I know from personal experience that it may seem there were no warning signs that a psychotic break was imminent. It’s also possible that those who know JB intimately may reflect on their memories and find a few signs that were missed — things they couldn’t have possibly recognized as a warning sign without the benefit of hindsight.
When I was a senior in high school, I came home from school one day to find my dear sweet mother a complete mess. She was frantically pulling out papers from all sorts of random hidden places and tearing them up into little pieces. When I asked what was wrong, all she would say was, “I don’t know, Jennifer, but something is very, very wrong.” She said it over and over and over again. I was like what does that mean?? Is it Granny? Did something happen to dad? And she just kept saying I don’t know, I don’t know. My dad was coaching a junior high school basketball team at the time, and they had a game that night. I tried to leave to go find out what my dad knew, but she panicked and wouldn’t let me leave the house. (This was 1999 and before everyone had cell phones.) I screamed and cried and begged my mom to tell me what was going on. In my mind, I thought something terrible had happened to somebody in our family and she just couldn’t bring herself to tell me. It was an excruciatingly long afternoon waiting for my dad to get home that day because she was acting like a total lunatic, and I hadn’t the slightest idea why. At some point, I got a phone call from a college recruiter. She became so paranoid while I was listening to the man give his spiel that she yanked the phone out of my hand and hung up on him. I didn’t know who this bodysnatcher was inhabiting my mother’s body, but this was NOT my passive, easygoing mom.
When my dad finally came home, he convinced her to go to the hospital—where she stayed for the next 2-3 weeks. She was 51 years old when she was diagnosed with bipolar disorder and experienced her first manic episode. It’s extremely rare for the onset of bipolar to occur at that age. It never once occurred to me that day that she might have a mental illness. But after I did some research about bipolar disorder and learned the symptoms of mania and hypomania, I came to realize that my mom had been gradually building up to that break for a long while. They were mostly simple, small things that would mean absolutely nothing to anyone who didn’t really know my mother. Like she randomly agreed to buy me a car one day, out of the blue — and without consulting my dad first — when we had never even talked about me getting a car before and she’s the most frugal person I’ve ever known. She also bought me $300 worth of clothes that same day. At the time, I just thought I was having a really lucky day. I now know that shopping sprees and frivolous spending are hallmarks of manic behavior. There were other small things that were uncharacteristic of my mother that went unnoticed until she was diagnosed. But in hindsight, there were a lot of aha moments that made a lot more sense.
It’s incredibly hard to explain. But when someone you love and know better than you know yourself starts to behave in uncharacteristic ways, the last thing you suspect is mental illness. Especially when that person has no history of mental illness. It’s almost unfathomable. Thankfully, the most violent thing my mom has ever done is dump a cup of coke on my dad’s head.
All that is to say… I think it’s difficult to know what happened here. His mental state may have appeared out of nowhere or there may have been warning signs that went unnoticed to the fault of no one. He might have an undiagnosed mental illness or even a brain tumor. Or he might have been experiencing a drug induced psychosis. We just don’t know and the public may never know.
Regardless of the reason for his current mental state, I personally believe he is going to be devastated once he realizes what he’s done to this precious family.
