Jeremy's Battle: Mental Health Support Needed

May is mental health awareness month, so here we are...making you aware.

We are as vanilla as it gets...middle class Nebraska family. I'm a special education teacher and my husband runs our family landscaping and greenhouse services business we've owned for the last 19 years. We have two teenage boys...the oldest will graduate high school next week and then move to California for a three-year bonsai apprenticeship (yes, he's a pretty cool kid). Our youngest is a freshman and a rockstar golfer on the varsity team. Proud parents here.

But my husband tries to kill himself...a lot.

Diagnosed with severe depression in 2009, we spent years living in the dark...telling nobody our truth. We finally began sharing our reality in 2015 after Jeremy had survived at least four attempts, the worst was near-fatal in 2012...a car accident in which he drove straight into a semi on the highway. He was left with a leg broken in four places, punctured lung, fractured pancreas, complete colon reconstruction, brain bleed, and...still depression. When he awoke, I was in awe and relieved. He was destroyed his attempt hadn't worked.

But my husband fights for his mental health harder than anyone I know. He knows his brain lies to him...that we are NOT better off without him here. He actually went seven years without experiencing dark thoughts. But that all changed in July of 2024. So here's the short story...

Jeremy has been mostly unable to work since August...only off and on. This means our family business is struggling, because if you know what it's like to be a small business owner, you know the hours are long and the stress is enormous. Jeremy and I both cashed out our retirement accounts in December and January in order to pay bills and debt. We haven't paid Jeremy since August...we are living on my teacher salary alone.

In March, just a couple months ago, I woke to Jeremy shaking me awake saying, "Something is wrong." He was standing over my bed with a knife ready to end his life. I was able to talk him down and into accepting help. He went to our safe place, Richard Young Hospital in Kearney, Nebraska, for inpatient mental health treatment for the fourth time in our marriage and stayed for four nights and five days. They tried to level out meds and keep him safe.

It was then we all decided Jeremy may benefit from Electroconvulsive Therapy Treatments (ECT) for his mental health, since he had been denied Ketamine infusions twice. It was to perform a "factory reset" on my hottie hubby.

It didn't work.

Jeremy became a shell of himself. We stopped treatments on Monday, April 28th, because symptoms were becoming progressively worse. Jeremy cannot get out of bed unless forced. He does not eat or drink unless I make him. He cannot take his meds or remember how to function as the very busy and loving adult he truly is.

Today, I brought Jeremy to the ER. He has been diagnosed with severe dehydration and nutrition deficiency..."Mental Health Crisis - Failure to Thrive."

Our safe place, Richard Young Hospital, doesn't have enough beds to take a Failure to Thrive case, as they must keep room for immediately suicidal individuals. It's not their fault...this is mental healthcare in our world. It's all put back on the caregivers...those of us who love the individuals struggling with mental illness and trying desperately to help.

Enter our local Cozad Hospital. They admitted my husband and are hydrating and feeding him with watchful eyes...and I know they're doing it because they know I don't know what else to do. He will die if he continues like this, and Jeremy's doctors are doing their best with this love of my life who is both med resistant and med sensitive. By not eating or drinking, Jeremy is slowly completing suicide.

So here I am...asking for help. I have taken out every penny we have to pay bills. My retirement is gone. Jeremy's retirement is gone. I have begun the process of looking into selling our family business because the stress is too much on my husband, and nothing is worth losing him.

So we will give it all up. Jesus, take the wheel.

I have no pride left. Mental illness is taking my husband from me, and I'm begging you to open your eyes and see the reality that is this society's mental health crisis.

And they just cut funding from mental health programs in schools; we will see more of this when kids like my husband, who grew up being told they must be perfect and always put on a happy face...buck up buttercup and don't show weakness, are not taught how to express emotions and accept help.

If we can raise funds, I can keep our small business going...or pay the loans...or sell. I don't know. What I do know is I need help, and my husband's brain won't let him help me. So I'm on my own, and I have no problem asking you.

Then, we can continue to share our story far and wide. Welcome to May...Mental Health Awareness Month. This is our reality.

Please share and help us raise funds.