Don't abandon the mentally ill or their caregivers
Deseret News - Salt Lake City,UT,USA
The billboard reads something like, "If you have cancer, nobody tells you to just get over it," and then lists a Web site to learn about depression, a mental illness about which well-meaning people might say, "Just get over it, exercise more, and eat right."
I recently attended a National Alliance on Mental Illness of Utah press conference asking legislators to maintain funding for the mentally ill. Those who spoke had been touched by the illness — individuals, fathers, mothers, siblings, loved ones. Mental illness had a human face, a community face. As I listened to their stories, they could have been the families of patients suffering from a physical disease, cancer, diabetes or other illnesses. Their responses were the same — they hurt and stand by helplessly wishing they could take away the pain. But unlike a physical illness that may be visible, mental illness is not, and those suffering often do so in silence; not to mention the stigma and stereotypes our society still has about it.
It's a growing problem, exacerbated by our modern society, where we are now more mobile and transient, unlike previous times when parents and family were geographically close by and could help out. The social and emotional ties important for the development and sustenance of meaningful life are vanishing. More people are homeless and jails are overcrowded. At a time when we have become increasingly sophisticated in our ability to diagnose and treat people, resources remain inadequate and many who are ill are left to the street or prisons.
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Oh Kathie... Had I found you were going to be in Utah, I would hava made a point to meet you. When was the news conference and where? Not much is happening here in Utah for NAMIVets. I was supposed to teach a F2F class at the V.A. Hospital in SLC for NAMI Utah, but have never heard anything more about it. What I did hear was, there weren't enough vets interested in taking the class.
ReplyDeleteThe only thing we, as an affiliate have been doing, is having education meetings featuring PTSD.
Pat
Hi GrandmaB
ReplyDeleteI was not in Utah. The article came from their news.
NAMI needs to get more active across the country and start to use their strength to get people into the VA hospitals and centers. If they had let the veterans know about programs they can deliver on, there would have been enough coming to get the support they need.
If the VA is the problem, then they need to do it with some of the service organizations like DAV halls and VFW halls, churches, any place where these veterans can meet with people that can help them.