Category: Family

After the second part of the discharge conference on Friday, I expected that n. would spend most of his time at the apartment on Balmoral Street, until that arrangement collapsed. When he had been in hospital, n. told me a story about Keith, the actual tenant, slicing a phone cord to make a point to…

The discharge conference was continued on Friday morning August 27. N. was being discharged – he could not stay at the hospital even if he wanted to, and was not going have a continuing relationship with this doctor. Medical psychiatry is focussed on sedating and housing people who act out and fit within a few…

N. came to my house Wednesday evening August 25. We had dinner and watched some episodes of Clerks on DVD. He went into his room and got some clothes. He took some accessories from his old Gameboy to use with a Colour Gameboy that he picked up somewhere. He took some Ramen noodles and Lipton…

During the first session of the dischage conference on Tuesday (August 24) the resident reported that n. did not present the symptoms of bipolar disorder, with the qualification that n. had not been willing to discuss his thoughts with the team. The senior psychiatrist, Dr. Perlov, did not disagree but suggested that there may be…

N. was discharged from hospital yesterday morning, and was put into an “emergency placement” by CFS, in his case a largely unsupervised placement in a motel on Portage Avenue West near the Grace Hospital. By the time I got the message and called the motel, n. had left to see his girlfriend. I checked again…

n. has been staying at PY1 – the Adolescent Psychiatry inpatient unit at the Winnipeg Health Sciences Center – since Friday August 13. He has been a voluntary inpatient for assessment. This represents a little progress. In February 2004 he had been admitted for a few days and started an assessment but he ran away.…

I’m posted the first version of this post on Wednesday August 4 from an Internet Cafe in Canmore, Alberta, where I was camping on holidays. I came for the Canmore Folk Festival and arrived in time to see most of the Festival in spite of car trouble. I finished this post from my friend Randy’s…

N. has been resident in a group home a few blocks from my house, as I posted on June 9. I attended a meeting with n., his CFS social worker, his group home key worker, and my estranged wife Jan on June 10. N. was argumentative, and I got the distinct impression that he was…

N.has been back in Winnipeg for nearly a month. He held out in Edmonton until May 18 or 19 and visited a shelter. His name was on a watch list and an Edmonton Child Care worker gave him a one way bus ticket to Winnipeg. He came back Thursday evening May 20 and spent the…

My friend Stephen Katz offered my some support and advice in a private email message in the form of a quote from the Sunscreen song. I may have heard of it, but I didn’t think I had ever actually heard the song or read the lyrics. The story of the Sunscreen column, the Sunscreen speech…