Why Now Lord?

Introduction This is a story about a family of devoted parents and their four children, one of whom was hyperactive as a child and diagnosed with manic depression (bipolar condition) and obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) as an adult. His life spanned thirty-seven years, seven and a half months, and ended unexpectedly on August 28, 2008. The family’s experiences with a hyperactive son and brother, who, later as an adult, developed mental illnesses, were certainly different from what we experienced with our other children. At the same time, this family’s experiences were unique because its son and brother was, in many ways, a unique individual. He had two automobile accidents as a driver before he started the first grade. He had fourteen jobs in fourteen years but was never unemployed for more than a few days until he was diagnosed as being mentally handicapped following his last job; after which, he was never again employed full-time. He gave two cars away because he felt his friends needed them more than he did. He was a terrific craftsman. As a high school student, he designed and built a driveway fold-up basketball backboard for one of his teachers before anyone could buy it in stores. He built a cedar chest for another teacher, the quality of which was on par with what you could buy at a store that specialized in fine hand-crafted furniture. He built an obvious crooked set of steps to attach to an obvious crooked porch on his sister’s home so both looked perfectly straight. It is my hope that as you read this book, you will be able to feel the emotional highs and lows his mother and I and his siblings felt, never knowing what the next day or, sometimes the next hour would bring. I also hope that by reading this book, the reader’s awareness and sensitivity to the whole issue of mental illness will be raised to a new height, so there will be more support for research funds for mental illness, and people’s compassion for the mentally ill will be increased. The book is divided into three parts. Part 1 describes the family from the time before there was a family to when their second son arrived twelve days after he was born followed by the birth of two sisters one year and five years later. Part 2 describes the family’s joys and heartaches through the thirty-seven years he was with us while part 3 describes his father’s emotional life following his son’s passing. This book is intended for general reading by anyone who likes to read about the true experiences of a family as it journeyed through life as a unit. Hopefully, it will appeal to the religious and mental health communities because of how the mental illness of one family member played a major role in the struggles and joys of the entire family, and how God’s role is evident throughout the nearly fifty-year time frame covered by this book. The family hopes you will be able to experience the emotional highs and lows of this true story.