By : Benedict Carey
Source : NY Times

When the pandemic first hit the Bay Area last spring, Ann thought that her son, a 17-year-old senior, was finally on track to finish high school. He had kicked a heavy marijuana habit and was studying in virtual classes while school was closed.

The first wave of stay-at-home orders shut down his usual routines — sports, playing music with friends. But the stability didn’t last.

“The social isolation since then, over all this time, it just got to him,” said Ann, a consultant living in suburban San Francisco. She, like the other parents in this article, asked that her last name be omitted for privacy and to protect her child. “This is a charming, funny kid, also sensitive and anxious,” she said. “He couldn’t find a job; he couldn’t really go out. And he started using marijuana again, and Xanax.”

The teenager’s frustration finally boiled over this month, when he deliberately cut himself.

“We called 911, and he was taken to the emergency room,” his mother said. “But there they just stitched him up and released him.” The doctors sent him home, she said, “with no support, no therapy, nothing.”

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