Last day in Paris. Quelle domage! Have I sufficiently mangled the French language? I just called to order a taxi for tomorrow morning to take us to the airport, and it’ll be a miracle if it arrives on time. Or even tomorrow. Or ever. I might have called and said, “I’d like a hansom cab for 1920, SVP.” It was that bizarre on my end. I heard her giggle.
liz | 3:53 PM | Uncategorized
Liz Spikol was born in Philadelphia sometime in the 20th century. She started writing about her experience as a person with mental illness in 1999, while employed at Philadelphia Weekly as the paper’s managing editor. Aside from serving as that paper’s web editor, music editor, staff writer, senior editor, executive editor and a host of other random roles that she couldn’t make up her mind about, she has also worked as a Spanish teacher, as a Certified Peer Specialist during Philly’s system-wide transformation and as a communications specialist for a prison reform organization. Currently, she works at the Mental Health Association of Southeastern Pennsylvania and writes book reviews for PW. This blog — named one of the Top 10 Bipolar Blogs of 2007 and 2008 by PsychCentral — is about medications, schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, OCD, PTSD, SAD (and many other acronyms), mad pride, Big Pharma, celebrities, hospitals, stigma and the recovery movement. And other stuff.
I just received the following email regarding testimoney on the Bill to make a Kenda’s Law AOT law in Pennsylvania.
If you have been considering testifying at the public hearing on Pennsylvania’s proposed assisted outpatient (AOT) bill, SB 226, on October 2nd in Harrisburg but first need more information, please visit our Pennsylvania State Activities page located on the Treatment Advocacy Center’s web site at http://www.psychlaws.org/StateActivity/pennsylvania.htm (select “Attend a public hearing” for details on the hearing and/or “SB 226″ to read a copy of the proposed bill).
After reading the information on that site, if you still have any questions, please email me or you can also contact Michele Hansarick, Executive Director, Senate Public Health and Welfare Committee, mhansari@pasen.gov.
If you decide you would like to testify, please contact either me or Michele Hansarick by this Wednesday, September 12 and include the following information: name, address, phone number, and e-mail address (if available) and also state why you want to testify (e.g. you are a family member and want to share your thoughts; you are a person suffering from mental illness; you are a mental health professional; etc) and if you support or oppose involuntary outpatient commitment [a.k.a. assisted outpatient treatment] and the provisions of SB 226.
If you are not able to attend the hearing, you can also send a letter or email expressing your point-of-view on this topic. Or, if you can attend but do not wish to make a statement, your presence at the hearing will also be very valuable.
When I contacted Xavier Amador, Ph.D., http://xavieramador.com/index.html, author of “I’m Not Sick, I Don’t Need Help” to ask for a quote about his opinion of assisted outpatient treatment (AOT) laws such as Kendra’s Law that SB 226 is modeled after, he stated, “AOT is a vital tool that we need to help people who have anosognosia, or lack of insight, for mental illness.”
I hope you will consider being a part of the process of helping Pennsylvania obtain that “vital tool” by your involvement with the public hearing on Tuesday, October 2nd.
hehe. Bonne chance!
For a reasoned and objective explanation AOT, go to http://bazelon.org/issues/commitment/positionstatement.html
There seems to be a lot of subjectivity in deciding who should be subject to AOT. That Bazelon Center link provided by Sally really gives a well-reasoned critique of the whole issue. I believe one of the functions of these kinds of laws is to help enforce the existing social order, and to make the disturbed seem less disturbing to the comfortable and secure.
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