only 6 weeks. HELP!

Windanc sounds like you have been an overcontrolling mother for a long time so this should not come as any big surprise to you that sonny is now having fun trashing his life with both hands. He may be emotionally immature due to you being overly protective. His new girlfriend sounds like his emotional present age.

Having passed the bar in two states is no easy trick to do. Does he want to be a lawyer or was this foisted upon him by you and his dad? He may not even care for "your" choice of careers for him.

Let him make his own mistakes with this sloppy girlfriend. He may find it refreshing that the place is a pig stye. He is a bit old for her but he does need to grow up a bit.

Stay your distance and let him come to you when he is ready as the more you intrude on him the further away you're pushing him. Kids need room to grow - let him have his space for now and find his own way in ife.

The girlfriend may just be a passing thing (let's hope so) but if there is a child involved down the road then you'll have to just grin and bear it and support him the best way you can emotionally. Don't let his hurtful words stick in your craw as he is just going through a rebellious period and probably does not mean it in the end.

Apparently if the girlfriend is bossing him around he's used to that kind of behavior out of women and accepts this...

If he's rebelled against you then one day he will rebel against her as well.

I don't believe I've been over-controlling; . Paul has made his own decisions, including law school and paid for it himself. This was his goal, as was his taking his masters in Michigan that he earned and paid for himself. I have always supported him emotionally, but not financially or bullied my way into his life, until now. He has always been shy and retiring and very conservative-minded in any and all moves he's made. This one, seriously, came out of the blue. I have indeed made it clear that I trust his logical mind to eventually find the right place for himself, but if he gives up this opportunity, it will be a difficult task to get into any law firm in the future. And as for the girlfriend's insistence that he try art, that's HER dream, not his. Paul has clinical depression, always has, and she exchanged his medication for vitamins. Since that time, his doctor had to intervene and he's a bit btr. No, this isn't about my controlling him, honest.

Oh, one other thing and my reason for urgency. He has until Friday to accept the PhD program and leave the law firm. It's a difficult thing to watch your son who's worked so hard just throw away such an opportunity in a tough economic climate. His doc says he's experiencing the same chemical reaction as an addict. New 'love'. Sigh.

First, when posting a follow-up question or info, please use the Answer options at the bottom of the page rather than the Comments.

The fats here are he is an adult and can make his own decisions. You can express your disappointment in those decisions, but they are still his to make. So you need to back off.

It will hurt a great deal to back away, but that is really your only choice.

If you had kept totally quiet, agreeable, and serene, I'll bet you would have seen a different person come out of this. But you didn't, and now he wants nothing to do with you.
'I respect his intelligence and trust him to make the right decision, but to consider that he has to live with that decision, I do not.' You do not what? Have to live with his decision? Do you plan to die, kill yourself or him? I don't understand that sentence at all. You want him to make the right decision. The right decision is the one he makes of his own free will.
'I also made it clear that it's a two-way street. That I, too, have boundaries and will not tolerate any disrespect.. '
Except oops, you are the one in his face, or as you call it, keeping the lines open. He wants nothing more to do with you.

Mink, tarantula, 20 year old girl, total mess, and art. Sounds like he is having the time of his life. If he changes his mind, then maybe he'll be a better lawyer or teacher or whatever he decides to be.

Well, if he's having the time of his life and you all think this is my doing, then why did I just get a call to fly to Michigan because he put a gun in his mouth and is in the hospital, unhurt, but under medical supervision? This was urgent, not normal and something was wrong with my son. Sometimes, a parent knows when their child is screaming for help, instinctually.

I have NEVER interfered until this latest abrupt turnaround. Perhaps it would be wise to not judge until you have been there and I don't hear any parental tones here.

Wish him luck and peace through this, please. Got to run.

OK, sorry. Yes, best wishes to all.

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Originally Posted by Windanc

Well, if he's having the time of his life and you all think this is my doing, then why did I just get a call to fly to Michigan because he put a gun in his mouth and is in the hospital, unhurt, but under medical supervision? This was urgent, not normal and something was wrong with my son. Sometimes, a parent knows when their child is screaming for help, instinctually.

I have NEVER interfered until this latest abrupt turnaround. Perhaps it would be wise to not judge until you have been there and I don't hear any parental tones here.

Wish him luck and peace through this, please. Gotta run.

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He may have been introduced to some drugs by messy girlfriend. Who knows? Where did he get the gun from in the first place to do this?

He's obviously mentally unbalanced now. Possibly he may have a bipolar condition that is now just surfacing as acting erratically like you say is one of the symptoms. This is severe stress he's under now and the bipolar condition rears itself up in men at around age 30 so he fits that criteria. And if he has just discovered drugs his mind and emotions can't take it due to the stress.

Have you checked out girlfriend and ran her name in the local county criminal docket to see if she was arrested in Michigan lately? This may be an eye opener for you, maybe not. Just because some one is into drugs and not arrested means nothing. She could have been lucky and not get arrested yet. Or she could have had her record sealed when she reached 18. I'd recommend checking her out.

He may have tried LSD or bath salts (the latest craze similar to LSD), meth, heroin, or ecstacy or something that has altered his thinking and emotional balance. What did the hospital attribute his actions to that would make him suicidal?

Sorry I called you overcontrolling. You didn't include some pertinent facts in your initial post. I guess I jumped to conclusions not having more of a complete picture available.

I can see where Twink and Joy are coming from. There are certainly enough clues in your posts to justify the opinions they have. But I can't say its cut and dried.

This suicide attempt, indicates a serious deterioration of his condition. Its clear he is mentally unbalanced and it has been controlled until now. Hopefully being hospitalized will mean he's under a doctor's care and can get himself stabilized and back to normal.

I've tried everything, but can't get a flight out until early in the morning. He's resting, so there's really nothing I can do until I get there. The doctors in that part of the world are doing their best to diagnose his condition, but it's a remote area with limited specialists.

Something's gone haywire, that's for sure, though. He got the gun from his father. My husband was his step-father, who died, and a fine man who fell to melanoma. His bio dad wasn't the greatest and probably one of my biggest mistakes in life but we have been divorced for decades; it was only recently that he showed up. This whole thing has made me take a good hard look at all that my son has had to deal with and how strong he has tried to be for a long time. Who knows what private hell he's been living with while being so strong on the outside. I just cry for him.

That's a really good idea to run a check of the girlfriend. All I've come up with, so far, is just local gossip that she's a bit of a loner and dropped out of school, ran away from home, and is sort of a fringer in the community. She seemed like a nice, but young, lady when I met her, but she physically clung to him during our dinner and I found it a bit unsettling that she drew strange pictures with a magic marker on my bathroom walls during her visit. I mentioned this to my son and he was in no mood at the time to listen and was far too defensive. That's when the trouble really started. Then it was the announcement of his quitting his job and it just spiraled downward after that. I HAD to get back to work here in CA, but when I left, he promised me he'd talk to a counselor and his doc had his meds starting back to work. He claims that the girlfriend convinced him he could get better 'naturally' and provided him with her own herbal 'vitamins' that nobody can find now. I mentioned that to the psychiatrist at the hospital tonight and they're checking. Interestingly, the girlfriend has disappeared.

Believe me, I only want what's best for him and, yes, he obviously has mental issues that need to be addressed NOW. That poor young man. I haven't been back to visit him in a year or so and thought things were going well until this happened. My oldest son has also suggested the drug situation that you mentioned and sent a friend of his to our townhouse on the lake (my oldest lives here in California). Sure enough, when they emptied the garbage they found drug paraphernalia in the bottom of the trash. My son has never taken drugs before. The police are checking that out to see what is there. So far, it appears to be hashish pipes, but God, I don't know.

In the end, I'll go on up tomorrow and do my best to help him however I can. Maybe, in a strange way, all of this was for the best and he can get the help he needs. I'm so sorry that he felt he couldn't come to me with this until it became so out of control. To me, it happened all too fast, but obviously this is a festering and long-term problem that he's been harboring for some time. It's heart breaking and very confusing but he is everything to me and our family and there is a lot of love and support waiting for him when he's ready to accept it.

Thank you for any insights. I appreciate them very much. Now, if I could only sleep! Again, thank you.

I've been following this thread. I wish you the best, and your son too. Please let us know what happens.

He didn't pull the trigger. There are a lot of trite sayings about having to hit bottom, but they have some truth to them. He may have needed this. He may need to connect with his bio father, for starters. He may need to think about math vs law. So very different, and I can see a mathematician not getting along in a court room or room full of law books. In the end it doesn't matter how solid a career one has if one is miserable. I once worked for a computer game company and when we advertised for lowly game testers, many of the applicants were lawyers, pleading for the chance to make 150K less money. Doctors, lawyers, merchants, chiefs, we hear about them changing professions all the time and finding their niche as farmers or chefs or artists or owning an ice cream stand.

I also wouldn't put too much emphasis on diagnosis. That's for insurance and is not really helpful otherwise.

I wouldn't have called the police (? ) to examine wastebaskets in my own home, but that's me, and it's done.


He's alive, the young woman has split, and he can examine his life for a while, and maybe be the better for it. He sounds wonderful. Here's a big empathy card from me.

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Originally Posted by Windanc

In the end, I'll go on up tomorrow and do my best to help him however I can.

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The best help you can give him is to see that he gets professional care. There is very little you, personally, can do other than let him know you still love him.

If what your oldest son's friend found was a glass pipe and chore boy inside the tube - what he was smoking was CRACK or METH - not hash. Hash is a thing of the past. Not everyone smokes hash and gets nuts like your son did. Crack or meth will make you a raging maniac in no time at all. This makes more sense to me now about how your son was acting and the suicide attempt when he obviously "came down". Crack or meth is more readily available than you would think and is readily available to most young people if they know where to look. Crack or meth will make a person flip out and get violent in no time at all due to the chemicals it is made with. It is totally an acid based drug which can wreck havoc with a normal person's brain if they are not used to this. It's made from all sorts of chemicals from acetone to paint thinner. Mostly from stuff a normal person would not want to ingest. And if he's a first time doing any kind of drugs this is what has flipped him out as it is too intense for a "starter drug". Did you notice if the girlfriend had rotted teeth? This is a tell tale sign of crack or meth use. My son was educated about these drugs by a Sheriff's Deputy. Also, did you notice any circular blisters on the gf's fingers? This is a telltale sign of holding a very hot glass pipe.

You may want to discuss the crack or meth aspect with your son's doctors. They may be able to test him for this drug before he is released. Crack or meth does not go away in a big hurry it will still be in your system for a long time.

Crack and meth makes a person violent and highly aggressive which seems make the person care nothing about anyone other than the next fix of crack. They will sell their own grandmother for the next fix of crack or meth. Highly addictive even after doing this 4 or 5 times due to the chasing of the high. This would fit your son's MO to a T saying nasty things to you and being very easily aggitated. And the suicide attempt would be when he crashed after being high. Apparently the girlfriend turned him onto drugs and he went overboard. That's why she has conviently disappeared in fear of being turned in.

Would suggest that you contact the Sheriff or PD when you get to Michigan and talk it over with them as well. Ask first who in the department would deal with this matter and deal with them exclusively to help you son and yourself as well and build a relationship with the department. Your son's girlfriend may be a user or a dealer. Have your eldest son's friend call out the department for them to test this. Don't have him bring it in as he could be charged with possession of drug paraphaneralia. He needs to explain the situation and they will send someone out to retrieve it. Don't ever take stuff lkek this to the police department but call them and have them come to investigate and retrieve the object. This way your eldest son's friend won't be charged with possession.

You are not the problem, the GF is the problem. The "drug art" in your bathroom is typical of someone who is high. She may be doing meth and likes to draw when high.

Meth and crack will both make a normal person nutty after just a few uses. Practically in the same category as both are made with similar chemicals.

If your son was already on "meds" as you put it, then he was an easy target and easy to lead by this girlfriend. The meds will only percipitate the illegal drug's effects on the brain.

Oh... joypulv and many others who offered their insights, I understand everything you said from where you were coming from. It's understandable because it's a big, big confusing mess and I take full responsibility for not explaining things in my first message properly. My only defense is that I was in reactive mode and as confused as a parent can be.

How I wish, after the last week (hasn't it been a year?) that I could speak to you and seek your guidance with more knowledge but I still have little to go on. Here are the Facts, however, as I know them. And, I am back in California because it was, to me, the only sane thing to do. Plus, I have a job to save that pays for the insurance needed for my, yeah, newly acquired melanoma. I got that lovely news while out of town. I went in for surgery to remove the 'spot' yesterday. Yep, hurts like an S.O.B. but the latest path tests say I got it in time. Yay.

Bottom line: The medical profession is a slow machine and at times imperfect. Yes, my son had drugs in his system. Not meth, nor none that they could confirm. They also saw no trace of usage, although I took your guidance and requested info on that. The drugs my son had in his system was a cocktail of antidepressants from three different psychiatrists. They were, Prozac, Effexor and Elavil. He also had anti-anxiety meds including Xanax, Valium and Klonopin. To date, my son has requested that I have no contact with him. The only moment we had was a hug. The girlfriend's home was raided and there were, indeed, the drugs you guys mentioned. Meth and other things that I know nothing about, but there is a warrant out for her arrest. My son is, however, still emotionally attached and his family, including mainly me, are rejected.

The psychiatrists recommended that we leave him alone for now and allow him to get off the major mixup of drugs and find a combative and simpler medication and then begin talking to him. He has agreed to that.

Needless to say, it will be near to impossible to retain his status as a lawyer for many years to come and his job at the University, oddly, will wait for him because he is a brilliant mathematician, so if he's OK, by mid year he can come back and restart his Ph
D program.

Needless to say, it has been an exhaustive search to find out what is the source of the problem, but I have offered full cooperation and honesty to the team who are working with him. There is no issue with the police where he is concerned. Small towns pay off sometimes.


Today I received my first email from him and it was here and there but he did say that he was working towards a reason why he dislikes me so much when I am, in his mind, at no fault and he has no answer for his blatant disrespect. I can't believe that's true. I must have done something! The psychiatrist is cryptic and merely says that this is not uncommon in a young man finding his wings and for me to live my life, send love and acceptance and move on, for now, until he approaches me. I will do that.

It's all really confusing to me right now, but I want to thank all of you for all of your insights. Believe me, I read them, good and bad, during the many hours of wait-room sitting.

Thank you. No pity party here, but golly, nobody told me a biopsy would ooze this much and be this painful on the leg. OUCH! Y'know"? Life is just a b#tch sometimes.