Niles told me to tell you about what's going on, and to ask for help to fix this crap. So basically here's my story:
I am an adult, 21 years old, but I am not treated like one at all. I have a strict, ruling father, whom I honestly think is a little off but I feel compelled to listen to his every command. About my home life: I live alone, well it doesn't feel that way. You see, dad lives just next door. I do have a sister but she ran to live with someone else when she was very young, and leads a much different and more independent life than I do. My biggest fear is that dad will die and then I will not have a clue what to do. Can't drive, have never worked, live off gov't checks and will go into more detail about that later. For now I am searching desperately for someone to live with or marry who will help take care of me, as horrible as that may seem. Dad does EVERYTHING for me; he pays my bills and buys my groceries (with my gov't money), he even goes so far as to fix my hair when I leave to go to college daily. The reason I get gov't money by the way is because after I was forced to go into a behavorial health center, I was told I have schizophrenia because I tend to have vivid nightmares. To be honest, I read up on schizophrenia online and according to what I read, true schizophrenics actually have constant auditory and visual hallucinations. I am on many types of medications, which I will go into detail about in a bit, and I think I have been experimented on with different types of medications, because I can recall, including an incident that happened a few weeks back, 3 times that I have actually hallucinated during my lifetime; that would be once during a high fever when I was young which may or may not have involved medications, a second time when I took one too many of some sort of psychiatric pill when the instructions were 'mixed up' and I hallucinated for about 24 hours, and finally the incident the other week when I messed up with some cold medicine that I was not suppose to take with my prescribed meds, and that caused a reaction that lasted for several hours. Now a bit about my medication: I am on the following prescribed medicines aside from some amoxicillan that I have to take just now for a bit of a flu I have; Abilify (the main one for my 'schizophrenia'), Lexapro (for depression/anxiety, which I do have a bit of anxiety; to be honest I'm afraid of people in real life and my stomach even upsets when I find myself in a big crowd; it's only because I'm not really allowed to go places and do things like other people because of dad's strict rules), Aciphex for my acid reflux (which is the only one I believe is REALLY necessary because I cannot go a day without getting heartburn no matter what I eat if I'm off of this), Pills for Vitamin D3, Injections for Vitamin B12 once monthly, Synthroid (for my thyroid apparantly), and Lipitor (well I may need this because according to a blood test my cholestorol was too high; another thing is I'm slightly overweight), and finally there may be some more that I am taking currently, this was most of them though, and also I have been on various types of meds over the years all of which I cannot recall. I would also like to mention I had a procedure done recently, a tubal ligation, and the gynocologist agreed with my dad immediately when he told her I'm a schizophrenic and I should have the surgery. I had the tubes cut and burned so it should not be reversable. A minor detail is that I am on Medicaid because of my 'medical conditions' which covered the surgery as well as covers everything else such as the frequent doctor visits. It seems that something new comes up all the time and I'm forced to be on another med or something. My doctor, whom I honestly believe does not know her ass from a hole in the ground because she often prescribes non-FDA-approved herbal meds just as easily as she writes out the real meds, has been my medical doctor ever since I was about 11 or 12 years old. Soon I'm getting a different doctor, however. Once I asked my doctor, Dr. Phillips (who is not really a doctor but a practitioner actually), why am I on so many medications? And she answered, don't worry, its normal. Aside from her, I also have a psychiatrist, Dr. Wilson, who is on the 'ACT Team', who come out to my house often, probably once or twice a week, to ask questions, but they have to have my father present usually, or that's what they 'prefer'. The 'ACT Team' consists of many different people, whom I don't believe are real doctors or nurses, who do home visits as aforementioned. Of course, all of them think I have shizophrenia. Now I would like to tell everything I can think of about the past that led up to all this: I used to be picked on in school a lot. Typical outcast, I got in several fights over people just plain being rude to me. This began in junior high, and because I was such a 'rebel', they thought I had a problem, so I started going out to this place close to where I live, a mental health center I guess, where I saw a psychiatrist, whom prescribed me my first psychiatric meds, and would talk to me and ask me questions and play games with me. When I got too old to visit this building, I went to another building on the other side of town for adults, and I would see some psychiatrist I remember not so well, because this only occurred for a short time before the ACT Team started doing their home visits. I remember clearly getting in fights with dad a lot, because for a time I didn't listen to him well, and any little thing that I said set him off. In one particular fight, dad pulled out a gun on me and threatened to shoot me if I didn't listen. And so, the next day he took me to the building where I visited the psychiatrist, saying it was just for a visit, then began telling some lady working there that was in charge I think, all about how I had threatened him with a weapon, which was such a lie, and said that they should hold me somewhere to 'evaluate' me for awhile, and he was very persistant until she said that she would do it, where at first she was saying it was not necessary. Then an officer came in and handcuffed me, and I was told to sit in a small room until I was to be picked up. I sat there from morning to night, a little water I think but no food, and then I was escorted in a police car off to Dorthea Dix mental hospital in Raleigh, about two hours away from where I lived. I stayed there for a week and begged to leave, however, they wouldn't allow me to until it was OK'd by my father. All during this time, I was put on a diet because I am slightly overweight as I mentioned, and about once a day I was visited by the doctor who worked there. I think that sort of broke me from arguing with dad, because ever since, I have simply obeyed him. I hope that was enough information, now I have a few questions for you all.
How do I find out about my rights and legal status?
How do I get a second opinion and fight my diagnosis?
How do I move out, or get therapy from my condition if I have one?
HOW DO I GET AWAY FROM MY DAD AND BECOME THE ADULT I'M SUPPOSE TO BE?
