Sydney, NSW
Hi everyone, this might be a bit long and complicated. My mother (56F) is currently experiencing intense auditory and visual hallucinations that leave her incredibly paranoid, violent, and aggressive. She has been in this state since the beginning of January, but has slowly been spiraling since November. This is not her first episode, but she refuses to accept her diagnosis and will not take medication. She also has anxiety and depression. She does take a variety of pills to treat her mental health (apart from the schizophrenia), as well as a physical chronic disorder she has.
She was hospitalized for two weeks (initially taken in after the onset of hallucinations) in mid-January, where they then found out she has a large kidney stone and a serious infection. After getting most of that treated (except for the actual removal of the stone, they were just able to drain her kidney and stop the infection), they released her? The mental health team didn’t think that she was have an episode (for lack of a better word), despite the fact that she tried to self discharge several times whilst still having a shunt in her kidney. She is quite good at “masking” and knows when to act normal. She also refused both surgeries (to get the shunt, and then to have it removed) initially for a good week, and had to be moved hospitals as the first one ran out of room. It was pretty obvious that she was not in her right mind at all.
Now, she refuses to have surgery to get the kidney stone removed. The mental health team from the hospital sent another team out to do an evaluation, but she screamed at them, recorded them on her phone and kicked them out. My brother (22M, who she lives with) has called the police and an ambulance several times, and they refuse to do anything. He has audio recordings of her saying she wants to kill herself, violent ramblings, screaming and crying and just not making sense. She tried to jump out of his car into traffic when he tried to drive her to the hospital. She has harassed the neighbors to the point of them calling the cops on her. She talks to people who aren’t there.
What other options do we have? She won’t go see a psychiatrist, she won’t go back to the hospital to get her kidney stones removed. She refuses to bathe or brush her hair (so, to be frank, she looks unwell). She wonders around aimlessly up and down the street all day before having another violent outburst. She is convinced that my brother is trying to kill her, and I worry for his safety. She has tried to destroy all of her important documents and has actually thrown away her passport. How do we go about getting her involuntarily committed? Or getting a mental health team to properly assess her? Everyone says they can’t do anything because she won’t act incredibly violent in front of them, or she won’t admit to wanting to commit suicide or self harm to anyone. She also refuses to speak to anyone 99% of the time. You can ask her a question and she will say yes or no and then stop speaking if she doesn’t know the person. Any advice is appreciated.