Tag: Mental Health

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I have to give Donald Trump credit for one thing — I am a much better citizen than I was in 2016. Before that, I paid attention to elections to the extent that I read the newspapers and made my decisions based on what I learned. But that was pretty much it. I didn’t worry much about Republicans winning elections. I may have been a little disappointed but that was the extent of my feelings. Life went on and, more importantly, democracy went on without getting much more input from me.

Now I pay attention. I think maybe I pay too much attention. I have to review every poll for every Senate race to see who is ahead. I know the candidates for every close Senate race in the country. Ask me this 20 years ago and I would be hard pressed to supply this information.

This isn’t a bad thing. Trump may be our punishment for taking democracy for granted. Thinking that all I had to do is just show up every election and everything would be find. I realize there are people who should just not hold office and I need to pay attention better which isn’t a bad lesson to learn.

But is is also driving me a bit crazy. Compulsive reading of poll numbers isn’t exactly easing my mind. I wonder. Are these correct? Polls have been wrong in the past, what if these are wrong now? How are we going to get through another couple years of the mad man Trump?

It is making me anxious and my anxiety can’t be quelled by thinking the Democrats look good and might win. Because, then, I start thinking about what revenge will Trump take on the country then.

So, at least until November 4, I will be anxious. Forgive me ahead of time if I am cranky for the next month or so.

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Judy Sandler, in Huffington Post, made an interesting observation about her reticence to discuss her son’s mental health with others. He is struggling with it but how do you talk about it without causing more, possibly well-meaning but, nonetheless, unwanted follow up questions or invading your child’s privacy.

This leads to a bigger question for me — why is mental health such a forbidden topic of discussion? How is silence helping anyone dealing with mental health? It is a problem that a lot of people experience — either personally or through loved ones. Instead of talking about it, we him and haw, give vague answers that say nothing and undermines any understanding that other people might have about mental health struggles.

There is this hidden shame. My kid is a mess and it is a really difficult time for us. My kid is a failure.

People, by and large, are interested in your life and aren’t nosing around for gossip. It is genuine concern. But it is mental health. We don’t talk about mental health problems. There is this weird connection with good mental health and the goodness of the person. If I tell someone my son is having mental health issues, I have somehow failed as a parent. Alcoholics, schizophrenics, drug addicts, depressed people are all somehow bad people who should be hidden away until they come to their senses.

This silence about people who are suffering with their mental health is damaging. It discourages people from seeking help. It also puts the onus of diagnosing mental health with the person breaking down or their families.

If we, as a country, were serious about mental health — everyone would get a yearly mental health check in to see how people are doing.

But no we would rather wait until a mother kills her children. Or a young man shoots up his schools. Or a depressed person kills themselves. Or drug addicts camp out on our streets. So many of our problems have a mental health connection. An annual mental health check ups would be far cheaper than cleaning up the mess broken people make.

It also might take some of the shame out of seeing mental health professionals. If everyone is doing it we might diminish the silence regarding mental health issues and, more importantly, we might be able to pro-actively address the problems people are dealing with before they breakdown.

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Lindsay Clancy killed her children during a postpartum psychosis breakdown. She then tried to kill herself by jumping out a window which only paralyzed her from the waist down. This is horrible. A nightmare really.

For some reason, people are arguing about it. Some say she should be found non-guilty by reason of insanity; others saying she deserves prison or worse. The vehemence is puzzling. Clancy was in a troubling state prior to killing her children. She also did strangle them. What does justice look like here? Should she suffer in a prison for the rest of her life or should she be free to suffer a free woman in her own home.

The guilty crowd bother me because they are focused on punishing Clancy which seems pointless. Her children are dead. She is paralyzed. Her marriage is over. Everybody in the world knows she is a child killer. Her life is ruined. I guess putting her in prison would make her life just a little bit more miserable. So there is that but all and all any further punishment seems like a waste of time.

The not guilty crowd are focused on the madness of a mother who should have been helped before breaking down and killing her children. Sympathy for a woman suffering under such duress is understandable but it doesn’t change the woman’s actions. Murderers get stiff penalties for their actions. So why not Clancy?

The argument that this could be any woman in postpartum depression is a bit of an overreach. Very few women actually murder their children while in postpartum depression. Clancy is an aberration. So, while postpartum depression affects many woman, it rarely results in the mother killing her children.

On the other hand, not guilty by reason of insanity is, understandably, a difficult sentence to accept. The killer still did the killing. The victims are still dead. She should have to pay for what she did. And, if not Clancy herself someone should? But who? Clancy’s husband? Mental Health Professionals?

The problem is the need to pin the crime on someone. If this person had only done what they were supposed to do, these horrible killings wouldn’t have happened. Some rational behavior on someone’s part would have saved those children. If only that were true.

This need for justice to put the world back into rational order is impossible here. I believe Clancy was a deeply troubled woman who broke down and killed her children. There is absolutely nothing we can do to make sense of her actions or bring justice for her children.

I can live with her going to prison or remaining a free woman. Either way, we left with a difficult problem. Dangerous crazy people. How do we stop them before they act and we are doing absolutely nothing to help the insane or protect their innocent victims. Nothing except waiting for it to happen.

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Mean Girls and Bullies are a reoccurring theme in any depiction of American adolescence. They always seem to pop up as a potent, almost dictatorial, presence in high schools. They also seem to land at the top of the school hierarchy which, given their nastiness, seems odd. It baffles me.

Think about it. On the first day of school the teacher doesn’t announce to the class that you are going to start dividing yourself into people you like and people you don’t like. Some of you will get invited to all the birthday parties, others will not. Suzy will be the chief mean girl and Bill is the big bully. Let the school year begin.

It is a hierarchy created by the kids. It is cruel. It is pervasive and it is has an effect on a child’s life.

Adults can try to mitigate the social hierarchy but it happens regardless of their best efforts. Adults can tell kids to be respectful but how does a school control the in crowd and the out crowd. The creation of these groups, be it — Jocks, Nerds, Cool Kids, Stoners — is an act of group self-creation. Adults don’t make the decision.

How the hierarchy all sorts out is a mystery to everyone but, perhaps, the group itself. In reality, there may not be any rational explanation other than this is the chemical reaction of this particular group of kids.

The two things that interest me here is why does it happen at all and why do the same type of kids (jocks and cheerleaders) end up at the top and others (nerds and goths) end up near the bottom. The story, the one you see in the movies and read in books, always is the same. Mean Girls and Jocks take over and end up at the top of the teenage hierarchy.

This would seem like an unimportant detail. Who cares why some kids rise to the top and other kids don’t. It is just school but I am afraid it is very important because mean girls and bullies continue their reign of terror throughout their lives.

Explain Trump. He is a bully. Why is he tolerated? Why are people still willing to work for such an asshole even though he has made everyone perfectly aware that he has no loyalty to anyone except himself?

Maybe the whole problem with Trump, particularly for the people who are immune to Trump’s charm, is trying to find a rational reason for people putting their faith in such an asshole when it is more of an instinctual thing — irrational and subconscious.

He is the silverback who beats his chest in the most convincing manner and to our ape selves that is all that matters.

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Another assassination attempt was made on Donald Trump. The Secret Service shot the man down. Early reports about the shooter are depressing. He thought he was God so I am not sure whether he had a coherent world view which prompted him to take this action but I doubt it. People who think they are God are uniquely incapable of coherence so this leaves us with crazy.

Early in the week two teenagers stormed a San Diego mosque — killing three people and then themselves. They hated about everybody, given the way it turned out, even themselves.

I don’t know what to do about the crazy people in this country. As a nation, we have pretty much decided to lump them in with the regular citizens which means they are left to their own devices. They can own guns, sleep on the streets, do whatever the Hell they want until they cross a line and then, in the worst case scenario, they are gunned down.

This is how we want to live and, lets be clear, no decision is a decision. We would rather have the occasional blood letting to addressing why unstable people with guns keep creating such havoc. Limiting gun availability is off the table. Let’s face it the 2nd Amendment makes this impossible. Furthermore there are too many guns out there now and there would be way too much resistance to confiscating guns to make it worthwhile. It is, for now, off the table.

But what about the other part of the equation dealing with all the crazy people. Well, this would require political will and money. Why this is controversial is beyond me? Mental health requires some level of preventative measure. Identify the people who are sick and get them the help they need before they break.

Think physical health. For example, we can control high blood pressure through medication. The first step, though, is identifying people suffering from it before we can help them. The same practice apples for mental health. We need to know who needs help.

But freedom, people shouldn’t be forced into a psychological check. We could require a yearly psychological check as a part of having health insurance. This would, at least, help us address the vast majority of the population.

Who is going to pay for all these checks? The government or the insurance companies? Forget I said anything.

So you see nothing is going to happen. We just have to accept that mad men with guns will be walking the street until they break and then after they are done killing, we will kill them or they will kill themselves. A little messy but the problem is solved without raising taxes.

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The other day, I was discussing how violence seems to be a part of human nature. There is something about violence that attracts humans both to participate and to watch. It is an irrational strong urge and, because of that, must be fed in some way. My speculation there got some confirmation today when I saw this post about chimps getting violent. Scientists are mystified on why these chimps, who were co-operating in the past, now were attacking each other. There is some talk about resource sharing but nothing seems to explain this sudden violent turn. On the face of it, it seems irrational.

The problem here might be trying to find a rational basis for this violence. Maybe there just isn’t any good reason other than animals sometimes have to express themselves violently and that, humans being mammals, the same irrational instinct is present in us. Why do football players continue to play football when there is substantial evidence that playing the game damages their future health. People stopped smoking after they learned more about tobacco, why hasn’t the same turnaround occurred with football.

Which makes me think our whole strategy on violence might be misdirected. Our base assumption is that nobody wants violence and, logically, this makes sense. Who wants to have their bodies beaten up? Who wants to watch this type of game? But, the truth is: people do want to participate and they do want to watch. Perhaps what we need to do is find a way that people can express these violent urges without, or at least limiting, the physical pain to other humans.

I know that violent video games have a bad reputation for the dehumanization of people but it is infinitely preferable to killing and maiming actual human beings. What I am saying is maybe we need to expand our tools in dealing with violent behavior. Yes people shouldn’t want to hurt other people however our very nature might predispose us to some forms of violence. How do we do we deal more effectively with that reality?

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Every time there is a mass shooting I have this momentary reflexive fear that the killer might be someone who I agree with politically because partisans will say that the problem is the politics of the person and not say something more directly responsible like guns. It matters why the person doing the shooting, did it. But, it doesn’t matter. All mass shootings are bad and the killer’s reasons are irrelevant. You can’t ban white men or trans people for the matter.

No one reason can explain every mass shooter’s motives. The shooter’s politics changes from instance to instance. The killings, however, continue. Of course, the recent shooting at the Minnesota Catholic school have charged partisans up and the problem is either white men or trans men depending on the political agenda of the writer.

Unfortunately, these identifications are unhelpful in helping prevent future mass shootings because the vast majority of white men and trans people aren’t going to shoot Catholic school children praying in church. In fact, 99.9999% of these people will never shoot children at any point whatsoever. So what makes this small number of people break, take up a gun and shoot strangers for no good reason?

The availability of guns is part of the problem. There is very little that can be done here as there is constitutional protection to carry arms, it is difficult to change the Constitution and there isn’t enough public support to even bother. So Gun Laws will not change. Any solution that calls for this is doomed to failure — at least right now. By all means, continue to bang your head against this wall but you are only going to get a bloody head.

These leaves us with addressing the mental health element which is another part of the problem. People who want to kill small children, for whatever reason, are mentally ill. There is no question in my mind and I think most people would agree with that. The question then becomes how do we stop crazy people from using their guns?

The most difficult hurdle to clear would be an acceptance that people need to submit to mental health assessments — particularly young people who are more susceptible to this type of behavior. This also involves a more restrictive take on mental health. Right now most people would say that going for a mental health check up is an option and not a requirement. You are free to be a crazy person — no matter that you are living on public sidewalks, no matter that you are a schizophrenic carry an AK47. Until you are actually hurt someone, you are free to be as crazy as you wish.

Personal rights and public safety are difficult issues to balance. I would argue because we have constitutional protection for gun rights than the government has a responsibility to assess a person’s psychological ability to responsibly carry them. It becomes a health issue instead of a gun rights issue. Every year of high school, every student needs to take a psychological evaluation. Not only could this help with mass shootings but also may help address homelessness, drug addiction and array of other social problem before they become serious problems.

If mental illness is the cause of school shootings then what is the mental health solution? So far the political class seems mired in pointless struggles about gun control and finger pointing at the the other side’s toxic politics neither of which is likely to change. What if we determine that good mental health is a personal responsibility and if we, as a country, can get early intervention with this very small number of people willing to shoot down small children we can address this without affecting anyone’s right to bear arms?

But you don’t have a right to be a crazy person — whether that manifests as shooting up a school or sleeping on public sidewalks.

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So another school shooting in Georgia. Tragically, the FBI actually had this boy on their radar, interviewed him and everything. Yet he still managed to go on his rampage. However, unlike other school shootings, the authorities were on the right track before the massacre and might have prevented it which makes this one worth more than the usual shrug of the shoulders and sigh of deep regret.

It is pointless to bring up new Gun Laws because it just isn’t going to happen. Hearing people saying this wouldn’t happen if only we had right Gun Laws. Right. Keep talking but the right people aren’t listening. It is doubtful that they ever will. Easy access to guns, even for adolescents and mentally ill people, is something that a significant portion of the American Electorate is willing to live with coupled with some ambiguous language in the Constitution makes new gun laws difficult to implement.

I do like the approach of holding parents responsible for the actions of their children. Michigan recently punished the parents of the Oxford High shooter and the father of the Apalachee High School has been arrested on charges too. Parents are, at least in theory, the adults with the most contact with their child. If a parent is worried that their child is dangerous and has access to guns, they have the responsibility to stop that child from using those weapons. This allows the parents to still own guns but puts them on notice that they will be held liable if their child uses those guns illegally. It is a very small step in the right direction.

Unfortunately, it is a reactive measure. The damage has already been done. Is there a way to stop the child from acting and this is where this incident gets interesting. The FBI questioned both the boy and his father about the boy’s intentions. Reading the transcript of the FBI’s interview is heartbreaking because the father claims to have talked to his child about school shootings and was convinced that he understood it was wrong. This is where it stopped though. The father reassuring the cops that nothing would happen.

I would be curious to know if any mental health examination of the child occurred. Nothing, so far, would indicate that one happened but diagnosing mental health issues might be a way to prevent some of these massacres from happening. It would be difficult to argue that someone suffering from schizophrenia has a right to bear arms. If someone is hearing the voice of God and brandishing weapons, I think most reasonable people would say the government has a right to intervene.

It also might encourage a more robust mental health care system. The present mental health system is based on family or self-diagnosis before the person breaks. The mentally ill child might not be the best person to measure his own sanity and parent’s might succumb to wishful thinking about their child. Since most mental illness begins to appear during adolescence and children are required to go to school until 16, a massive program of mental health diagnosis for middle and high school students offers a rare opportunity to comprehensively complete this task with some possibility of success.

This could address an array of mental health issues that the country is facing besides school shootings — homelessness, drug addiction, and alcoholism all have a mental health component and could be addressed. Presently, some school districts require medical examinations and immunizations. Adding a mental health aspect makes sense because children are moving into the adult world, knowing the mental health of a child would give both parents and the schools an opportunity to address any potential issues before they get too far out of hand.

Is this a perfect solution? No. Will it be cheap. No to that. There is no perfect solution and I think it is long past due that we expect policy to be perfect. If that is your criteria, then it will never be met and nothing will ever get done. It will be a first attempt to detect mental health issues in children and to make addressing these mental health issues a public responsibility. A good citizen has an obligation to address mental health issues in themselves and in their families before they become a public danger.

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My doctor and I have been working on the best way to handle my acid reflux. Antacids work but some are better than others. The one that I have had the most success with can also damage the liver. Our discussion turned to what do I do if the new antacid fails to work. He said then I would have to make a decision – is the toxic antacid worth continuing for relieving the symptoms of my acid reflux or should I take the less effective and less toxic antacid and learn to live with acid reflux which also carries the possibility of esophageal cancer. What is the better choice then — liver problems or esophageal cancer.

As I get older, I’ve been noticing that a lot of my healthcare decisions are like that — the choice isn’t an obvious good versus an obvious bad. It is two imperfect choices where I have to sort through the information and weigh the good and the bad to come up with an answer for me. Which got me thinking of chronic pain and addiction. There is this default preference for living with the pain over becoming an addict.

But why, particularly if the choice is being unable to have a normal life because the pain is too great versus living with addiction and having a normal life. The important question here is what makes the person more functional. Can they enjoy their lives with the pain or is it better lived with the addiction? There is something in the American Mind which fights the idea of addiction. Addiction is bad. Addicts ruin their lives and the lives of their families. At all cost, we must avoid addiction.

But can addiction be better than the alternate.? And, importantly, can addicts lead normal lives while addicted to drugs? Surprisingly, at least to me, most addicts lead pretty normal lives. They hold jobs and they take care of families. Now I am not saying it is ideal because it isn’t. It would be better not to be addicted to drugs. Life long drug use is associated with younger death — somewhat like the experience of cigarette smokers which is an addiction that is tolerated and we get along just fine. The problem with addiction is when the addict’s drug of choice is illegal or regulated by people who want to discourage addiction (think Oxycodone). Then the addict has to deal with dangerous suppliers, unregulated doses of their drug and getting arrested. These would all go away if we just let them use it legally.

And, yes, there will be deaths but would there be more than there are now. Certainly we would have reduction in deaths to turf wars between drug lords and wrong doses. It also opens up the possibility of working with addicts to get them off drugs whenever possible. Think again about cigarettes. An aggressive anti-smoking campaign has been successful in cutting the number of smokers dramatically. All while cigarettes were legally available and easily accessible.

I know several people that have chronic pain. They are in their 70’s. Their doctors try to find a way to stop the pain without addictive pain killers. The pain is still there which leads to the question what is worse chronic pain or drug addiction. And is getting off of drugs made more difficult by the return of pain? What is the point of 70 years not getting addicted to drugs? I know very few people in this age bracket that isn’t already taking a life long drug.

Personally, I have 4 prescriptions that I will take for the rest of my life. One of these is anti-depressant which if I stop, I will have problems. I am sure I can deal with them but it would be a difficult week or two and, if I do quit, would my depression return. So am I an addict and, if the addictive drug, allows me to be lead a normal life, why would I quit. If an addictive pain killer can do this, and everything else has been tried, why keep people from an effective, but addictive, pain killer.

This is a valid choice between options. I could live in pain and be addiction free or can live in pain with a dependance on drugs to keep me that way. I suspect this is already happening in the wink, wink nudge, nudge world we live in it. Doctors and patients are already making this decision but if Medicare and the insurance companies decide to monitor this more stringently, this wink wink nudge nudge deal can end tomorrow. Why not just come clean and say sometimes drug addiction is the best option in some cases.

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The Supreme Court determined that it was legal to ban people from sleeping on city streets. This will somehow cause the homeless problem to go away, at least if they are sleeping. I am not sure what happens to them when they are awake. This just moves them along during the night time hours. It reminds me of something the city of Coronado used to do with its homeless. They gave the homeless a bus ticket to San Diego. Problem solved. Until of course a few radio personalities found out about it. They, then, gave the homeless bus tickets to Coronado.

This law is a marketing ploy to give the illusion of action. The public sees the cops taking away the sleeping homeless and think something is being done. But where are they going? What’s to stop them from sleeping outside the city limits and coming back the next day? What happens to repeat offenders? Do they go to jail for illegal sleeping? Then the homeless will have both a home and plenty of food all on the tax payer dime.

This is a waste of time for everyone involved. More work for the cops and the courts. More hassles for the homeless. The public will only have temporary relief from the homeless on their streets. Drug addiction and mental illness will still drive people out into the streets because these are difficult problems that require a bit more thinking, more energy, more money and more time. The public is being tricked into believing something is happening when nothing at all is really changing. But it is a very good trick.