Help Ethan - 19-Year-Old Homeless Schizophrenic

Living with Teenage Schizophrenia

I am writing on behalf of a 19-year-old male suffering from schizophrenia. His name is Ethan Cole Woodard and he was born and raised in the Johnson City, TN area. Currently Ethan is fully functional approximately 50% of the time and the other 50% he is in and out of varying states of psychosis. Since I met Ethan several weeks ago, numerous attempts were made to obtain the assistance he needs, including a telephone evaluation with an inpatient mental health facility, a visit to the emergency room, and an encounter with the one of the local police departments when they delivered Ethan back to me after finding him wandering around the neighborhood in his underwear and a blanket.

 

How I met Ethan

I met Ethan and several members of his family briefly at the end of November at a long-term hotel in Johnson City, TN. Although I didn’t interact with Ethan directly, I recall him talking about playing football in high-school and he seemed liked a very pleasant young man. I didn’t notice anything peculiar about his demeanor during that brief meeting. However, about a week later I found him sitting on the sidewalk, distraught and sobbing outside of the hotel.

 

Why Ethan was Homeless

Earlier that day, Ethan’s mother had brought him to a local emergency mental health center to be evaluated. Although I don’t know the complete details, Ethan ended up walking home several miles back to the hotel and could not locate his mother. Since he had no place to go that evening, I let Ethan stay in my room at the hotel. The next day we encountered his mother and she told him he would not be allowed to stay with her anymore and that he needed to seek mental help immediately. I noticed Ethan was displaying some odd behavior but he did not appear to need immediate medical assistance.

 

Ethan is not self-sufficient and is homeless

I allowed Ethan to stay another day at my hotel room given his mother would not allow him to return with her. The following day, I brought him to Kingsport to his father’s house with belongings. I waited outside the house to make sure that someone was home to let him in. His father did answer the door and only moments later Ethan was returning to my car stating that his father said he was no longer welcome at his home and needed to find another place to stay. I brought Ethan back to the hotel and later notified the General Manager of the hotel in writing that I had a teenage guest staying with me that might be displaying erratic behaviors and to contact me should they have any problems with Ethan’s behavior.

 

Applying for social services and mental health assistance

Over the next several days, I applied for EBT and Medicaid assistance for Ethan, as well as starting the process of seeing if was eligible for disability benefits as it was apparent by then that he would not be able to obtain employment due to his erratic and social unacceptable behavior that I was able to observe first-hand. I also brought him to the homeless shelter in Johnson City where they put him on a waiting list. Despite our follow-up with the shelter, they have not had room for Ethan yet. At this point, I am thankful that Ethan did not end up staying there because I don’t think he would have received the appropriate care and would have eventually been forced to leave because of his mental illness.

 

Bouncing from place to place

During the following days, I was receiving increasing pressure from management and staff at the long-term hotel I was staying at to remove Ethan from my room as his erratic behavior was not acceptable. I was told he needed to find an alternative place to stay as soon as possible or I would no longer be welcomed as a guest. Since the holidays were coming up, I was considering going to a nearby city that I hadn’t visited yet for a change of scenery. I had made a promise to Ethan that I would not leave him until we found a good place for him to stay, so I took him to the Knoxville area with me. I had arranged for another stay at a long-term hotel where we could pay a discount rate for the week that had a similar set up with a kitchen and other features.

 

However, we were only there for a few days and this hotel notified me on Christmas Eve that they also found Ethan’s behavior unacceptable and we were told we had to leave immediately. I talked to the hotel manager and convinced her to let us stay until Christmas morning the following day, which she consented to.

 

The steps we took to try to get help

Earlier in the week, I had already contacted a local inpatient mental health facility that I had been referred to by the Mental Health Association of Eastern Tennessee. The facility would monitor Ethan’s behavior and attempt to stabilize Ethan during a three day stay. I talked to a case manager and then she requested at telephone interview with Ethan. Ethan is highly intelligent and is very verbally eloquent, so he had no problem having a conversation with the case manager. However, despite his willingness to enter the program, the case manager determined he did not demonstrate severe mental illness according to their criteria and therefore was not eligible for the program. I discussed my concern about their rejection of him and they said to let the local department to deal with him, which I told them was the exactly what I was trying to avoid.

 

On Christmas Eve, after I was told we were to vacate the hotel the following morning, I took Ethan to the emergency room to have him evaluated in hopes that they could assist in some way – by stabilizing him with medication or any other strategy that would allow him to function better. I confirmed as I had with others that I did not think that Ethan was a danger to other people but I did think he was endangering himself. For example, I had to convince Ethan to put on shoes and a shirt or jacket when he went outside to have a cigarette, otherwise he would go outside barefoot and bare-chested despite the weather.

 

Local law enforcement finds Ethan barely clothed

Currently, Ethan and I are at another hotel. However, I am very wary of paying a discounted weekly rate when we could potentially be asked to leave prior to the end of our stay. Last evening, Ethan was experiencing psychosis and left the hotel room abruptly during the evening wrapped up in a blanket with only his underwear on. I immediately went after him and found him sitting outside the hotel lobby wrapped up in his blanket and tried to convince him to return to the hotel room. He refused, so I went back to the hotel room where I could monitor him from the window. He did walk around the hotel property several times where I could see him but managed to leave the property despite me watching him. I tried to find Ethan but could not locate him. I left the door ajar for him, as I promised I would do earlier when he refused to come back to the room.

 

A short time later, after I had fallen asleep waiting for him to return, he appeared back to the hotel room door with several police officers. I explained Ethan’s story to them and that I had just brought him to the hospital the day before for mental health assistance. I told them how the hospital said that they could not be of assistance as he was an adult and appeared to be in sound mind. The officers were not particularly helpful, and asked me several intrusive questions and comments that made me feel as though I was to blame for Ethan’s behavior, and in the end the three of them stated they couldn’t do anything for him and were just here to return him to me.

 

Ethan's Future

While I have been able to support Ethan and myself with very little difficulties during the first couple weeks, the latter part of this month has been extremely challenging and bodes for a future of financial hardship at this point. Assisting Ethan has had a severe impact on my productivity and quality of work as a freelancer and therefore my ability to generate the income I usually do. I am well equipped to pay for my own living expenses but caring for Ethan has progressively had a severe impact on my finances which are now necessary to support both of us. I am currently researching potential assisted living facilities for Ethan but at the same time, I have grown to care for Ethan very much and would like him to continue to be part of my life, especially given the lack of understanding and resources available to teenagers suffering from mental illness. I would consider having Ethan continue to stay with me if he eventually gets appropriate medical treatment. Ethan has also expressed that he wishes to continue to stay with me as well.

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