A woman said she blames herself for her son allegedly beating his grandmother on Monday.

Nina McDaniel said she hasn't seen her son, Michael McDaniel, since he was arrested Monday and accused of beating Nina's mother, Michael's grandmother, with a walking cane.

"I saw her laying there and I thought she was dead," said Nina McDaniel as she described the events of Monday morning.

Nina McDaniel said she discovered her mother was hurt after allegedly being beaten by her son, Michael.

"I risked my family's life by having him here so no one else would get hurt because we didn't know. We did not expect what happened yesterday," said McDaniel.

Nina said Michael suffers from chronic paranoid schizophrenia.  She said her son has made threats in the past, but was never violent. 

For the last five years she has been caring for him and for her elderly mother, artist Helen Badulak.

"What she remembers, she was laying there and she could not get away from him," said McDaniel.

Badulak's physical health is improving, but Nina McDaniel said she is concerned about her mother's mental state.

"I'm being tortured right now because I love my mom and I love my son," said McDaniel.

And she said she's now forced to change how she will care for him in the future.

"And I have to make the hardest decision in my life, that is my son will never be able to come home to our house," said McDaniel.

McDaniel said she has made attempts in the past to get her son the mental health treatment he needs, but said current patient privacy laws or HIPAA prevented her from doing everything she can.

"If we as family members are willing to take on the responsibility of taking care of loved ones with a severe mental illness why shackle us up and prevent us from getting the information that we need," said McDaniel.

Nina McDaniel said she has been frustrated by the entire mental health system and said she plans on lobbying lawmakers to change those patient privacy laws so that no family will go through what she did Monday.