I don't really need emotional support, more advice.
Basically there is a woman living next door to me who I believe has Schizophrenia. She constantly bangs against the walls & screams her head off at night. It's very hard for me to get any sleep, and it's quite frustrating. About 5 minutes ago I just saw her outside her flat slamming the bin lids up and down.
She has knocked on my door to complain that we are making noise, at around 2am, she calls the police nearly every night (not sure why?), and she is generally quite a scary person to meet.
I don't really know what to do about it. My mum has called social services but they said they can't do anything due to confidentiality reasons.
I'm slightly worried in case she may be a danger to myself or my family. Does anybody have any good advice they can give me? I really don't know what to do.. It's getting ridiculous. I can barely get any sleep, and it's becoming quite stressful for my mum.
hi fragma,
call the police,the social services will [to put it mildyl] do frig all as they have heavy caseloads and not enough social workers and specialists.
the police,assuming are referring to the UK are well trained in all forms of disability and they will be able to have a hopefully non judgemental conversation with this woman, if she isnt taking meds for example; they can start off the process for getting a court order to take them and if she didnt follow that she woud become an inpatient,they can get her assessed if am not mistaken.
they are the only first line of defence any neighbour can go to really.
with the bin lid thing and screaming,its possible she is responding to halucinations-which are a part of schizophrenia,or she might be paranoid to and think she is being monitored by...whoever.
maybe she thinks bangning the bin lid scares away whatever is being halucinated? who knows.
schizophrenics arent all dangerous-they just have pyschosis which makes them act or think like theyre from a different planet and make people feel theyre unpredictible as they dont know them.
the majority of schizophrenics woud attack themselves quicker than other people,the form that tends to have the most violent tendencies is paranoid but when people get to the accute stage they usually end up being sectioned for the saftey of others and themselves.
schizophrenia seems to appear very differently in every person [like autism],have personally lived with one schizophrenic in a UK LD institution in the past- he also had mild learning disability and with all due respect he was a twat,was sexually assaulted by him though did not understand what he was doing back then-he did the same to any other younger female if staff let him get away with it.
he woud make death threats and woud stare all the time;forcing eye contact.
-he was a nasty bully,waiting till staff werent watching before attacking people.
-have also known many schizophrenics through one of sisters old jobs,
she used to work with almost all schizophrenics in a community group home for severe mental illness,and when used to go to the group home with mum/dad to meet her from work,had gotten to know a few-
they were cool-friendly and no different to anyone else apart from their experience of the world,ie; one guy woud greet us and say if he had spoken to the devil that day; he said it was a good day when he hadnt.
-sorry for the waffle,as per usual.
I'm guessing you live in an apartment building?
If so, complain to your land-lord. They may be able to help.
You are really in an odd situation. What I would do is try to avoid all contact with the person. I would also keep your house locked... Not knowing anything about this woman I do not want to assume, but she obviously has problems and I believe just staying away from her would be the best thing to do. I do not know much about this disease except that I was a movie on it in sociology where the "Main Character" (who's name slips my mind at the moment" was a harvard student who thinks he is some sort of genius and he also thinks that he is working for the government, but they are really just delusions in his mind. I would just do my best to stay away because people like that are unpredictable and I really don't know what she is doing or is capable of doing. I wish you the best of luck with your problem and hope that this post helped you in some way.
(07-06-2011, 03:33 PM)Techie© Wrote: [ -> ]hi fragma,
call the police,the social services will [to put it mildyl] do frig all as they have heavy caseloads and not enough social workers and specialists.
the police,assuming are referring to the UK are well trained in all forms of disability and they will be able to have a hopefully non judgemental conversation with this woman, if she isnt taking meds for example; they can start off the process for getting a court order to take them and if she didnt follow that she woud become an inpatient,they can get her assessed if am not mistaken.
they are the only first line of defence any neighbour can go to really.
with the bin lid thing and screaming,its possible she is responding to halucinations-which are a part of schizophrenia,or she might be paranoid to and think she is being monitored by...whoever.
maybe she thinks bangning the bin lid scares away whatever is being halucinated? who knows.
schizophrenics arent all dangerous-they just have pyschosis which makes them act or think like theyre from a different planet and make people feel theyre unpredictible as they dont know them.
the majority of schizophrenics woud attack themselves quicker than other people,the form that tends to have the most violent tendencies is paranoid but when people get to the accute stage they usually end up being sectioned for the saftey of others and themselves.
schizophrenia seems to appear very differently in every person [like autism],have personally lived with one schizophrenic in a UK LD institution in the past- he also had mild learning disability and with all due respect he was a twat,was sexually assaulted by him though did not understand what he was doing back then-he did the same to any other younger female if staff let him get away with it.
he woud make death threats and woud stare all the time;forcing eye contact.
-he was a nasty bully,waiting till staff werent watching before attacking people.
-have also known many schizophrenics through one of sisters old jobs,
she used to work with almost all schizophrenics in a community group home for severe mental illness,and when used to go to the group home with mum/dad to meet her from work,had gotten to know a few-
they were cool-friendly and no different to anyone else apart from their experience of the world,ie; one guy woud greet us and say if he had spoken to the devil that day; he said it was a good day when he hadnt.
-sorry for the waffle,as per usual.
Thanks that's helped me understand schizophrenia a lot more. The thing with calling the police is though, she always does it herself anyway.. (Like literally every night)... And she usually calls them after she's been banging & screaming, and then after the police leave, she's quiet and doesn't bother anyone.
I appreciate she probably isn't a danger, but nonetheless she's still a complete nightmare to live next to.
@630
You mean the film "A Beautiful Mind"? She's nothing like the guy in that film. I keep my house locked at night, as I would anyway. And I'm not sure saying her illness is a disease is really appropriate.
Have you tried finding another good apartment away from her? That's a simple solution I guess. Btw aren't the police getting annoyed by the fact she's always calling them. Why don't they send her to an asylum or something?
I don't live in an apartment, I live with my mum so moving isn't really an option. The police probably are annoyed, but there is little they can do I guess, since she hasn't yet shown to be a threat.
Then you should go with what Chick-Fil-A said. Tell your landlord!(if there is one)
Try calling some kind of mental house.If she really is insane and a threat,she should be put in a mental asylum...
Have you not said anything straight to her about the issue? Does she even know if she has a disorder or not?
I could see how that would be annoying, but at the same time, people usually don't get to see that kind of thing lol, it would be entertaining in that regard. Either way, I don't know what you'd do in this case.