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Somebody's father, somebody's son

by Debra Chervenka

   This is Alyssa Chervenka. At first glance, she seems like a normal, bright, active eight-year-old. She loves slumber parties, Brittany Spears, and Pokemon. She sings like an angel, and watching her dance reminds you of a newborn colt running in a meadow. But ask her about her father, and her cheery smile fades, her face drops, and she whispers, "He’s lost."

Alyssa’s father, Daniel, was brilliant, artistic, and troubled. He was diagnosed with bipolar disorder in 1997. He stopped taking his medication in 1998, and his condition grew steadily worse. In May of 1999, he entered his worst manic episode ever. I knew it; his family in Phoenix knew it. Everyone knew it but him. We tried to get him treatment. When he came to visit me, I called the PERT (Psychiatric Emergency Response Team) to have him evaluated for involuntary treatment. They said he was clearly delusional, but since he wasn’t threatening to hurt himself or anyone else, they had no legal grounds to commit him. His mother and sister frantically called the County Mental Health department in Phoenix, but there was nothing they could do, since he refused an interview.

Finally, on the night of May 28^th, 1999, he called his sister and indicated a threat to his family. She immediately called 911. The dispatcher told her that unless he had exactly spelled out his threat i.e. "I’m coming to your house at 9:00 p.m. with a shotgun," there was nothing they could do to help. That night he made some more phone calls, left his open notebook, Bible, and glass of soda on his table, and drove up towards the remote mountains of the Four Peaks Wilderness north of Phoenix. No one has seen or heard from him since.

The missing persons report filed by his mother was not taken very seriously, at first. After all, he was an adult, with no criminal record and no documented history of institutionalization. The detective made a cursory examination through the window of his apartment and said it looked like he’d be back any time. Eleven days after his disappearance, the police department finally broke into Dan’s apartment. The message light on his answering machine was blinking. One message was from a man who’d found Dan’s wallet on the road to Four Peaks the morning after he disappeared. A trip to the scene revealed Dan’s car, abandoned at a trailhead. Search and rescue teams were dispatched, complete with dogs, helicopters, and horses. But the trail was cold.

Now we wait. In the agony of not knowing. In the netherworld of guilt, and of anger, and of frustration. We wait with the hundreds of other families of other lost loved ones who didn’t get help in time. We write letters to our legislators, we go to meetings, we chat online. His mother seizes every opportunity to keep his story in the public eye, even though this means that her phone rings every time an unidentified body is found in the desert. And we watch Alyssa grow up. She is now under a therapist’s care for posttraumatic stress disorder. If we can’t make sense of this, how can she? And we pray, for patience. And for peace. And for answers that may never come. Most of all, we pray that this never has to happen to another family.

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