The Friend Who Wouldn't Take Her Medication

I knew this friend for forty years. We basically grew up together. It was close to a sibling relationship, the kind where you fight and then get over it. We loved the same music and shared a dark sense of humor about almost everything. Out of the two of us, I was always the nicer one.

She has schizophrenia. When she’s off her medication, the mood swings get bigger than the normal ups and downs everyone deals with, and honestly, they make her mean. She’s also been through domestic violence, and I think that plays into it too. Her thoughts get disorganized, and she’ll say things that are flat out impossible, things that couldn’t have happened the way she describes them. I think she used to take her medication regularly, though I honestly don’t know for sure. What I do know is the mania got worse over time.

I dealt with the erratic behavior by avoiding disagreement, even on things I felt strongly about the opposite way. I didn’t want to set her off any further. Being right about something stopped feeling like it mattered. But some of what she said started to genuinely offend me, and that’s really where the end began.

It built up slowly. Certain conversations started to really bother me, and even knowing what she was going through, words still matter. Some of what she said hurt because it was true. Some of it hurt because it was completely false. And some of it felt aimed at me on purpose. I still feel guilty about putting up boundaries. If I had an illness I couldn’t control, I’d want someone to stick around and help me too.

The hard part is knowing there’s medication that could help, and she doesn’t take it. It could be any number of reasons. The side effects can be brutal. She might just forget. She might not believe it actually helps her. Whatever the reason, I’m the one left deciding whether to keep loving her through what feels like abuse, or protect myself, all while knowing she needs help she may not even recognize she needs.

The grief is remembering how incredible she is when she’s in a good headspace. You look at old pictures of the two of you and remember exactly who she was, and eventually you start avoiding those pictures altogether. You wish she’d just get her head straight and get back on track. Then you feel guilty for even thinking that, because who am I to decide what track is right for her.

Right now it feels like watching a train wreck. My only real choice is whether I buy a ticket and stay to watch, or look away.

Nobody talks about this honestly because nobody actually has the tools to handle it. Ask thirty doctors and you might get something close to a consensus, but none of them can promise a fix. Nobody fully understands the brain, or the specific chemistry each person is dealing with. We’re all just fighting our own small battles and hoping it gets better.

I haven’t gotten through this one. It’s still happening. I go back and forth between blaming myself and blaming her. Trying to think my way out of it with logic didn’t help. Being rational and scientific can smooth over a lot of rough feelings, but not this one. What’s actually changed is I understand the whole thing better now, like hearing a song so many times you finally catch what it was really saying. More wisdom, more understanding, and it still hasn’t made me feel much better about it. I wish I had a magic wand.