Nothing bizarre at all. The facts about the reason she took him out of school have been posted in several places, and I actually have experience working with the mentally ill. The defensiveness and misguided protective efforts (and state of denial) of some parents is well known.
“Nothing bizarre at all. The facts about the reason she took him out of school have been posted in several places, and I actually have experience working with the mentally ill. The defensiveness and misguided protective efforts (and state of denial) of some parents is well known.”
I think you were unfairly criticized by a few previous posters here — I thought your observations were good.
I have no experience with mental health issues at all (I ran RR engines for a living). But it looks to me like the mother either…
- Failed to recognize the descent the boy was experiencing (from having Asperger’s to something far worse, perhaps into schizophrenia), or
- Sensed that things might be getting worse, yet tried to ignore that in the hope that what she had done in the past would still work with him.
One news article (posted on Drudge) said that she had told someone that she was afraid that she was “losing him”. So it looks like she knew he was headed downwards (another news report said she had found him trying to burn himself with a lighter), but didn’t comprehend just -how far- “down” he actually was.
Her fatal misjudgment was in failing to comprehend that having weapons in close proximity to the boy might afford him the opportunity to do something unpredictable.
She didn’t see it coming, perhaps out of her own well-intentioned blindness.