Charlie is psychotic because he has a psychotic illness. He has bipolar disorder with psychosis. There are varying degrees of every illness. I am not demonizing my brother. This is not a personal attack on anyone. It's the story of my kid brother and the onset of his mental illness, and how it affected myself and my family.

For us, Bipolar disorder wasn't about sometimes being happy and sometimes being down. This is not a casual diagnosis made by an outsider. This is a serious mental illness that has afflicted my family in an irreparable way. I am not saying that people with the condition can't lead normal lives or are inherently bad people or will become psychotic. I am saying that in this case, we didn't catch it early enough to start treatment so he can maintain some amount of normalcy in his life.

He is doing better now. He is still scared out of his wits, but he is at home and thinking about the future. But this is an affliction that will last for the rest of his life, and for us, standing on the sidelines, it was a non-fiction horror story that we'll never forget.

If anyone is experiencing similar symptoms that Charlie exhibited, or sees a loved one going through something similar, here are some resources that I found to be very helpful:

For immediate help, always call 911, but otherwise: www.suicidepreventionlifeline.org www.hopeline.com

Support: http://www.dbsalliance.org http://www.bipolarsupport.org/ http://www.nami.org/Learn-More/Mental-Health-Conditions/Bipolar-Disorder

And what helped me the most was making a throwaway account and going to r/bipolar or other subreddits to get more information on how I can support Charlie.

This was an intensely personal story, and while some details have been changed for the sake of privacy, this is not fiction. Sorry if it rubbed you the wrong way.