From the intro to an in-depth feature in the Toronto
Globe and Mail. In the picture, Toronto's Darlene Wierski-Devoe and her husband, Dave Devoe, say it was only their constant pressure on doctors and programs that got help early for their daughter, Sydney, who was diagnosed with anxiety disorder at the age of 3.
On a Monday morning in September, 2006, during what they call their "darkest of days," Heather Bishop and Sean Quigley committed their 10-year-old daughter, Erynn, to a psychiatric hospital.
The breaking point came after a Saturday shopping trip to a Sam's Club in their hometown of London, Ont. When Ms. Bishop casually suggested to Erynn that she put a toy back on the shelf, the girl's expression clouded, then she erupted into screams. There was no way to bring her back: Soon, she would be throwing punches. They had to get out of the store.
Mr. Quigley slung Erynn over his shoulder and Ms. Bishop abandoned the cart piled high with groceries, just as they had done dozens of time before. This was no simple tantrum. It was everyday life for the couple — trying to protect their daughter and everyone around her while she was consumed by rages she barely remembered afterward.
"She's not spoiled — she's sick," Ms. Bishop wanted to shout at the other shoppers, but she kept her head down.
"I hate you! I hate you!" Erynn shrieked in the car, wildly kicking the seats and flailing at Mr. Quigley's head while he tried to drive home. Ms. Bishop crouched low in the passenger seat and fumbled on her cellphone for the emergency after-hours line, begging them to find their daughter's psychiatrist.
He answered within minutes. "Are you safe?" he asked.
"Not really," Ms. Bishop said, weeping.
A week later, they helped Erynn pack a small suitcase and a collection of stuffed animals and hugged their only child goodbye at the hospital. She had never spent a night away from them before, but they were desperate and out of options.
Ms. Bishop manages stewardship and donor relations at the University of Western Ontario while Mr. Quigley works in theatre. For the previous three years, they had juggled their schedules around Erynn's appointments, ever since she had been diagnosed with bipolar disorder, which causes extreme mood swings.
Across Canada, about 800,000 families struggle with the stress and complications of raising a child with a mental illness. Often, like Ms. Bishop and Mr. Quigley that September afternoon, they feel they can't make it one more day.
In many ways, Erynn was a delight — witty, precocious and bold. At the age of 3, she corrected a stranger on the difference between an insect and an arachnid. As a preschooler, she watched Ms. Bishop leave the house on a bright morning and announced to her dad, "My mommy walks with grace and beauty in the sun." She read beyond her grade level and created complex, magical worlds of imagination.
From the time Erynn could speak, however, Ms. Bishop and Mr. Quigley suspected that something was wrong.
As Erynn herself describes it now, at 12: "I just stop thinking the right way and start thinking differently. I get a hate for people that I am angry at. I kind of just have to wait for it to blow over."
They knew she needed help. Finding that help, they quickly learned, is easier said than done.
From the intro to an in-depth feature in the Toronto Globe and Mail. In the picture, Toronto's Darlene Wierski-Devoe and her husband, Dave Devoe, say it was only their constant pressure on doctors and programs that got help early for their daughter, Sydney, who was diagnosed with anxiety disorder at the age of 3.