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Just Another Sunny Day [In Santa Monica|
By lindamuralidharan on 2013-06-14 01:03:13
Yes, just another sunny day here and maybe also where you were when the news broke. A young California man, well
known to be “troubled” and fascinated by guns kills both family members and members of the community with a high
powered gun and in possession of obscene amounts of ammunition. He is said to have lived in Santa Monica with his mother
after a separation of the family with a father and at least one sibling living separately. The father and brother were killed in
his rampage. He is said by neighbors to have been so filled with rage at times that neighbors heard his booming voice
through the walls of the home shared with his mother. He is said to have had some kind of mental health treatment earlier in
his life and some kind of prior contact with the police. It is said that acquaintances of the family were “concerned” by his
ongoing behavior. Last week I wrote from the standpoint of considering some legal and personal measures that need to be
debated and likely enacted into law with regard to making the possession of guns in this country safer and more rationally
regulated. Mental health is an indirect but related issue, and that is what I am focusing on here. What means do we have by
which to intercept this young man’s life trajectory before it takes a fatal turn? His life ended also at the time he ended the
lives of others who were completely innocent and even if some dysfunction on the part of his family of origin contributed to
his troubles, nobody deserves to die because of mistakes in family or community living. What first comes to mind is mental
health treatment. Is there a sufficient range of services available in each and every community in the USA? I can answer
that one. There are not sufficient services to serve all the folks who need some level of assistance. Assistance can cover
everything from affordable access to a doctor who can prescribe appropriate medication if needed to subsidized housing
options whether in a group home or in an independent living setting. And in between there may be everything from
outreach volunteers who provide socialization opportunities to access to financial benefits for those whose illness prevents
them from maintaining regular paid work. [caption id="attachment_4559" align="aligncenter" width="600"]
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Working towards a society that values everyone with mental health problems[/caption] Some communities provide all of the
above, and some provide only the barest skeleton of a mental health system. Some services are supported by tax dollars,
some by public non-profit organizations and some by privately paid for medical and housing options. And when we think of
the issues affecting Adam Lanza (who killed many people in Newtown, Conn.) and John Zawahri, what is the state of our
knowledge about the causes and treatment of their states of mind when they commit homicide and/or suicide? We have
pretty limited knowledge when we consider the field in relation to what we know about electronics or advanced medical
procedures for joint replacement or treatment of diabetes. We do know, however, that people can be helped if the right
circumstances can be brought about, and we have learned from some people who are in a happy state of recovering from
various mental problems, that solutions do exist. I am here to advocate for our society as a whole to take responsibility for
preventing future waste of human life by improving knowledge about mental health and how to work towards it if a person
is on the wrong track. For one thing, I encourage family members to join organizations and services that specifically guide
families in the kinds of behaviors and conversations that make things worse for their ill family member and the kinds of
things that can improve the situation even if the individual is not ready to accept direct treatment from a professional. There
is therapy for families and there are organizations like the National Association for the Mentally Ill (NAMI) who welcome
everyone with a desire to learn and help. One of the news organizations reported that here was another disturbed young man
living with a single mother who was trying to cope with his disability. This is significant. It is usually too much for a family
to manage a very ill person at home especially if the person shows signs of potential violence. Until a family has engaged
in a program to help such families cope and until the ill person has shown at least a degree of willingness to try treatment, it
is wise for the person to live away from the family. The rest of us in society need to be engaged in a learning process and a
lobbying process. How do we identify those who need treatment before disasters occur? What are the gaps in your
community mental health system? What needs can very well be met by a conscientious and dedicated local government
entity? What services and funding needs to be implemented from the Federal level? Whom do you lobby or ask to join you
as community advocates for better services? What is the role of the schools? Did you know that recent research projects
have identified some very early warning signs for youth who may likely develop a psychotic illness in the years immediately
following? Were you aware that there are interventions that can be used to make prevention of such an illness possible and
that schools play a key role in identifying young people needing these interventions? As they say, don’t let the perfect be the
enemy of the possible. If we save a dozen lives in the next two years...well it would be better to save a hundred, but if your
daughter were one of the saved twelve you would not quibble about statistics. I hope we can work toward saving lives one
at a time, if necessary. In the process, if you are so inclined, you would feel very positive because you have reduced even
more in the way of human suffering than just the actual physical lives of people. A person who is experiencing an emotional
illness is in a great deal of mental/emotional pain most of the time unless engaged in effective treatment. In any event, we
need as a society to devote more resources to preventing and treating those clusters of negative behaviors that we have
chosen to call "mental illness".
Here is one of many resources on the Internet. The web site listed immediately below this sentence tells about one person's
dynamic experiences with personal episodes of mental illness and her life after she entered into treatment and recovery.
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http://www.wambui-bahati.com
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Also, NAMI has many types of resources, and I have just illustrated one of them below. NAMI can also assist people in
finding local NAMI chapters both on and off campus.
Learn About The Issue
There is much we now know about students and the mental health issues they experience while attending college. Here are
some brief facts and stats about college students and mental health. This data undoubtedly makes the case for the importance
of addressing the mental health needs of all students on college campuses and why everyone should care about this issue.
Check out NAMI's resources for faculty, staff and students to begin to address these important issues. Mental health issues
are prevalent on college campuses. (Please check web site for the specifics).
e 75 percent of lifetime cases of mental health conditions begin by age 24!
e One in four young adults between the ages of 18 and 24 have a diagnosable mental illness. More than 25 percent of
college students have been diagnosed or treated by a professional for a mental health condition within the past year.>
¢ More than 11 percent of college students have been diagnosed or treated for anxiety in the past year and more than 10
percent reported being diagnosed or treated for depression.*
¢ More than 40 percent of college students have felt more than an average amount of stress within the past 12 months.>
¢ More than 80 percent of college students felt overwhelmed by all they had to do in the past year and 45 percent have
felt things were hopeless.°
e Almost 73 percent of students living with a mental health condition experienced a mental health crisis on campus.’
Yet, 34.2 percent reported that their college did not know about their crisis.
¢ Colleges across the country have reported large increases in enrollment.’ At the same time, college counseling centers
have also observed an increase in the prevalence and severity of mental health issues experienced by students and an
increase in the number of students taking psychotropic medications. !°
Go to the NAMI web site for more details and other data and resources. Well, I had a surprise myself this week. I was
engaged in a conversation with a troubled teenager whom I know quite well. He has issues with anger, depression, ill
advised use of pot, family break up problems, early childhood problems of abandonment, and etc. I have been worried
about him as he has pretty well seemed to have lost interest in anything but pot, electronic games, and high energy music.
He has a few friends and his closest spends hours with him on the violent video games and when they can get away with it,
smoking pot. School grades were never great, and now they have tumbled to new depths. I started a casual conversation
with him about our national privacy issues. He had some opinions to share about that and was open to a two way dialogue
that looked at issues from several angles. Often he is passive and withdrawn in social settings but he was animated and
engaged in this case. The subject turned to the various school shootings, and his first thought was to not publicize these
events so there is no copy cat temptation. Then he acknowledged the public has a right to know, and I posed the question of
how to help such individuals work through their anger, their urge to kill. Quickly but quietly, the young man said to me:
“We could comfort them.” I was completely blown away by what sounded to me like maturity beyond his years and a
thoughtfulness that he has all too rarely shared in my presence. Maybe I just need to give him more opportunities...and be
prepared to comfort him when he may signal a need for it.
And on sunny days and cloudy days all across the country I hope more people will reach out to friends, neighbors, public
officials. I hope they offer comfort and encouragement for meeting the emotional and mental health need of our
communities. I hope we speak up in sufficient numbers that the elected representatives allocate more funds to provide a
better and more comprehensive mental health system.
[caption id="attachment_4561" align="aligncenter" width="600"]
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we m i ca | Photo from article about the
mentally ill homeless at Philadelphia Occupy, philadelphiaweekly.com[/caption]
