When my son Francis was thirteen years old, he began to exhibit some peculiar behaviors. Brilliant yet legally blind, he suddenly became afraid of placing anything on the table, fearing it might land on something else. Meals turned into an ordeal as he would repeatedly swipe at the table before setting his glass of milk down. As his condition worsened, he would hold his plate in the air and eat from it. Recognizing a potential mental health issue, I reached out to Dr. Steven Rasmussen to schedule an appointment.

Unfortunately, the renowned psychiatrist was fully booked and could only see Francis in about six weeks. I wasn’t sure we could wait that long...     We could not wait…the next day a tearful Francis stood in the middle of the living room floor unable to take a step, afraid he would step on something.  His fear immobilized him. Hubby and I had to carry him into the car and drive him to the local mental health hospital for children, where he remained, hospitalized.

It was very scary for me to leave him there, and even scarier for him.  He remained immobilized in his bed for a few days as an evaluation was conducted. He saw a social worker and a psychiatrist daily, and Hubby and I attended family therapy with him. It was humiliating.  Both professionals dwelled on the fact that we “pushed him too hard”, and we caused his brain to overload and snap.  I had prided myself on not “pushing him”, but offering him a multitude of opportunities, and I failed to see how this broke him. Yet, the finger was pointed at me during each session. How could I have been so wrong?

Francis stayed in the hospital for six excruciatingly long weeks, after which time they met with me and Hubby to give us the bad news that they were unable to cure him, and they referred us to a “specialist”, Dr. Rasmussen, with whom we had our originally scheduled appointment the next day.  While furious that it had taken them so long to figure out they could not help him, yet grateful the hospital had kept him safe for so long, we made our way to see the recommended doctor with a handful of written reports in my hand.

By the time we reached his office, we were desperate for answers. Blaming me for providing so many opportunities and “pushing” him wasn’t going to cut it. Dr. Rasmussen spoke with us for a few minutes and reviewed the reports from the children’s hospital. After a quick glance, he handed the reports back to me and told me to throw them away. I will never forget his words. He explained that the social worker and psychiatrist who treated Francis were Freudians, believing that human behavior is explained by childhood experiences, hence their insistence that someone was to blame. He assured us that no one caused anything. Francis has obsessive-compulsive disorder, a chemical imbalance in the brain that generally responds well to medication like Prozac, which he promptly prescribed.

  And so it was.  Francis can keep his obsessive thoughts at bay with the Prozac which curbs them. He notices that if he does not take his medication, the obsessive thoughts come back and interfere with his life. In fact, he had a serious problem when he went to school at Cambridge in England, (on a Bill Gates scholarship) because the liquid Prozac that was prescribed there was not the same formula as what he had been taking in the states.  We overnighted a bottle with the pill formula he had been used to taking, and the rest is history.

Francis has gone on to lead a very successful life in California and has won several national awards for his creation of the voice over cell phone program for individuals with disabilities.  He is also at the forefront of several of the newer computerized apps for people who are blind. He makes sure to hire individuals who are blind or have other disabilities and has always been a speaker for disability rights. He is the father of two, and recently purchased a multi-million-dollar home that is accessible for his young son. He and his family spend weekends sailing in San Francisco Bay, with sailing being a love of his after a childhood of sailing his Sunfish on the pond behind our house. All of this would have been impossible were it not for the diagnosis of obsessive-compulsive disorder and the subsequent dispensation of Prozac.  I realize that many parents are anti-medication, but in this circumstance, it is the medication that allows him to live a full and happy life, and for that, I am very grateful.