The boy wears SpongeBob pajamas and sits up in bed, a blanket draped over his shoulders. In his right hand he holds a rosary.
"Please, please, please help me," he whimpers.
Imaginary voices bark at him. "Go away," he tells them. "Go away! Go away!"
He screams for his mother: "They're making me have these bad thoughts."
Stephanie Escamilla is videotaping her son Daniel. He is 10. Nobody believes her when she says he hears voices. This tape will be her proof.
When the voices come, they tell Daniel to kill his brother, his mother and himself. Sometimes he turns the TV on full blast to drown out their commands. Or sprinkles holy water around his bed.
As the camera rolls, Stephanie calls psychiatric hospitals near her home in San Antonio. Repeatedly she is turned down. Nothing can be done for her son, she is told, unless "he is a danger to himself or others." It is December 2009, and Daniel's hallucinations last more than two hours.
Daniel is 14 now, and his mother no longer needs to convince doctors that he is mentally ill. He suffers from bipolar disorder with psychosis. In the past four years, he has been hospitalized more than 20 times.
But a diagnosis merely marks a beginning. Raising a child with mental illness is "a roller-coaster ride through hell," Stephanie says. She is engaged in an epic battle on multiple fronts.
What if Daniel has an outburst in public and is misunderstood? What if he succumbs to the voices? How can she help Daniel find joy?
And what about the rest of her family? They need her, too.
With broad shoulders and a thick frame, Stephanie looks the part of a worthy combatant and strong advocate. It wasn't always this way. She was a single mother with self-doubt, quick to blame herself for Daniel's plight.
Imagine what it's like for a mother to watch her son suffer – the little boy who sang and danced to Michael Jackson tunes, who tossed the baseball out back, who she dreamed would become a doctor.
Think how painful it is to hear him say nearly every day that he wants to kill himself.
Stephanie's fight is literally one of life and death – a desperate attempt to win back her son from the mental illness trying to consume him.
She'll do whatever it takes to save Daniel.
I have a son that is mentally disabled as well. This is a horrible illness. My husband and I know first hand what it is like to go through this. We try to keep eachother up lifted as much as possible. We stay in a positive light and we teach our son to stay positive always.
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