(VT) Before the gun debate, can we talk about mental health issues?

I've managed, so far, to avoid posting anything about the killings at Virginia Tech. Too little was known, and too much didn't add up to allow for a reasoned comment.

Of course, that never stops the media. In much the same way the Imus thing turned into a false and disingenuous debate about black peoples' languauge and vocabulary choices, so has the VT issue been turned into one of a gun debate and a debate about the cowardice of the victims. More than anything, calling the victims cowards absolutely disgusts me.

But I digress.

It seems to me the real issue here is mental health and the care we give those so afflicted.

Of course, for the sake of those who may not recall easily, this all started with that holiest of holy men, Saint Ronald of Reagan. He's the one who opened the mental health facility doors and set that population adrift, without care or support. Since then, mental health care has gotten increasingly dysfunctional.

The young man who appears to be the perp in Blacksburg, appears to have a very long history or mental health issues. Indeed, even his creative writing teacher expressed concerns that perhaps he needed some help.

And yet, the man was out there. Adrift. Without a safety net. Able to give free reign to his internal demons.

We can talk about gun laws. That's a fair debate. We can talk about the cowardice of our citizens if we all feel like going there. (I'm sure mirrors would not be allowed in the room where **that** debate would be held!)

But how about discussing the fundamental issue here. The issue of that perp's mental health. And how, years ago, the seeds of this tragedy were sown and cultivated. The growing crop born out of those seeds planted so many years ago was known to more than a few people.

But the system to help him - and save the victims we're now burying - failed.

Massively.

THAT ought be the debate we have today.

Mental health care and support for the basic emotional needs of all people is sorely lacking in America. It is the root of a huge bunch of problems.

but was convinced he didn't need it.

That's the problem with these guys. They are far, far above ordinary mortals. They see everything clearly and have no need for some wigpicker who is as far below them as a flea is below ordinary mortals.

Unless you want to start forcing people back into mental hospitals for aberrant behavior, I'm afraid the only way to get these jokers off the street is to wait for them to snap and then try to minimize the damage. It still happens rarely enough to constitute an acceptable risk.

And for the record, I wish there was a hell so Reagan could reside there for eternity for throwing mental patients out onto the street and then refusing to fund their care in the community.

some patients are notoriously "noncompliant" with their treatment plans, when they manage to get to see a MH professional. So that's another dimension that needs to be recognized.

However, thus far armchair diagnoses and various speculations are contributing to stigma.
I participate in advocacy and I have friends who have severe mental illnesses. They go through rounds and rounds of tweakings of medications and simply spend their lives struggling.

Even worse is that discussions about particular illnesses twists that facts, warp the mythology, and perpetuate stigmas so that the mention of their illness brings about hurtful reactions.

I am only suggesting caution and respect.

sad state of affairs, even the media should be reporting on it, by the way I agree with you.

And we have to figure out how to treat the mentally ill, and to ensure that they never have access to firearms.

But to bring him back to "normal" insanity requires "normal" society be there for him to function in, this has changed, loss of jobs, lower income, lack of healthcare.
Society has shifted leaving many unable to function "normally" imho.

upon edit. Many people can function outside the box and its a good thing that brings change, but pushing the masses out of it, we got trouble.

Aside from the multiple legal issues involved in involuntary treatment and treatment in general one of the primary problems is the lack of funding for research on what causes these brain diseases.

The issues of patience resistance to treatment are complicated. There has been some indication that the area of the brain that controls denial may be impacted for some suffering from Schizophrenia which makes disease acknowledgment on the patients part even more challenging.

The fact is that schizophrenia does not appear to be "one disease" that can be pinpointed to a root cause and therefore treatment is done in a series of trial and error efforts to ameliorate symptoms.

Tagged for interest.

That simplification I am seeing may be comforting to some, life being so cut and dry, black and white, but that comfort comes at a cost. Without examining how this person got to that point how could we possibly stop it from happening again?

Some say schizophrenic, some say it was a side effect from the anti-depressants. No one knows now for sure and may never know. But the topic is mental illness. One layer of prevention is stopping mentally ill people from being able to arm themselves sure. But another is to find a way to recognize it and deal with it before it's too late.

I personally hestitate when correlating treatment for depression causing another symptom of depression. I have a bias in favor of these drugs personally that gives me doubt to this. From my completely untrained eye he seems likely schizophrenic. Intelligent with a gradual descent to manifesting it in late teens early 20s. It's so easy to judge anyone that dealt with him now with hindsight knowledge of what they should have said or done. What we need is a known system for dealing with people as if they all have this potential. Treat sick people not evil people in order to stop the next evil act from the sick person.

I really feel so bad for his family. They are victims in their own unique horror.

Thanks to all of the posters.

...and what the forensic psychologist said on CNN--it seems highly likely that he was
sexually abused in childhood. It was horrendous to hear the psychologist say that his
writing was soaked with feelings of helplessness and powerlessness, which turned to anger.

I've met many survivors of sexual abuse, and the damage is catastrophic. Some people turn
the anger on themselves--resulting in depression and addictions. Some turn the anger outward--
and violence like we've seen in Virginia happens.

I was sexually abused. In my early years of therapy, I processed a tremendous amount of
rage. There was so much rage that I thought I was going bonkers. I would go out to the
garage and smash wicker baskets with a baseball bat. I was lucky. I had health care and a
stellar therapist who allowed me to call him daily during these rough times. He assured me
that my feelings--although strong and scary--were normal and to feel them.

I remember researching sexual abuse--in particular, the anger that some survivors feel. I
recall reading that many survivors have rage and anger that is equivalent to what a serial
killer feels. I remember being very scared about that. Not for myself--because I had my
wicker baskets and my therapists. I was scared for those who don't have health care or
access to a therapist or any kind of support.

I agree this is a mental-health issue. More specifically, I think this issue is about
violence in our society, in particular, against children--and the plight of these
adult children.

I'm certainly not excusing what the perpetrator did. Not at all. However, violent
acts are more likely to be prevented--if society takes more seriously the issue of
child sex abuse and other violent crimes against children.

We are breeding a nation of very traumatized people who grow up and have to live in
society. Some people are able to heal. Some struggle for a lifetime. Some never
get help, and sometimes violence is unleashed on many undeserving victims.

We should all work toward coming out of denial about this country's epidemic of
childhood sexual abuse, which happens to 1 in 4 girls and 1 in 7 boys, and understanding the
long-term effects of denying this epidemic.

It's a pet issue of mine. K&R.

Summary:

Recent regulatory warnings about adverse behavioural effects of antidepressants in susceptible individuals have raised the profile of these issues with clinicians, patients, and the public. We review available clinical trial data on paroxetine and sertraline and pharmacovigilance studies of paroxetine and fluoxetine, and outline a series of medico-legal cases involving antidepressants and violence.

Both clinical trial and pharmacovigilance data point to possible links between these drugs and violent behaviours. The legal cases outlined returned a variety of verdicts that may in part have stemmed from different judicial processes. Many jurisdictions appear not to have considered the possibility that a prescription drug may induce violence.

The association of antidepressant treatment with aggression and violence reported here calls for more clinical trial and epidemiological data to be made available and for good clinical descriptions of the adverse outcomes of treatment. Legal systems are likely to continue to be faced with cases of violence associated with the use of psychotropic drugs, and it may fall to the courts to demand access to currently unavailable data. The problem is international and calls for an international response.

Introduction:

In 1989, Joseph Wesbecker shot dead eight people and injured 12 others before killing himself at his place of work in Kentucky. Wesbecker had been taking the selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor (SSRI) antidepressant fluoxetine for four weeks before these homicides, and this led to a legal action against the makers of fluoxetine, Eli Lilly <1>. The case was tried and settled in 1994, and as part of the settlement a number of pharmaceutical company documents about drug-induced activation were released into the public domain. Subsequent legal cases, some of which are outlined below, have further raised the possibility of a link between antidepressant use and violence.

more:

http://medicine.plosjournals.org/perlserv/?request=get-document&doi=10.1371%2Fjournal.pmed.0030372

Another reason for people to go off their meds...

I'm tired of my meds. I've heard they can do bad things to me. Maybe I can stay at your house while I'm not taking them?

Bah. Just heard another nightmare story yesterday about someone who only takes her meds when she feels she needs them. Trouble is, she never feels she needs them when she really, really needs them the most. I had a friend like that. She tried to kill herself in my bathtub.

My mom is a person who could have benefited from modern meds. Maybe she still could. But to have her tell it, she's better off without and it's all an evil plot by the medical establishment anyways. Needless to say, I had an ...interesting... childhood.

And God, it's a genetic thing. You should've witnessed my great grandma chasing people off with a kitchen knife, or my grandma hitting and biting and ripping at the paramedic's clothes. You'd be surprised how many large grown men it takes to subdue a little old crazy lady.

This nation's attitudes about mental health are insane. We're too fucking afraid to face the problem in a straightforward way. Instead we'd much rather blame the people who are suffering, or guns, or evil spirits, or some imaginary and fantastical pressure that causes regular people to "SNAP!"

The really crappy thing is that there are still good reasons NOT to seek care, you can still mess up your future if that sort of thing is on your record, or you can't afford the meds that work for you and suddenly have to stop taking them, and people do have to cover for people who are for the most part harmless, because mental illness is such a huge stigma in so many places, and people with known mental health issues aren't hired, or insured, and denied housing.

A long time ago, I was asked to leave college twice for my sometimes bizarre behavior. It was all hush-hush no real records kept because people who were looking out for me didn't want to jeopardize my future. My third try at college, I graduated, and quite honestly I'm much more stable and more likely to stay out of trouble than most people who are not considered to be mentally ill.

If we don't fix this insanity within our society, if we start to look at every eccentric "loner" as a potential mass murderer, and not as someone to reach out to, then our problems will only get worse. There will be more crime, more drug abuse, more alcoholism, more homelessness, and more suffering overall.

There ain't no herbal supplement, religion, or feel-good philosophy that will solve these problems. There's some gritty, hard, dirty, painful work to do to make things right. If we're looking for something or someone to blame, we're never going to accomplish anything, we may as well be blaming every bad thing that happens on evil spirits and bad vapors and the voices in our heads.

I honestly think that's where we are at as a society -- we'd rather believe in good and evil because solving actual problems is hard work. Any clan of chimpanzees or wolves or elephants or orcas probably has a much better grasp of reality than we humans do. Our silly heads are full of meaningless things, and we pick on one another like abused chickens, plucking the feathers out of the weaker among us.

and can't help but think that what has been spent in Iraq would have funded the first decade, at least.

When it becomes obvious to those brain-dead morans that still support this regime that the government doesn't give a shit what happens to them, we might see some change. But I'm not holding my breath.