She’s In Jail: A Frustrated Mother Chronicles Her Daughter’s Descent. She Needed Help, Not Punishment.

by

imageedit_15_4057854339

(7-11-16 Every week, I receive emails from parents seeking help. Most have an adult child who has been arrested because of an alleged criminal act clearly related to a mental illness. Sharon Giaccio has been keeping a detailed account, adapted here, of her family’s ongoing struggle to help her adult daughter. Sadly, this still unfolding story is all too familiar to many of us.) 

DAUGHTER’S MENTAL ILLNESS “HI-JACKED” HER LIFE

My daughter is in jail today.

Mental illness stole her from us. It also caused her to lose herself. 

We never imagined this could happen when she left for Catholic University in Washington D.C.  I remember exactly when it began. On March 3, 2010, we were called by a Student Health psychologist at the school where she was a third year student.

The caller was blunt:  “Your daughter is catatonic and needs to be hospitalized.”

Click to continue…

I Tell My Story At White House Summit Held To Encourage Jail Diversion

by

obama

President Obama listens to inmates during a discussion at a federal prison in El Reno, Oklahoma. (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza)
(7-8-16) I was asked recently to speak at the White House about the problems that I encountered trying to get help for my son, Kevin, when he had a mental breakdown. I was the closing speaker for a summit held to encourage jail diversion. What follows is the White House news release.)

Launching the Data-Driven Justice Initiative: Disrupting the Cycle of Incarceration

By Lynn Overmann, Senior Advisor to the U.S. Chief Technology Officer

Today, America’s largest mental health facilities are often our local jails. With seven times more people with mental health problems in jails or prison than there are in mental health treatment facilities, local police, emergency medical teams, and jails across our Nation have become the front lines for people in mental health crisis, and, too often, the only response. While local police and sheriff’s departments are increasingly teaching their officers how to safely and effectively respond to people in crisis, law enforcement alone cannot solve the complex social, medical, and behavioral health issues of some of our Nation’s most vulnerable people.

Last summer, in a speech to the NAACP, President Obama said:

“[O]ur criminal justice system isn’t as smart as it should be. It’s not keeping us as safe as it should be. It is not as fair as it should be. Mass incarceration makes our country worse off, and we need to do something about it.”

To answer the President’s call, and building on the Administration’s work to reform the criminal justice system and increase access to mental health and substance abuse treatment, we are proud to launch the White House Data-Driven Justice Initiative (DDJ) with communities across the country. Today, a diverse, bipartisan coalition of 67 city, county, and State governments — supported by non-profit organizations, private sector companies, foundations and universities — have begun sharing solutions that are having significant impact in reducing jail populations, and are committing to expand and scale these innovations. One local innovation driving dramatic change is the way several jurisdictions are using data to identify and divert people with mental illness out of the criminal justice system and into coordinated care in their communities.

Click to continue…

Red Flags: Warnings Signs of Violence That You Should Know

by

warning

(7-8-16) Dear Pete,  In your recent blog post, “Violence and Mental Illness: An Uncomfortable Subject But A Grim Reality For Some Families,” there are frequent references to “warning signs.” Please tell us what all the warning signs are. –K. Y.

I passed this email request to  my friend and fellow advocate Doris Fuller, Chief of Research and Public Affairs at the Treatment Advocacy Center, who wrote poignantly and eloquently in the Washington Post about her own daughter’s illness and eventual suicide. Here is her thoughtful reply. 

Red Flags for Family Violence

Risk factors

Most people with serious mental illness are not violent. However, a small percentage not being treated may be violent toward family members or others. According to Surviving Schizophrenia: A Family Manual, the three most important predictors of violence are:

  • Past history or threats of violence, against family members or others;
  • Concurrent alcohol or drug abuse; and
  • Failure to take prescribed antipsychotic medications.

Additional risk factors that have been found to be significant are:

  • Being 20 to 35 years old
  • Delusions of being persecuted, watched or attacked (“paranoia”)
  • “Command hallucinations” that order the person to engage in a specific behavior (e.g., hearing a “voice” that orders the person to commit a violent act to end world hunger)

As the number of risk factors present increases, risk increases.

Click to continue…

Exploring Family Trauma: A One Woman Show Called: Aliens, Nazis and Angels

by

(7-6-16)  Mental health activist Leah Harris has written and is performing a one woman show about family trauma based, in part, on her childhood experiences with her mother who had schizophrenia. Performances begin July 9th and run until July 23rd in the Washington D.C. area. Congratulations Leah!

leahharrisphoto

The playwright with her mother and grandmother, 1977.

Why I’m Doing a One Woman Show about Inherited Family Trauma

By Leah Harris

I was raised by Jewish grandparents who grew up during the Great Depression. (I guess this makes me an honorary Baby Boomer, even though I’m technically Generation X.) My grandmother loved to tell me stories told to her by her father, my great-grandfather Max Schumacher, who emigrated from Poland to the US in   1914, and died before I was born.

“Your great-grandfather was sitting on the stoop with this little girl, and a Cossack rides by on his horse and pop! shoots the little girl in the head, killing her. He never forgot that day. Soon afterwards, he came to America. If he hadn’t, he most likely would have been killed in the Holocaust.”

“Grandma, what if the Cossack had shot great-grandpa Max instead of the little girl?”

“Well,” she’d say, “none of us would be here.” It made my head hurt to think about it too much.

As a child, I would sometimes get annoyed at my grandmother, because she told the same exact stories over and over again. I could recite them by heart. But today, I am grateful for my her storytelling. Our family stories are firmly implanted in my consciousness. They have formed the seeds for my creative work delving into the nature of trauma and memory.

The reason I was raised by my grandparents was because my single mother was diagnosed with schizophrenia as a young adult.

Click to continue…

Inmate Dies After Being Arrested For Trespassing: State Officials Don’t Bother Contacting Family

by
Photos by Joe Mahoney, Richmond Times Dispatch

Photos by Joe Mahoney, Richmond Times Dispatch

(7-5-16  A second prisoner with mental illness dies after being held on a minor charge in the Hampton Roads Regional Jail, which already is being sued for negligence in another troubling death. When two investigative reporters learn about this second incident, state officials stonewall, hiding behind HIPAA which they claim prevents them from releasing any information. Meanwhile, the Office of the State Inspector General and the disAbility Law Center of Virginia, which have the authority to investigate inmates deaths, stay mute.

Thankfully, Richmond Times Dispatch Reporters K. Burnell Evans and Sarah Kleiner, who have been doggedly investigating Virginia’s mental health care system, set out to learn the identity and background of this anonymous prisoner. 

Had it not been for them, it is doubtful that anyone would have bothered to learn any information about the deceased.  Their story reveals how easily it is for individuals with mental illnesses to be marginalized in Virginia. It also raises additional questions about the leadership in state agencies that are responsible for caring for Virginians with mental illnesses. 

State fails to notify family after woman dies at Central State Hospital

BY K. BURNELL EVANS AND SARAH KLEINER

Richmond Times-Dispatch July 2, 1916

DINWIDDIE, Valerie Anderson was buried as she died — quietly and alone, in the care of Central State Hospital workers.

Past the winding entrance to the hospital’s grounds near Petersburg, past the payroll building, accounts payable office and garage, her body was laid to rest June 21 in a locked cemetery bounded by shade trees and semitrailers rumbling along the northern terminus of Interstate 85.

A temporary wooden cross marks her grave. It is both peaceful and loud here, where 736 souls are buried.

Although a florist’s card at the grave marked “With deepest sympathy from Central State Hospital” bears her name, state officials at the cemetery on Friday still would not confirm the identity of the woman who died in their care on May 26, the day after she arrived from Hampton Roads Regional Jail in Portsmouth.

Click to continue…

MHA Advocate Explains Why Those Opposed To Bill Should Be Proud Of Revisions Making It More Palatable

by
Mental Health America staff and executive portraits, photographed on location at the MHA offices, Alexandria, Va., Tuesday, May 14, 2013.

Mental Health America staff and executive portraits, photographed on location at the MHA offices, Alexandria, Va.,

(7-4-16) This is the second analysis of Rep. Tim Murphy’s mental health reform legislation that could be voted on as soon as tomorrow in the House.) 

AN OPEN LETTER TO ADVOCATES ABOUT THE MURPHY/JOHNSON  BILL

BY DEBBIE PLOTNICK, MENTAL HEALTH AMERICA

Dear Fellow Advocates:

It’s time to step back and take some credit. Acknowledge that your efforts have made a significant difference, even though no one has gotten everything they’ve wanted. But your efforts have had very positive results. Then gather your strength to not only beat back more of what you don’t want, and what you find hurtful, but also to fight for more of what you know is true and right, and for what you do want.

Look closely at where things are presently, not only where you wish they were, and just how far they have yet to go. Stop and really assess, don’t get stuck on where things were. Look at pending legislation in terms of existing law and regulation, and then think about what has the potential for good, as well as for bad. But most importantly, and hardest of all, is look beyond personalities and propaganda. Follow your own good counsel to present. Be in the here and now as you fight for what you passionately believe should come to pass (no pun intended).

What follows is detailed and nuanced. I respectfully ask you to please read it and then critically weigh what you think, and consider how you’d like to proceed. Maybe something will change, maybe everything will change, and maybe nothing will change. But it is my sincere hope that by reading this you’ll have a better understanding of where things are now, how they got there, and the important role advocacy has played, and can still accomplish.

Click to continue…