A few weeks ago I penned On Mass Murder: Are You Listening Greensboro? Proving what I've long believed that Greensboro is one of the dumbest cities in America, local conservatives expressed no interest in spending money on mental health care citing personal responsibility and denying we have a shortage of mental health care here in the USA. As recently as yesterday local liberals were still trying to convince me that gun control will solve the problem. As I pointed out 1 month ago today, both sides are wrong. From yesterday's Greensboro News & Record, an article by Barbara B. Smith, a clinical assistant professor at the School of Social Work and the Department of Psychiatry at UNC-Chapel Hill:
"A new direction for mental health
Much too frequently in America, we bear witness to horrific shootings. We try to make sense of these events and ask ourselves why they happened and how to prevent future tragedies. We call for gun control — anything — to stop the insanity. No doubt, stricter gun laws are needed in this country. But we also need a humane and effective mental health system that gives priority to young people with emerging severe mental illness.
In the aftermath of these events, people with mental illness, particularly schizophrenia and other psychotic disorders, become demons in the eyes of their fellow citizens. This ugly public perception of mental illness affects what happens privately — if a young person with a promising future develops psychosis, we don’t want to believe it. We ignore it or call it something else. And because many have this notion that a person with schizophrenia is equivalent to a monster, the person with psychosis isn’t likely to embrace that label. Denial delays treatment, and the cycle continues.
I know these challenges because I have spent the past 20 years working with people with schizophrenia. I love my clients. They are not monsters. They are your brothers and sisters, mothers and fathers. They are part of the human family, with the same hopes and dreams we all have.
Most people with emerging mental illness are in distress and open to help if it is humane and addresses their problems. If psychosis is treated, perhaps we can prevent violent acts that stem from paranoid delusions.
As with any other illness, early intervention has the potential to create better outcomes in schizophrenia. But in the U.S., it’s almost impossible for young people with emerg-ing severe mental illness to get the help they need. Over the past 30 years, our mental health system has suffered from fragmentation and underfund-ing. The resources we do have are sometimes misdirected. We have over-relied on medications, hoping for the quick and simple cure for disorders that are complex.
The emergence of a severe mental illness can affect every aspect of a person’s life. People with severe mental illness are best treated with a comprehensive approach that includes psychological treatment and social and vocational supports, in addition to medication. For those with very severe psychosis, we also need safe and humane settings for treatment.
The international community is far, far ahead of us in the area of early intervention in mental health. We can look to Australia, Canada, the U.K., Japan, Finland and Singapore to learn how to help our youth.
Can you imagine the U.S. being so far behind in the treatment of cancer or cardiovascular disease?
So, what can we do to improve our own nation’s mental health system? We need to strengthen our efforts at prevention and early intervention in psychosis. We need to put just as much emphasis on mental health as on physical health. We need to get the message across that psychosis is treatable, recovery is possible, and mental health can be restored. Let’s do the following :
• Treat emerging psychosis like a true medical emergency.
• Make youth mental health a public health priority.
• Provide education to young people, their families, their teachers, and their faith communities about early warning signs of mental illness and how to get help.
• Create specialized early intervention teams that can respond rapidly and humanely to people with emerging severe mental illness.
• Strengthen the mental health workforce by developing training initiatives that focus on people with severe mental illness.
• Broaden the dominant medical model to include psychological treatment, social interventions, psychiatric rehabilitation and peer support.
Ultimately, as a clinical social worker, what I’d like to see is what I’d want for myself or someone in my family: early intervention, easy access to care, the best treatment from a multidisciplinary team of professionals, shared decision-making, and enough support to lead a meaningful life as a contributing member of the community. If we had those things in our mental health system, we would all be better off."
Someone should put Ms Smith in charge. Just because I am a mental health patient does not make me stupid. As a matter of fact: I'm most often the smartest person in the room even if not the most educated. I know a lot of people don't like the way I go about things and I really don't care. If I really wanted to attract flies I would use honey but even the mentally ill are smart enough not to want to attract flies.
So what's wrong with all you so called, "normal people" who keep trying to get me to be nice and attract flies?
Here's a dose of reality for both sides, left and right: With every mass shooting, legal gun sales skyrocket! Scared people go out and buy guns. By the same token, many people who were previously pro gun become anti-gun, especially those closest to the families who lost loved ones. The gun industry loves the increased sales. The NRA and other pro gun groups see huge spikes in membership and fund raising. Anti-gun groups see huge spikes in membership and fund raising. Advertising and media companies profit $Millions. Senators and Congressmen get $Millions inbribes campaign contributions from both sides... Everyone strikes it rich except the working class. You will pay out far more to keep the treadmill turning and yourselves exausted than you'd ever pay to screen and treat the mentally ill. Kinda makes you wonder who the mentally ill really are, doesn't it?
The mentally ill stay mentally ill while our children die. And you wonder why I pen books about nuking you? Morons, the lot of you.
"A new direction for mental health
Much too frequently in America, we bear witness to horrific shootings. We try to make sense of these events and ask ourselves why they happened and how to prevent future tragedies. We call for gun control — anything — to stop the insanity. No doubt, stricter gun laws are needed in this country. But we also need a humane and effective mental health system that gives priority to young people with emerging severe mental illness.
In the aftermath of these events, people with mental illness, particularly schizophrenia and other psychotic disorders, become demons in the eyes of their fellow citizens. This ugly public perception of mental illness affects what happens privately — if a young person with a promising future develops psychosis, we don’t want to believe it. We ignore it or call it something else. And because many have this notion that a person with schizophrenia is equivalent to a monster, the person with psychosis isn’t likely to embrace that label. Denial delays treatment, and the cycle continues.
I know these challenges because I have spent the past 20 years working with people with schizophrenia. I love my clients. They are not monsters. They are your brothers and sisters, mothers and fathers. They are part of the human family, with the same hopes and dreams we all have.
Most people with emerging mental illness are in distress and open to help if it is humane and addresses their problems. If psychosis is treated, perhaps we can prevent violent acts that stem from paranoid delusions.
As with any other illness, early intervention has the potential to create better outcomes in schizophrenia. But in the U.S., it’s almost impossible for young people with emerg-ing severe mental illness to get the help they need. Over the past 30 years, our mental health system has suffered from fragmentation and underfund-ing. The resources we do have are sometimes misdirected. We have over-relied on medications, hoping for the quick and simple cure for disorders that are complex.
The emergence of a severe mental illness can affect every aspect of a person’s life. People with severe mental illness are best treated with a comprehensive approach that includes psychological treatment and social and vocational supports, in addition to medication. For those with very severe psychosis, we also need safe and humane settings for treatment.
The international community is far, far ahead of us in the area of early intervention in mental health. We can look to Australia, Canada, the U.K., Japan, Finland and Singapore to learn how to help our youth.
Can you imagine the U.S. being so far behind in the treatment of cancer or cardiovascular disease?
So, what can we do to improve our own nation’s mental health system? We need to strengthen our efforts at prevention and early intervention in psychosis. We need to put just as much emphasis on mental health as on physical health. We need to get the message across that psychosis is treatable, recovery is possible, and mental health can be restored. Let’s do the following :
• Treat emerging psychosis like a true medical emergency.
• Make youth mental health a public health priority.
• Provide education to young people, their families, their teachers, and their faith communities about early warning signs of mental illness and how to get help.
• Create specialized early intervention teams that can respond rapidly and humanely to people with emerging severe mental illness.
• Strengthen the mental health workforce by developing training initiatives that focus on people with severe mental illness.
• Broaden the dominant medical model to include psychological treatment, social interventions, psychiatric rehabilitation and peer support.
Ultimately, as a clinical social worker, what I’d like to see is what I’d want for myself or someone in my family: early intervention, easy access to care, the best treatment from a multidisciplinary team of professionals, shared decision-making, and enough support to lead a meaningful life as a contributing member of the community. If we had those things in our mental health system, we would all be better off."
Someone should put Ms Smith in charge. Just because I am a mental health patient does not make me stupid. As a matter of fact: I'm most often the smartest person in the room even if not the most educated. I know a lot of people don't like the way I go about things and I really don't care. If I really wanted to attract flies I would use honey but even the mentally ill are smart enough not to want to attract flies.
So what's wrong with all you so called, "normal people" who keep trying to get me to be nice and attract flies?
Here's a dose of reality for both sides, left and right: With every mass shooting, legal gun sales skyrocket! Scared people go out and buy guns. By the same token, many people who were previously pro gun become anti-gun, especially those closest to the families who lost loved ones. The gun industry loves the increased sales. The NRA and other pro gun groups see huge spikes in membership and fund raising. Anti-gun groups see huge spikes in membership and fund raising. Advertising and media companies profit $Millions. Senators and Congressmen get $Millions in
The mentally ill stay mentally ill while our children die. And you wonder why I pen books about nuking you? Morons, the lot of you.
