Sisters

As if the world needed more memoirs, Mary Loudon has written about her journey to “discover” her schizophrenic sister, Catherine — after Catherine’s death from breast cancer.

I haven’t read the book. But I can’t help feeling there’s something mercenary about finally plumbing the depths of your sister’s life after she’s gone, particularly when you haven’t seen her for many years. The author, Mary, claims Catherine wasn’t much into the family, though it sounds as though she had a fairly involved relationship with their parents.

Writers are vultures — I should know. I comb the carcass of every experience roughly, oh, two seconds after I have it, hoping the shreds will amount to a column, a post, a poem, a video, a book. It’s disgusting, and perfectly natural at the same time.

But there are places even I wouldn’t go. My sister and I, though we love each other, are kind of estranged, and that’s partly my fault. If she dies tomorrow, I won’t be writing a book about her, turning her pain into my own. It’s not fair. It’s not my story to tell.

The few pages of the book I managed to read on Amazon also made me uncomfortable. Mary was the “lucky” sister, pretty and married and smart and a mother and successful writer. “I enjoyed great good fortune,” she writes. “It looks as if Catherine and I began our lives in the same place but we didn’t. She had schizophrenia and I did not.” There is something smug and kind of icky about all this self-congratulation, even in the context of sympathy. It’s as if she assumes her loser schizo sister deserves her pity, when in fact it sounds to me like she lived a pretty okay life for the last 12 years or so.

Anyway, now Mary is the lucky sister again — in part because she’s co-opted the unlucky. Then again, as one of the book blurb reads: “Mary Loudon sets out to learn the story of her vanished sister, but winds up finding herself.”

Ew.

Relative Strangers

liz | 3:08 PM | Uncategorized

Such a lovely piece of writing, I had to share it with you

From Kent, one of the TTWS faithful (thankfully):

That pigeon photo reminds me of something that happened to me last Spring. Coming back from my favorite Starbucks one morning, I saw two pigeons at the foot of a big cement planter by the edge of a bridge. One of them was standing right next to the planter, so close that it was completely out of the rain (which was coming down at an angle), with its head slumped way forward. The other one was sort of standing beside the first, away from the planter. It seemed to be making little noises towards the first one.

Later that morning, after the rain had stopped, I came back to that same place. The first pigeon was still there, and still in that same slumped forward position, but this time it was all alone. I guess its companion must’ve finally realized that it wasn’t going to wake up. Sometimes I think people don’t give animals like pigeons enough credit for having thoughts and feelings.

About the Jersey shore – I’ve never been there, but I think I remember seeing ads for some amusement park at Asbury Park inside comic books that I used to read when I was very young. To be able to take a weekend trip or even a day trip to someplace like that seems to me to be an important sign of mental health, and a good way to help maintain it. I think the ease of being able to do that is one advantage that the northeastern U.S. has over other, less sparsely populated areas. I remember once taking a trip like that with a friend from Boston to the historic town of Concord, Massachusetts. We took a train (I think it was a “commuter train” – run mainly for commuters, but I’m not sure).

The sense of independence and adventure that experiences like that can give you – even when things don’t go exactly right – can really improve your outlook on life and the world in general. I think it’s a shame that poverty prevents many people from being able to have such experiences. It’s a shame that poverty is such a constant companion to so many of us who have been through the mental health system – I think such poverty is often one of the biggest obstacles to recovery.

[Photo of Asbury Park, New Jersey, by Sister72]

liz | 11:18 AM | Uncategorized

R.I.P. Grace Paley

Ah, one of my favorite writers. I felt like I knew her.

Grace Paley, Writer and Activist, Dies

liz | 4:36 PM | Uncategorized

The Trouble With Spikol: Print Edition: The Mysteries of This Burgh

Summer is the time of year I actually look around me. In winter and even fall, my sensitivity to cold means I’m so smothered in fleece and down, I’m unable to move a ski-gloved pinkie, let alone lift my swaddled head.

So I’m always surprised to see the city again. Once we get past the rainy spring, I see the sun alight on lovely things—fountains, trees, line-drawn stickers on dumpsters.

People seem more alive, and less fully clad, and I feel fondness toward them. I find myself striking up conversations at the bus stop, holding doors open and saying “God bless you!” when someone sneezes, even if they’re 50 yards away. Because though they won’t hear it, the Cosmic Being Who Lives in My Head will, and he’ll know I am kind, even in the presence of a stranger’s mucus.

I always tell people how much I love the heat. I lived in Texas for a few years, so I came to think of it as sensual rather than head-spinningly revolting. But my self-satisfied proclamations fizzle when it’s 99 degrees out with 99 percent humidity. Then I get cranky, and think, “Hold the door yourself, bitch.” Only I say it in my head as “beyotch”—I guess because I’m a dork.

Lately I notice most of my thoughts are prefaced with, “Why the hell … ?” It signifies the end of summer: Things that were passingly strange for two months have now taken on an impenetrable veil of inscrutability. After frustrating weeks of trying to solve the mysteries below, I’m sending out the alarm and hoping you can help. If not, I’ll just call SEPTA. About all of them.

On the Broad Street Line, there’s a recorded female voice that warns the doors are closing. Why does she say, “Da-aws closin’,” as though she’s from the South? Did Philly buy Alabama’s subway recording? (If we did, it’s because we could get it for cheap.) Personally, I’d prefer a nice, wide Philly accent for the Broad Street Line, along the lines of a dipthongy, “Doaws cloh-sing, airight?”

Why don’t conductors on the regional rail know how to pronounce town names? You’d think they’d be the experts. I know they don’t live in Daylesford, necessarily, or Upsal, but I feel like the two prerequisites of the conductor job are to be able to enunciate, loudly, and to have some familiarity with a hole punch. Is that asking too much? A native Tupelhockonian needs to interrupt the next time one of those sonorous baritones mangles their town name. They need to take a stand. Rise up, Tupelhocken! Rise up!

I know everyone talks about how Philly smells in the summer. It’s passe to even mention it. I’m guessing it was first discussed in the summer of 1776. Yet I must ask: Why does the parking lot of a certain 43rd and Walnut supermarket sometimes smell like poo? I was there with a friend visiting from L.A., and she was horrified by the odor—which of course, being a Philadelphian, I hadn’t even noticed. We determined it was emanating from a giant brownish puddle of water (we hope, we hope), which we wisely avoided. It made L.A. smog seem like Febreze.

Why do people feel smug when they’re seated at an outdoor table? They peer out at the pedestrians with pity and condescension, whispering about us in low tones as they feed each other calamari and sip overpriced wine. So what if I’m plodding by with one of my cute flats mangled beneath my heel because its cuteness gave me a blister? So what if my sweater’s on backward and you can see the tag is the old-font Gap (but before the old font became new again)? It’s not like you sit down at Rouge and a Boxer dog-fairy turns you into a royal. Hear this, sidewalk superiors: Your reign lasts only as long as your post-dinner coffee.

In one subway or another—I can’t keep track anymore—there’s a McDonald’s ad celebrating African-American franchise owners in Philadelphia. It features a photo of about 20 men and women laughing and pointing as if they’re in the same room, though it looks like (and this might be intentional in a horribly misguided way) they’re just cut out and pasted together. The poor quality of the ad isn’t baffling—seen one local-yokel ad campaign, seen ’em all. What is baffling is that the woman at the center of the photo—the one around whom all this bonhomie swirls—is white. And blond. And white. Months of study of this advertisement hasn’t made her blacker. Who is this mysterious pale ingenue?

Of course I have more such observations, but most of my confusion is self-directed. Why do I think flip-flops and an old pedicure is the equal of work shoes? Why does every short-sleeved summer shirt I put on make my upper arms look like sausage links? Why do I find myself telling doubters that the Jersey shore in summer is as good as the Riviera?

Some questions are better left unanswered, I suppose. For all the rest, there’s SEPTA.

[Photo, by me, of a dead pigeon in the subway. Why, dead pigeon, why? Another mystery.]

More »

liz | 1:09 PM | Uncategorized

Downgraded

I keep getting headlines about hurricane Dean in my email in-box because of Google news alerts: “Dean Downgraded to Tropical Depression,” for instance. And I was thinking, wouldn’t it be great if the meteorological powers that be could do that for my mental health status? The headlines would read, “Spikol Downgraded to Temporary Depression; Danger Over by Wednesday.” Then I’d know I could be back at work in a couple days and I wouldn’t have to panic over whether my mental house would have its roof blown off.

liz | 10:22 AM | Uncategorized

Janssen parties tonight

Kent emailed to say Risperdal has been approved by the FDA for kids between the ages of 13 and 17.

Adult drug OK’d for kids

liz | 4:33 PM | Uncategorized

My brain itches. Will you scratch it?

Got an email from Philip Dawdy about academic freedom. I then spent the next several hours reading transcripts, articles and assorted documentation, and have concluded that I can no more encapsulate this story than turn water into wine. Please refer to his website for what’s an extremely interesting and confounding discussion, including a subplot about Munchausen’s By Proxy — a diagnosis that I don’t think is ENTIRELY unwarranted, at least not if you have a Jewish mother.

Muzzling Academics, British Style

liz | 3:31 PM | Uncategorized

Bipolar Made Me Do It: Grab Elie Wiesel

We know two things about Eric Hunt (pictured), of Vernon, N.J.: He has serious psychiatric problems, and he was interested in Holocaust denial for a few years before he confronted Elie Wiesel at a peace conference earlier this year. Sometimes, these two things can go together in disastrous ways, as in the case of Rusty Weston, or Richard Bauhammers. In this case, luckily, little harm was done, despite erroneous media reports, like this one at sfist, saying he tried “to beat the holy hell” out of Wiesel, which is not at all clear.

What is clear is that, at a meeting of a peace conference, he confronted Wiesel in an elevator, asked to speak to him, grabbed him, tried to drag him down the hallway, and then fled when Wiesel screamed. Wiesel was not injured; he was merely grabbed. He wasn’t even wrestled to the ground, or punched, or hit.

I’m Jewish, and not fond, shall we say, of Holocaust deniers. Nor am I fond of unwarranted grabbing. But this man is ill; when police located him to arrest him, he was already in a psychiatric hospital. Prosecutors — who don’t deny Hunt’s mental illness — are overzealously charging him with attempted battery, stalking, kidnapping, false imprisonment, elder abuse and false imprisonment of an elder, compounded, in each case, by a hate crime allegation. If convicted, he’ll serve seven years.

I’m not defending Hunt’s views on the Holocaust, but I’m suggesting they may have been inflected by illness. In the recent past, in a psychotic moment, I saw an old man’s eyes seem to drip blood. I didn’t act on it, but what if I leaned across the table and shoved a tissue in his face until he screamed? Should I be charged with elder abuse? I realize that’s an imprecise analogy, but this is complicated. I hope Wiesel — who should understand complexity after all these years — will consider the prosecutorial strategy and perhaps intervene when the case goes to trial.

Vernon Man to Stand Trial

[Thanks to Susan S. for letting me know about this story. I couldn't do this without you guys.]

liz | 10:18 AM | Uncategorized

That’s it?

In the days of multimillion-dollar lawsuits, I can’t help feeling this settlement isn’t much of a win for the plaintiffs. Below is the entirety of Michael P. Buffer’s article from the Wilkes-Barre (Pa.) Citizens Voice:

The Luzerne County Correctional Facility Board voted Monday to pay $150,000 to settle a lawsuit about a 1995 suicide in the prison.

Luke Blumer, 19, hanged himself on Dec. 13, 1995, with bedsheets and shoelaces. The lawsuit alleged prison officials knew the Hazleton man was suicidal but still placed him in cell by himself without adequate supervision.

His wife, Nicole Blumer, and attorney, Joseph Rich, the administrator of his estate, sued the county.

The county is not accepting responsibility for the suicide by settling, Solicitor Jim Blaum said. The settlement was recommended by the county’s outside legal counsel, Blaum said.

The county must pay for expenses because it did not have liability insurance for the prison during the time the suit was filed.

Blumer was serving a sentence for burglary and criminal trespass. His sentence was for a minimum of two years.

liz | 2:36 PM | Uncategorized

Deinstitutionalization: I know I should jump this, but I can’t

Recently I worried about the pending closure of Mayview Hospital, home to more than 200 people with severe mental illness. My concern is for their future: Where will they go? What will they do? What if they don’t have family or community resources? Will they end up homeless?

My nervousness for their future provoked a few reponses, particularly after I suggested that deinstitutionalization has failed many people, and I cited Philadelphia in particular. But that’s oversimplifying things — something that’s all too easy to do on a blog.

Mental health care advocate extraordinaire Fran Hazam sent out a very interesting report, “Learning From History: Deinstitutionalization of People with Mental Illness As Precursor to Long-Term Care Reform,” by the Kaiser Foundation — coincidentally published just a few days ago. It does a good job of examining the key mistakes made in the past, one of which was an overreliance on families as a source of support. (When you ask families to take on the role of professional caregivers, maybe you end up with TAC. Just a thought. And an overly simplistic one, at that!)

The Kaiser report identified the following as some of the mistakes in past deinsitutionalization policy:
Inappropriate living situations, insufficiently provided essential services; insufficient connection between state policy for institutions and federal policy for community care; insufficient resources; multiple funding streams were uncoordinated; and discrimination in housing.

Thankfully, we can learn from those mistakes. And in the case of Philadelphia, we did and we have, as Susan Rogers, of the Mental Health Association of Southeastern Pennsylvania, points out. She writes:

You write, “Though it’s generally cause for celebration when people get out of the hospital, we’ve seen, especially in cities like Philly, how deinstitutionalization failed many former patients, who ended up homeless and hungry.” Liz, it is not state hospital closings that render people homeless; it is the lack of decent, affordable housing.

I’d like to call your attention to an article from the Philadelphia Inquirer (“Mentally Ill’s Safety Net Found Strong,” 5/13/96), about a Pew study of what happened to people after Philadelphia State Hospital was closed. The third and fourth paragraphs read:

The city [of Philadelphia] can care for its mentally ill population without a state institution as a safety net, according to a new study funded by The Pew Charitable Trusts. “The dire predictions of lack of access to care, of homelessness, of people sitting on grates throughout the city don’t appear to be borne out by the data,” said Carolyn Asbury, Pew’s director for health and human services.

In fact, the closing of Philadelphia State Hospital sparked a revolution in the city’s public mental health system. You say “deinstitutionalization failed many former patients.” This is true of the deinstitutionalization movement of the early 1960s, when people were released from institutions with no provisions made to serve them in the community. It is very different from the closing of Philadelphia State Hospital, when the Coalition for the Responsible Closing of Philadelphia State Hospital made sure that the dollars supporting the hospital followed the patients into the community to set up a system of services and supports, so that they wouldn’t fall through the cracks. This system was also designed to serve what is known as the “diversion” population – people who would have been served by the state hospital if it had remained open.

Clearly, people must have stable housing in the community, along with the services and supports they need in order to live successfully there. According to the article you posted from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, state officials are working on making sure that these things are in place. And I do believe that, any time people who have been locked up in an institution are released to live their lives in freedom, it is a cause for celebration.

I agree with that, of course. I want people to be free and well. I’m just a worrier, I guess. And maybe I’m only worrying about a small number of people, as the Kaiser report suggests:

Clearly, deinstitutionalization policy has been a success for most people who might in other times be in a public psychiatric hospital. But for many it has fallen short of providing the services necessary to move toward recovery and have a desirable quality of life. For a small minority (about 1% of those with serious mental illness, or 136,000 people in 2000) now incarcerated in jail and prison, the situation is particularly bad.

My understanding is that that number is quite a bit higher now. I also worry about quality of life. I know it’s better to be out of an institution. I just wish we could find a way for people to be more successful when they come out, particularly when they’re older. Again, from the Kaiser report:

Still unaddressed are problems of poverty. SSI condemns recipients to live with incomes at about 75 percent of the federal poverty level. As a result, in 2004, they would have needed 110 percent of their entire monthly income to rent a modest one-bedroom unit. Many individuals now in nursing homes have depleted their resources and will be left with SSI or similarly low incomes. Many elderly individuals living in the community will be in similar situations. Addressing the problems of abject poverty will take a comprehensive effort.

Luckily, in 2007, we are better prepared than ever before to deal with a hospital closing like this one. I feel confident that Susan is correct, and I will try my best not to worry so much.

[Photo by atomicpuppy68]

liz | 10:25 AM | Uncategorized