Hidden Valley Road: Inside the Mind of an American Family

Peter and Lindsay

After only a few years working for the company, Lindsay was promoted to sales director at the Eldora Ski Area; by 1990, she had started her own event-planning business and was in a serious relationship with the man she would eventually marry. Nevertheless, she felt she couldn’t rest until she had found a way to help her less fortunate siblings.

With this in mind, Lindsay became Peter’s legal caretaker and brought him home to live with her. Here, she began complementing his drug regimen with therapy appointments and found that Peter responded well to having his concerns over the failures of the medical establishment heard. It was while Peter was living with Lindsay that she learned he too was sexually abused by Jim.

Throughout this period, Peter generally functioned well as long as he kept taking his medication. However, he often became so confident that he would go off the drugs, leading to a return of his delusional symptoms and an increased risk of severe psychotic breaks in the future. Dr. Freedman (now based in Denver) told Lindsay that, in his opinion, years of being poorly medicated had made the prospect of Peter breaking the cycle of hospitalization and relapse unlikely at this point.