First, be an informed consumer. Just like with a car or washing machine you can learn about medications and other treatments for mental health problems. Turn to websites like your state mental health agency or the National Institute for Mental Health, the National Mental Health Association and the National Alliance for Mental Illness. Google key words about what you want to know, as you would for breast or prostate cancer, diabetes, and heart disease. Ask others who have successfully navigated the mental health care system and taken medications. As has been said, caveat emptor — let the buyer beware — and be prepared.

Second, ask questions of your doctor and other health professionals. Rather than being a marketing arm of the pharmaceutical companies, be a prudent buyer. Don’t be shy — you are your best advocate. When you visit your doctor ask two questions: why are you suggesting this treatment for me and what alternatives do I have? When in doubt get a second opinion: any doctor who does not welcome a second opinion is not worth keeping.

Finally, recognize that medications for mental disorders often help but generally are not sufficient. Great reliance on medications has fostered inattention to individual and family therapy and skill building programs.

Emphases mine. For the rest of the article, click here.

We’ll all miss Steven so much, and I’ll say more about that later. For now, I’m wishing the best to all family and friends who are hurting. That’s what Steven really cared about in the end, though he was very passionately annoyed by knitting, as well.

Steven was often told he was anti-American. I loved his passion, and he cracked us the fuck up every day. This video was part of a series he did for PW called Steven Wells’ America, in which he took sacred cows and basically grilled them for dinner. Below, he reflects on the religiosity of an America that voted for Bush a second time (Steven was a staunch atheist). Toward the end he smiles a bit, so you know that he knows he’s being ridiculous. And that’s part of what was so cute about Steven — he’d rant, but then laugh at himself.

Explanation:

A package of bills sponsored by Senate President Richard J. Codey that are designed to protect patient safety and improve employee training and oversight at state psychiatric hospitals was approved yesterday by the Senate Health, Human Services and Senior Citizens Committee. … Sen. Codey worked closely with the Public Advocate’s office in drafting these bills, in part, to address a number of injuries and deaths that had arisen recently at state facilities such as Ancora Psychiatric Hospital.
Bill S2492, would require the Department of Human Services (DHS) to establish a training program for staff members who work directly with patients at state psychiatric hospitals in order to ensure the delivery of safe, secure, and therapeutic care.  Utilizing best practices in patient treatment, the curriculum would include topics such as state and federal reporting requirements, patient safety, disease prevention, health wellness activities, anger management, skilled decision-making and how to deal effectively with life-threatening emergencies. … The bill would require DHS to establish an on-site educational assessment and remedial instruction program at each state psychiatric hospital in order to evaluate the proficiency of all staff members who work directly with patients.

The bill would also require the commissioner of DHS to establish minimum educational standards for staff members at a hospital who work or will work directly with patients. … Employees already working directly with patients at the time of the bill’s enactment would be required to undergo an evaluation to determine if they meet the educational standards or require remedial instruction through the on-site education program.Any employee that refuses to participate in the training program or fails to meet the educational standards and refuses to participate in remedial instruction, would be terminated from employment at the hospital. …

The second bill, S2493, would require current and future employees of state psychiatric hospitals, developmental centers and veterans’ memorial homes to undergo drug testing for controlled dangerous substances as a condition of employment.

The last bill in the package, S2494, would require DHS to report the number of physical assaults and deaths that occur at state psychiatric hospitals. The report would be a public record, posted on the official DHS website, and updated quarterly, but would not contain any identifying information about patients or staff members.

As a longtime fan of Sen. Codey’s commitment to mental health matters, I do think it’s a good move. But is it transformative? As an astute TTWS reader notes:

It’s hard to see how these three bills alone will transform patient care at New Jersey’s state psychiatric hospitals which includes Ancora, let alone insure the care long required by law, New Jersey Statutes Annotated 30:4-27.1(c), It is the policy of this State that persons in the public mental health system receive inpatient treatment and rehabilitation services in accordance with the highest professional standards and which will enable those hospitalized persons to return to their community as soon as it is clinically appropriate.

Too often words and deeds fail to intersect at our nation’s psychiatric hospitals. Transform and its variants are now used so frequently that any change is considered transformative. More recently at another New Jersey state psychiatric hospital where a new building was going to lead to transformation (click here, paragraph 5), the reality belied the representations, ex. Developing therapeutic alliances between patients and staff remains a challenge, with differences in race, ethnicity, social class and education creating a ‘them versus us’ scenario.

“When I use a word it means just what I choose it to mean — neither more nor less.” Humpty Dumpty

One thing to keep in mind, Fran says: “a voter in the hospital will need assistance from a friend to complete an Emergency Absentee Ballot. The process can be complicated to use for someone who is ill, since the completed ballot has to be hand delivered to the County Election Board….not to your local polling place.”

She also says, “In Philadelphia Remember to Vote the 2 Questions First…..so easy to forget them after choosing candidates. But important YOU be heard on these changes to the City Charter !” This is especially good advice to us with cognitive difficulties.

The below is from Paul O’Hanlon, Esq., of the Disability Rights Network:

Election Day Survival Kit for Voters with Disabilities

Pennsylvania registered a record numbers of new voters last year. If the poll worker cannot find your name on the list of registered voters, ask them to look at the list of “inactive voters.” Voters who have not voted for a few elections, or who did not receive or respond to official election mailings have been placed on a list of “inactive voters.” The act of voting will be sufficient to transfer your name from the ”inactive” to the “active” list. If your name cannot be found on either list, and if you are sure you are at the correct polling place – ask for a provisional ballot. Federal law requires that you be provided with a provisional ballot in such a case. Do not leave the polls without casting a vote!

How do I verify that I am registered to vote?
Go here.

How do I locate my correct polling place?
Go here.

Will I be required to show I.D. to vote?
All first-time voters, and all voters who are voting for the first time in a precinct, can be required to show an acceptable form of I.D. You can find a list of acceptable forms of I.D. here.

If you do not have I.D. when you go to vote, and if returning later with proper I.D. is not an option, you have a right to vote by a Provisional Ballot. Provisional Ballots receive greater scrutiny than other ballots. However, if you are registered to vote, and if your signature matches the signature on your voter’s signature card, then your Provisional Ballot should get counted. If necessary, casting a Provisional Ballot is much better than not voting at all.

Can I get assistance in the voting booth if I need it?

Voters with disabilities have the right to have the person of their choice provide assistance in the voting booth. The person providing assistance can be almost anyone — a friend, a family member, or even a poll worker. However, the assistant cannot be: (1) the voter’s employer; (2) the voter’s union representative; or (3) the Judge of Elections.

When a voter with a disability requests assistance in the voting booth, the poll worker should look up your registration card to see if it has a notation indicating that you require assistance. If there is no notation on the card, you will be required to complete a written statement explaining the nature of your disability. Some voters may be offended at intrusive questions like asking for the name, phone # and address of their doctor. But the poll workers are required to enter all this information, along with the name of the individual who provided assistance, into the “Record of Assisted Voters.” The voting process is a very formal process with many safeguards.

What if I find my polling place is not accessible on Election Day? How can I vote?

Voters with disabilities, as well as seniors 65 and older — who are assigned to inaccessible polling places — are eligible to cast an Alternative Ballot. It is called an “Alternative” ballot because it is a method of voting provided to the voter as an alternative to having an accessible location. (Some deal!)

An Alternative Ballot looks exactly like an Absentee Ballot, but a different colored envelope is used to distinguish it from an Absentee Ballot. The normal deadline to file an application for an Alternative Ballot is the Tuesday before Election Day. However, if you did not know that your polling place is inaccessible, or if you had some good cause for not being able to file by that deadline – you can still vote! The Pennsylvania Department of State created procedures for an Emergency Application for an Alternative Ballot, which may be filed as late as Election Day at 8:00 p.m. A voter with a disability who discovers on Election Day that their polling place is not accessible can file an Emergency Application for an Alternative Ballot. This Emergency Application must be filed on Election Day, before 8:00 p.m., at your County Elections Office.

What if you can’t get to your County Elections Office on Election Day?

If you are unable to travel to the County Elections Office on Election Day, you can get a friend or relative to act as your agent to travel back and forth to the County Elections Office.

You will need to prepare three forms: (1) the Emergency Application for Alternative Ballot; (2) the Designated Agent Form; and (3) the Certification of Designated Agent Form.

What if my right to vote is challenged on Election Day? What if someone says I’m not competent to vote?

In Pennsylvania, we have only 3 qualifications for a person to register and to vote. The individual must be:

• A citizen of the United States for at least one month before the election;

• A resident of Pennsylvania and the election district for at least 30 days before the election;

• At least 18 years of age on or before the day of the election.

Pennsylvania does not have any laws that restrict the right to vote of people who happen to have developmental, mental health, or physical disabilities. In rare instances, Courts issue orders depriving people of the right to vote. But, so far , “electors” in Pennsylvania cannot be challenged on competence, ability or worthiness to vote.
Persons convicted of felonies (or any other crime) are eligible to vote – only individuals currently incarcerated in penal institutions for felony convictions are denied the right to vote.

Who can I call on Election Day if I’m prevented from exercising my right to vote?

Call the Election Protection hotline at 1-866-OURVOTE (1-866-687-8683)
Voters who speak Spanish can call 1-888-VE-Y-VOTA (1-888-839-8682)
or
Disability Rights Network of Pennsylvania

1-800-692-7443

1-877-375-7139 (TODD)

Voting is your right. Don’t leave the polls without voting!
Your vote matters — but only if you use it!

The ACLU’s Voting Rights Project webpage details all kinds of cases in which voting rights are compromised, even in the U.S., even in 2009. I vote because I feel privileged to be able to do so. I’m one of the lucky ones, is how I think about it.

For information on Election Day if you live near me, go to the Committee of Seventy’s website.

Vote on Tuesday, May 19, for judges, city controller. I’ll be running this post again.

To find your polling place, go here.

You don’t have to ponder too long to understand the metaphor here. This morning I heard on the BBC that since the ceasefire, aid groups have been stymied in their efforts to get into Gaza. They’ve been getting the runaround from the Israeli officials. It made me wonder what the good rabbi had to say.

Heard through 21st-century ears, the Plagues that beset ancient Egypt in the Torah’s story of liberation from Pharaoh are ecological disasters.  (Exod . 7:13 to 11:10).

The rivers become undrinkable, locusts consume the crops, a climate disaster of unprecedented hailstorms assails the country, mad cow disease descends upon the herds,  a sandstorm of impenetrable darkness – a darkness you could actually feel, not only see – holds prisoner the land and its inhabitants.

All brought on by Pharaoh’s stubbornness,  his arrogance,  his dependence and insistence on horse-chariot armies to subdue other peoples abroad and slave-driving overseers to subdue workers and ethnic minorities at home.

So go the major outlines of the story. But within these stark, boldly inscribed black-letter texts is hidden a more subtle chiaroscuro of the psychology of power. Why did Pharaoh act in such self-destructive ways?  (Remember, “Pharaoh’s army got drownded, deep in the Red Red Sea.”)

When Moses first invokes Divine power —  showing Pharaoh that he can turn a stick into  a snake  — Pharaoh is dismayed, but after his court experts perform the same trick, he “strengthens” his own heart and  moves forward on his imperial course. When Moses raises the ante and has his stick swallow the sticks of the Egyptian, again Pharaoh is taken aback, but strengthens his own heart  and refuses to let the Israelites make a festival for themselves.

And then what we call the “plagues” begin. Moses strikes the Nile, the life-blood of Egypt, with his stick — and now no mere magic trick follows but a major eco-catastrophe: a “red tide” ironically drowns the Nile into what tastes and smells like blood. The source of Egypt’s life becomes undrinkable, and all its fish die.   This time Pharaoh is frightened — but when his own magicians show they too can pollute the streams, he strengthens his heart against the poor – and God.

Then come the frogs, and Pharaoh surrenders for a moment;  but when the frogs vanish, he toughens his heart. Again, when swarms of mosquitoes infest the land, he wavers but toughens his heart again. Mad cow disease strikes the herds, but Pharaoh toughens his heart.

Boils erupt on the bodies of Egyptians – and now for the first time in response to any of the plagues,  YHWH  — the Breath of Life Itself – strengthens Pharaoh’s heart. 

When hailstorms far worse than had ever afflicted Egypt shatter crops, Pharaoh strengthens his own heart.

Then Moses warns Pharaoh of a plague of locusts that will eat away not only the present crops but their seed for the future, and the will of Pharaoh’s courtiers finally breaks. “Do you not see that you are destroying Egypt?” they cry  out to Pharaoh. But once again the Breath of Life toughens Pharaoh’s  heart, and he overrules even his own advisers, so bent is he on reasserting his own power.

There comes a darkness so thick it could be felt –  perhaps a three-day sandstorm – but once again, though Pharaoh trembles, God hardens Pharaoh’s heart. Only the deaths of all of Egypt’s firstborns push him over the edge into ordering the Israelites to leave –  notice that he orders them, rater than permits them  — and even then, when he awakens in the morning to see his land devastated and his economy torn to shreds, he cannot bear his humiliation, his powerlessness. He orders his army to reenslave the departing Israelites. He and the Army end up drowned in the Sea of Reeds.

We might well ask, Why does God intervene to harden, toughen, stiffen Pharaoh’s heart? At those late moments in the story, what has happened to “free will”?

We might similarly ask, “What has happened to the free will of a heroin addict?”  The first  shooting-up, the fifth, even the tenth, may be acts of free will. But at some point, Reality (call It “God” if you like) takes over. The body has so deeply responded to these acts of free will that it loses its freedom.

And this is what happens to Pharaoh. He chooses hard-heartedness so often that he loses his ability to choose. He  — the most powerful man in the world  — has lost his freedom in order to deny freedom to those he has enslaved. The most powerful army, the most brutal police cannot save him: indeed, they destroy him.

There is a teaching, “Absolute power corrupts absolutely.”   Torah teaches, “Absolute power addicts absolutely  — and self-destructs absolutely.”  And this is a warning to all leaders and peoples, not a mere historical chronicle but an archetypal tale of what happens when top-down, unchecked power becomes not an instrument for change in the service of life but an addiction.  Who today are the institutional pharaohs that are bringing plagues – ecological disasters — upon the earth,  and serfdom – economic disasters – on the people?

Not long ago I wrote about the Jewish vote in the Philadelphia area, and I spoke with Rabbi Arthur Waskow who runs the Shalom Center. His insistent message of peace and reconciliation over many years has been transformational for many on the Jewish left, and I have to say that if I had to hand over leadership of Israel (or Palestine) to anyone, it would be to him. Every so often I get sermons sent via email, and I’m always powerfully moved, despite my agnosticism/atheism. (My father gets upset when I say I’m agnostic. He’s a hardcore atheist. Sorry, Dad!)

Until the madness in Gaza comes to an end (madness that, in my opinion, the Israelis are currently culpable for), I’ll be running the emails from Rabbi Waskow here at The Trouble With Spikol. Waskow isn’t afraid to take sides, but this particular email goes beyond that. Normally, I’d create a jump, but I don’t know how to do that with this software. So it’s really, really long.

Wednesday afternoon I got a phone call: Would I come to Washington on Thursday to stand outside the Israeli Embassy to mourn the dead of Israel and Gaza, and call for a ceasefire?

Groooan. Yes.

So that’s where I was yesterday, along with about 50 other people of many different religious and cultural communities –  ranging in age from 22 to 84, all dressed in black –

all mourning the dead both in Gaza and in Israel,

all calling for a ceasefire and an end of the Israeli embargo/blockade of Gaza.

The vigil was called by Code Pink, a women’s antiwar group founded to oppose the Iraq War. They often use whimsy and humor to oppose war; on this occasion, they were solemn, in mourning, some of them in tears.

Before  the vigil actually formed, there was an odd and almost funny encounter. Almost.

About 80 college-student tourists were standing in line at the Embassy door, waiting for a tour and talk with the Ambassador. Most of the vigilers had not yet arrived; so  I walked up to the students and just started talking.  I explained who we were, what we were doing – Some of them asked questions. One teacher-age man came out of the group to argue with me.

And then — Out from the Embassy came a security officer. He walked up to me and said, “This sidewalk is part of the Embassy, part of Israeli territory. Move.”

I said, “The American police say we are fine here on this sidewalk.”

“It is Israeli territory. Move, or I will arrest you.”

I laughed: “Do you really want the Embassy of Israel to arrest an American rabbi on an American sidewalk?”

“I will arrest you.”

This time I just looked at him. I shrugged. I stayed put where I was. He walked over to the police officer nearby, spoke with him a minute  — turned and walked back into the Embassy.

Funny –  almost.  I thought:  ” Because you have annexed large parts of the West Bank, you think you can annex a strip of American sidewalk?”

Hours later I learned that one of our vigilers had walked into the Embassy with the students, waited toll the Ambassador was speaking, and interrupted to give him a white rose of peace and urge him to support a ceasefire.

When the vigil itself began, I  spoke; so did a former US colonel and foreign service officer who quit over the Iraq war; an aid worker who had spent years on the West Bank; and a Catholic nun in her 8os who was aboard one of the “ship-in”  boats to Gaza that brought medicine and baby food past the blockade before the Israeli attack on Gaza began.

Since the attack, let me note, two more of the ship-in boats were forced to turn back. One was rammed by an Israeli Navy vessel and limped back to Cyprus. The other, just yesterday, certified as weapons-free by Cyprus officials,  carrying desperately needed medicines for Gaza hospitals, was surrounded by Israeli Navy ships and threatened with being fired on. It too finally sailed back to Cyprus.

I began with the blessing over learning Torah, added one for “livakesh u’lirdof hashalom: to seek peace and pursue it.”  Then I mentioned the passage in Joshua where – after crossing the Jordan into Canaan, believing he is on a Divine mission to make Canaan the Land of Israel  – he is confronted by a mysterious messenger from God – an angel.

Joshua demands, :Are you  for us or for our enemies?”  The angel answers: “No.”

No.

God’s vision of reality was deeper, higher. And we were vigiling not on behalf of the Palestinian government or the Israeli government, not supporting either one’s use of military force. We were here out of grief and compassion for the dead and the traumatized of both peoples. Thirteen dead Israelis, and tens of thousands traumatized, forced to leave their homes by the rockets. And more than a thousand Palestinians dead, thousands wounded with no hospitals able to heal them, tens of thousands with no home to flee from or return to – homes blown up.

There had been alternatives, I said. Hamas could have responded to the blockade by asking for hundreds of small boats to break it nonviolently , creating an impossible political problem for the Israeli government. They could have asked Palestinians in Israel and East Jerusalem to create a general strike, a sit-down in Israeli roads, on behalf of ending the embargo.

And  Israel, which certainly is obligated to protect its citizens from rocket attacks, could have done so in other ways. Most simply, it could have ended the blockade, as Hamas was demanding. It could have begun negotiating with Hamas, the de facto government of Gaza.

So we had come like God’s messenger’s “No!”  — to demand an immediate ceasefire, an end to firing rockets from Gaza into Israel, an end to the Israeli invasion and attacks on Gaza, an end to the violence of the Israeli blockade and embargo. If there had been a Hamas office in Washington, we would be there too.

And then I recalled the passage in last week’s Torah portion where Jacob blesses his two grandsons Manasseh and Ephraim. In every other brother-struggle story in the Book of Genesis, it takes decades for estranged and hostile brothers to be reconciled. Here it happens instantly that any conflict between the younger and older is dissolved at once — because there is a third party with greater power and great moral authority.

The Israeli and Palestinian peoples are now so devoured by fear and rage that only a third party can bring both power and moral authority to bear to make a decent peace. That only power is the new Obama administration. It must insist on a regional international emergency peace conference out of which there must come a peace treaty between Israel, a new Palestinian state with its own choice of government, all the Arab states, and Iran.

Why, you might ask, did I draw on Torah, rather than just using secular language to the same end? Because I am trying to heal Torah from the poisonous hate-filled interpretations of it that right-wing Jews and Christians have thrust upon it. Jews chant about the Torah that “all her paths are peace.”  It is time to make that so.

And because I look toward a grand alliance of American Jews, Muslims, and Christians to get the new American government to take this stand. Otherwise it will not; it will fall into the old habits.  Together, the peace-seeking majority of each of our communities can call forth the deeper wisdom of its own tradition and the deep anguish each feels for the death and destruction among our kinfolk in the region of Abraham, Hagar, and Sarah.

In every corner of America, we need new “Tents of Abraham, Hagar, and Sarah,” ready to share deeply with each other and then to act together for peace. Already in many communities groups like the one that created the Abrahamic Call for Peace that came from Boston just a few days ago  are springing up. And three years ago, I worked with a Benedictine nun and a Sufi Muslim scholar to create a study guide and handbook for such a Grand Religious Alliance, The Tent of Abraham. In it there is also an essay by Rabbi Phyllis Berman on how to “pitch this Tent.”   The book is available at a discount with free delivery by going to www.beacon.org/tentofabraham  (When the website asks for a discount code, type in the word “tent” 9with no quote marks).

With blessings of shalom, salaam, peace -
Arthur

Check it out here, but also know that Becca wanted to call it “I Can’t Believe It’s Not Nutter,” which I think is completely hilarious.