Losing

Last week, I came across this video post...

It's hard to watch because it feels very honest and direct.

As adults, we are caught off-guard.  It challenges our ideals of what childhood should be like knowing full well that, at the same age, we all kept secrets and pretended to be somebody who only really existed in family snapshots. 

To watch this is to have unfocused outrage.  Tillie has experienced things that no child should experience, even though to be an adult is to experience everyone of them in some form or other.

We want to help, to reach through the little YouTube window and try in some way to make it better even though we would, at best, only be delaying the inevitable disappointments of adulthood.

The real message of this video is not in the incidents of her life--shocking though they may be--but in how she has chosen to respond.  The take-away is that, after all that has happened to her, she is still accepting, still willing to listen, still thinks that everybody, no matter who they are, is "beautiful."

* * *

One of my jobs is to keep the Agency's Facebook pages supplied with new material.  To do that, I look at lots of blog posts, news stories and videos from all over the world.  Lately, there has been a whole lot of material relating to teen suicide.

It doesn't seem to matter whether the suicide happened in the developing world, the developed world, across the street or across the country, it was remarkable to me how similar the stories are one to another.

The players in each of these dramas have experienced loss, or have been threatened with loss; have been shamed, or believe they have brought shame to their families.

One story that has produced a number of different articles concerns a murder-suicide in Mississauga, Ontario near Toronto.  A 16 year-old male jumped from an overpass onto a busy expressway just prior to the discovery of the body of his 17 year-old female friend.  The young man survived the fall and being struck by at least one car only to succumb to his injuries a week later.

In the days since this double tragedy, it has come out that the male and female were friends, but that the male wanted more of a romantic relationship and the female did not share the same feelings.

The impact of this story and others like it on adults is generally one of shock and surprise.  We can't seem to understand why the young man would take the life of his friend and then try to kill himself.  Surely, this was just a case of unrequited puppy love.  What's the big deal?  Right?

The arc of childhood development is the evolution of empathy.  As infants we are completely self-obsessed and, hopefully, before we are turned loose on the world, we have some sense that others may have equally, if not more, compelling needs and desires than our own.

Researchers are now telling us that the brain is not fully developed until the mid-twenties.  Seen in that context, the challenges of navigating high school and relationships--romantic and otherwise--seem much more perilous.  As adults, we think we are lucky when we find the love of our life, but, as teenagers, every relationship is the love of your life.

I remember the last day of elementary school very clearly. 

It was a bright late June day and I was walking home from school crying.

I was absolutely inconsolable because I was never going to see Jane again.

This WAS a big deal.  For most of the previous 7 years, Jane had been part of my life.  She, along with the Wood sisters, was one of the three who were perpetually ahead of me in terms of grades. 

It's not like she and I were friends, but now that school was over, we never would be.  She and her family were moving to Ottawa and I wasn't.

I think I can still find the park bench that I collapsed on and where I spent what seemed like an eternity sobbing.

I was learning about loss. 

And it was more than the loss of a pet, or a cherished toy, or even a beloved relative:  this was the loss of an idea.  A secret vision of a theoretical future that was so special that I had dared not speak of it to anyone.  In fact, I don't think I really understood how I felt about Jane until I realized that I would never see her again and even that wasn't really real until after I had seen her for the last time.

But when I did, it hurt a LOT.

Everyone has had an experience like mine; one where you figure out what you want and then learn that not only can you not have it now, you won't ever have it.  The kind of want that so easily gets mistaken for need.  The kind of want that makes your heart race and your chest feel tight and your breath seem hard to catch.  The kind of want that makes an 11 year-old kid think that he could take a 90-minute bus ride to Ottawa despite having no earthly idea where to find Jane and a sneaking suspicion that she wouldn't exactly be happy to see me if I showed up.

Everybody has been that way about something, or somebody and so, no matter how hard we might wish to deny it, we all have a way back to understanding what it is, and how it is, that our teenagers are thinking. 

We can make that journey--make that connection--if we want to.

But, paradoxically, to be a teenager is to be in a rush to be an adult and we learn from our parents that teenage thinking is not nearly as important as adult thinking.  Teenagers are encouraged to "grow up" and to "get serious" even while their brains are still changing and their passions are so monumental because they are so new.

After the constant upheaval of being a teenager, what is desired is to have "adult passions" that are properly sized, proportional, manageable.

It is only after having been an adult for a while that you recognize the trade off that has been made and the space that has been emptied of outsized passions and filled with many too-small and far too trivial sentiments.

* * *

I try to take my dog for a walk every night after work.  I should be better about doing this considering all of the things he continues to teach me.

We have two or three routes that we take on a rotating basis.  A couple are pretty short and one is so long that he is dragging his tail before we are two-thirds done.  I try to mix them up just to keep it interesting for him--go a different route every day--but what I have come to understand is that it really doesn't matter.  We could walk the same route every day and it would be the same treat for him.  The choice to change up routes is one that I am really making for myself.  As far as the dog is concerned, so long as he is out walking, he's happy.  I might not be able to tell, but every tree--even though it was in exactly the same spot yesterday--is a new discovery, a chance to catch up on current events.

I have to keep reminding myself of this.

I watch him engage with his world from the other end of the lead.  I have to correct myself, stop myself from getting impatient as he makes his tree-by-tree, post-by-post inventory of the neighborhood.  I catch myself thinking how could he possibly be interested in smelling the same dried smells that he smelled the day before.  To him, they are of course fascinating and nuanced because he receives a lot of his information about the world through his nose.  I get much of my information about the world through my head.  I associate new information with old information, I see, or perceive, patterns based on experience.  As I get older, it takes less and less input to create new, fully formed impressions of the world.  My dog gets up every day thinking that it is the best day ever.

* * *

I'm much older now.  In theory, I could go to Ottawa any time I wanted. 

In theory.

I want to be absolutely clear. I have no interest in tracking down Jane, or anybody else.  I'm married and have a dog.  (We have a cat too, but we're never sure he's made up his mind to stay with us.)

In theory I could do a lot of things, but the other lesson you learn as an adult is that every choice has a consequence, every decision to move toward something is to move away from something else.  And choice by choice, day after day, the once seemingly endless possibilities of your future become the responsibilities of your present. 

Instead of treating each new opportunity as a sensation to be experienced, it become an obstacle over which it becomes harder to see from where you have come and that blocks your path to the future.

Tillie, for all the growing up she has already done, has not yet done so much that she can't see her future.

We all know a Tillie, probably more than we realize.  Get to know their stories.  Listen without judging.  Acknowledge them.  If you're feeling brave enough, tell them what scares you.  The life you save, just might be your own.

--Graham Campbell
Associate Director

World Mental Health Day 2011

The following post was developed with material from the website of the World Federation for Mental Health.  Where the pronouns "we" and "our" are used, they should be read as World Federation for Mental Health.

World Mental Health Day 2011 is October 10. World Mental Health Day raises public awareness about mental health issues. The day promotes more open discussion of mental disorders and investments in prevention and treatment services. The treatment gap for mental, neurological and substance use disorders is formidable especially in poor resource countries.

Physical and mental health are intertwined. There is a real need to deal with the mental health problems of people with chronic physical illnesses and physical care of mental health consumers through a continued and integrated care.

This year’s theme is “the Great Push for Mental Health.”

The major themes of the Great Push are Unity, Visibility, Rights, Recovery, and planning of this program is now in progress.

• UNITY - Perceptions of disunity in the mental health world, probably exaggerated need to be dispelled. The first round of the WFMH (World Federation for Mental Health) Great Global Consensus has demonstrated substantial agreement on fundamental issues with over 530 replies from organizations and individuals demonstrating over 95% agreement on the 10 principles of the World Federation The second round is in preparation and will address the inclusion of mental health as one of the Millennium Goals. The Consensus is designed to culminate in a WFMH/MGMH Consensus Summit" where participating organizations will be invited to fund one representative to the Summit at which the Consensus will form the basis of a WFMH /MGMH “Charter” to the United Nations and Governments stating clearly what mental health related and consumer/users/survivor organizations around the world require governments to do to improve mental health.

• VISIBILITY- Mental illness and the mentally ill are invisible, but stigma is everywhere. Our support for mental health must be made visible to governments. How can that be achieved but by public events? We will encourage organized parades, rallies and parties starting on World Mental Health Day (October 10, 2011), involving consumers and their families marching in public together with the support of mental health associations, professionals, academics, volunteers, managers of services and students! Countries will be encouraged to create and fund their own national parades. WFMH insures they happen together on World Mental Health Day. Parades should celebrate good mental health with celebrities and sports persons while calling for better awareness of, and services for mental illness. Parades should be attractive and entertaining for the general public while carrying a strong message. They could collect signatures to hand to governments with demands to do more for mental health both in their own country and abroad. Parades might continue year by year growing in strength and entertainment until a significant change in public opinion and government action is demonstrated. This is already happening in many places, particularly in India and in 2009 in Kalmunai, Sri Lanka, where nearly 5000 students, government and non-government sectors participated in a march two kilometres long. We need to be visible. They have shown us the way.

• RIGHTS - Appalling conditions are tolerated in many mental hospitals and abusive treatments for mental illness are common. Governments must not be allowed to tolerate these conditions: There is clearly a strong grass roots need to bring together legal experts and existing organizations to collect evidence and to lobby governments to address these issues across the world and bring them to public attention. We proposed the setting up of a Centre for Mental Health and Human Rights to tackle such issues with governments.

• RECOVERY - is an important concept but the term is used in many different ways. WFMH will convene a conference to sharpen the concept and define its principal features. Meanwhile, thousands, perhaps millions, receive no mental health care because of the absence of professionals to assess and diagnose their illnesses, the first rate limiting step to recovery. We now have methods using computer technology able to empower nurses and health assistants, aimed at improving the detection, diagnosis and treatment of mental illness. We recognize that these are only the first steps to true recovery; nevertheless they are an essential starting point. Such methods are already being successfully piloted in India, Europe and Australia. They have potential to bring relief to the untreated. The campaign will promote any appropriate and culturally acceptable method for bringing relief to those suffering mental illness.

Some major activities that WFMH is embarking on include:

• The development of a grass-roots campaign so that mental health can have more visibility and priority in the public mind internationally;

• Work with the Commonwealth Secretariat in anticipation of the UN Special Session on Non-Communicable Diseases scheduled for September, 2011;

• Participation in the United Nations process to reformulate the Millennium Development Goals;

• Developing strategic partners with international agencies and advocacy groups to promote the Great Push; and

• Promotion of the Great Push using both traditional and social media.

The World Health Organization has recently (September, 2010) released a report titled Mental Health and Development which makes the case for the integration of mental health in development efforts. Mental health is intimately tied with key areas of development such as education and human productivity. Our World Mental Health Day theme this year underlines the relationship of mental health with chronic physical illnesses. As we identify non-communicable diseases like heart disease, diabetes, cancer and respiratory diseases as the new scourge, the relationship to mental health is both intimate and unavoidable. The bottom line is that there is no health without mental health and that there is no development without health AND mental health.

Physical and mental health are intertwined. There is a real need to deal with the mental health problems of people with chronic physical illnesses and physical care of mental health consumers through a continued and integrated care.

Suicide and Social Media

http://www.editorsweblog.org/special.php?tag=social%20media

A key strategy in suicide prevention is to talk about suicide and to ask those you suspect of being suicidal whether they are thinking of harming themselves. 

Somewhat paradoxically, it is also true that suicides, especially among teenagers, appear to happen in clusters and so there is this notion that suicide is contagious.

A recent internet posting from New Zealand prompted this blog post on our Suicide Prevention page on Facebook.

Why We Care

by Paddy Kutz, Executive Director, Mental Health America of Licking County

At your age, why are you still working? I hear this question frequently and my current answer is “because not everyone in Licking County is mentally healthy.” Seriously though, I am driven by our vision for our county which is of a just, humane and healthy society in which all people are accorded respect, dignity and the opportunity to achieve their full potential free from stigma and prejudice.

One in four people will experience a serious mental disorder in his or her lifetime, including major depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia and severe anxiety disorders.

Mental illnesses are no-fault, biologically based brain disorders which cause disturbances in thinking, feeling and/or relating. Persons living with these disorders deserve the dignity of medical treatment and a wide range of supportive services from mental health care providers, friends and family, including caring congregations.

Though the majority of individuals living with mental illness can successfully be treated, stigma and misinformation continue to be significant barriers to treatment.

Consider these facts: this is “Why We Care”

• depression is the number one illness around the world (not just in the United States)
• one third of homeless people experience mental illness
• 90% of persons who die by suicide have a serious mental illness
• there are more people with mental illness in jails and prisons than in state mental institutions
• at least 67% of youth who drop out of school have an untreated mental health condition
• treatment works and people recover
• there is no health without mental health

It is our mission to promote good mental health, wellness and for victory over mental illness. We need everyone’s help in understanding these disorders and what it takes to be mentally healthy. Good mental health isn’t just the absence of illness. We must have good self-esteem, get along with others, and cope with life’s demands. When you have a mental illness, all of these things can be tougher to achieve but possible.

Having good self-esteem means to like oneself, but remember, you have to be likeable. Good self-esteem is a quiet feeling of liking who you are. So anyone who is boastful or a braggart does not have good mental health.

Getting along with others includes respecting differences and leaving the person alone if you don’t like them. A mentally healthy person doesn’t bully, name call, fight with, put down, or intimidate other people. You maintain self control and deal with conflict and anger in healthy ways.

Coping with life’s demands means that you use positive ways to deal with stress. There are many good ways to relieve stress, but drinking and drugging doesn’t solve anything and just leads to more problems.

Consider some of these constructive choices: this is “Why We Care”

• Figure out what is really causing the stress, write it down and then brainstorm solutions that will reduce the stress. Turn to a trusted friend, family member, school counselor, professional, minister, priest, rabbi, faith leader or call Mental Health America of Licking County at 740-522-1341 or email at mhalc@alink.com. Don’t suffer in silence, talk it out
• Eating right, sleeping right and exercise are so important to deal with life’s demands too. In fact, new research shows that exercise works just as well as many anti-depressant medications, so get up and move it.
• Get rid of that stinking thinking and remember this is where many people need help, so ask for it.

I met former first lady, Rosalyn Carter, many years ago and have never forgotten her quote “People living with mental illness are our neighbors. They are members of our congregations, members of our families; they are everywhere in this country. If we ignore their cries for help, we will be continuing to participate in the anguish from which those cries of help come. A problem of this magnitude will not go away. Because it will not go away and because of our spiritual commitments, we are compelled to take action.”

This is a perfect time for you to help me help others. Our website has lots of helpful information about mental health and mental illnesses as well as the services we provide throughout Licking County. Check us out at www.mhalc.org. On the left side click on the donate sign to contribute. If you have questions, please ask. I care and I want to be helpful for another 30 years.