Heads up: This is one of my touchy subjects.
I'm posting this, because I'm... Annoyed. Yeah, that's a good word.
If you didn't know, I recently earned (and paid the licensing fee for) my PLMHP. Meaning, I've completed the work to get a provisional license to practice in mental health. Including a master's degree.
Yay! And I'm working toward getting a license that
doesn't have the "provisional" attached to it. It's a 1.5+ year process for the latter bit, one that picks up where my schooling for my M.S. left off.
One of the groups that gets led at my work is a group on stigmas and stereotypes, with a focus on mental illness - how those with a mental illness are perceived by others, and how they perceive themselves to be.
One of the groups that I lead is a mental health awareness group, in which we go over current events related to mental health.
So as I was scrolling through Twitter after work today (instead of taking a nap... Bad idea, I guess), I came across this from the Huffington Post:
Jackkqueline Pogue, Homeless Woman Accused Of Pushing Woman Off Train Platform, Was Schizophrenic.
Now, with all of the events that have happened last year, I have to say I'm annoyed. When something goes wrong, they automatically blame it on mental illness - in general. Now, it appears this woman actually DOES have a mental illness (specifically, untreated schizophrenia, according to the article), and I can understand it playing a part in this particular case. But I mean the past few events, like Boston, and the automatic assuming that people only do these things if they have mental illness.
Silly me, I looked at what people were saying in reply to the tweet with that article. And then I saw... This:
"
Just like the people who have committed mass shootings. When will we institutionalize these people?"
I left out his Twitter handle on purpose. If he was that energetic about posting such a comment then he probably doesn't care who sees it, but I don't know that it's for me to share who it is...
It was one of those moments of "... Did someone seriously just say that?"
I double-checked his picture to see if age-related stereotyping was going on, and it very well may have. But I found it interesting that this person claimed to be a historian, a writer, a lecturer... and he was going about it without the facts.
Also, some of my clients are absolutely TERRIFIED at the idea that they may be hospitalized/EPC'd by the cops, concerned they'll be locked up.
So naturally I was a bit... Shall we say, incensed.
And like any, um, good person trying to hold their tongue in a manner yet get the point across... I schooled him. Because that kind of ignorance is unacceptable.
I provided him with
information on mental illness from
NAMI (National Alliance on Mental Illness).
I also provided him with
information on schizophrenia from
NIMH (National Institute of Mental Health).
In the event that you don't feel like checking out the information, let me sum it up:
Approximately 25% of the US population has a MI (mental illness) or had one at some point in their lives -and that's before the release of the DSM-5 and the controversy that goes along with it, thank you very much. Give or take 1% of the US population has schizophrenia.
Speaking from personal experience with the population I work with, which includes SPMIs (severe and persistent mental illness - major depression as well as bipolar, schizophrenia, and schizoaffective disorders), as well as the information provided, most people with mental illness would like to be contributing members of the mainstream population. I've got clients who want to go to work and/or go to school - and clients who DO work and/or go to school. I've got clients who just aren't able to work. My supervisor has mentioned to me clients so terrified they'll be locked up that they avoid talking to others for fear that they'll see something wrong with them...
I've got cranky clients, quiet clients, boisterous clients, sweet clients, clients who laugh and giggle a lot. They have good days, and they have bad days. They enjoy watching movies, going on walks, going to the store, playing games, dancing... Laughing at Betty White's antics (we recently watched
The Proposal for a laugh in my Stress Management group). We've had the occasional violent/aggressive client (see also: not often at all). Many of our clients are really quite intelligent - one who can school everyone on a certain counseling theory, another who is amazing at math, and who enjoyed science so much he taught it to his peers, multiple who've taught me a thing or two about music (and I used to be a music ed major!), and another who is so amazing at history it's a little scary! We've got one who's such a proud, new papa that he adores showing off pictures of his little one, all you have to do is ask.
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How is this any different from the rest of the population?
(The large font was unintentional. It happened that was because I increase the font on my smiley faces... But it worked out quite well, no?)
Mostly we have clients who want to fit in. Who want friends. Who want to be accepted. Who feel left out. Who will offer you support if it looks like you're having a hard time, and who will look out for you.
Some who miss the choices and lifestyle they had prior to the start of their symptoms and their diagnosis. I have a client who, to this day, well over a decade later, grieves the fact that, for her, mental illness means she has no option of even adopting children.
As for schizophrenia in particular, we've got a number of clients who wear headphones and listen to music to help with any auditory hallucinations (that is, hearing voices or other things). Sometimes they play whatever. There are a few in particular... One person loves classical music. There's another who enjoys rap, I believe - I'll have to ask what he's listening to some day. Another person likes a little bit of everything - and when the music is up loud enough, I find myself wanting to sing/dance along to it, because it's music that I also enjoy.
Riddle me this: How can you say that all people with mental illness are violent and should be locked up? Do you even know all people with mental illness? And what about the people who are violent and don't have a mental illness?
Oh, and saying someone is "mentally disturbed" or something to that effect isn't the same thing as "having a mental illness". Just FYI.
Basically: Having a mental illness doesn't mean someone is a bad person, or that they should be locked up. Although if you want to make a case for more mental health services to be available to people, be my guest.
Lumping everyone with mental illness into the category of being "violent" or something else equally unflattering isn't helping anyone.
I can guarantee you know or have met someone with a mental illness, or who has experienced a mental illness with a loved one.
By the way, ADHD, Postpartum as an onset specifier to a mood disorder (as in, the mood disorder started postpartum), and premature ejaculation are in the DSM-IV-TR, people.
Just saying. (Had to throw that last one in there for good measure, you see. haha)
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