Ketamine: wonder drug or dangerous/ineffective treatment?

(2-17-23) All of us search for better ways to control the symptoms of serious mental illnesses. Ketamine has recently gotten much attention. Steven Petrow, a journalist whom I admire, recently published an article in The Washington Post describing what happened when he took ketamine under a doctor’s supervision to learn if it would help ease his clinical depression. 

Have you tried Ketamine? I’d appreciate you sharing your experiences on my Facebook page.

My ears perked up in recent months when I began to hear the buzz about ketamine, the anesthetic and hallucinogenic drug that has found a new market as an antidepressant.

Numerous credible studies have documented benefits, including that it is fast-acting, with patients sometimes showing improvement within a couple of days. And social and other media have featured doctors and patients describing it as “life changing,” with one user commenting that “I felt like a completely new person.”

For someone suffering from depression, that’s a tantalizing promise.

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My sister and me riding a pony as children. (Photo courtesy of Pete Earley.)

(2-13-23) My only sister, Alice, died on this date  fifty-seven years ago after being struck by an automobile. I was 14 years-old at the time and it was my first experience with death. Nineteen years after her death, I awoke one night calling out her name. I realized that I had repressed most of my memories about Alice because her death was so painful. My good friend, Walt Harrington, who was an editor at the Washington Post, suggested I return to Colorado and investigate my own sister’s death as a reporter. The Post published my account in 1986. I am posting it today in her memory. With the passage of time, the hurt and memories fade, but in your heart, you still feel the loss.)

Missing Alice: The Story of My Sister

By Pete Earley for The Washington Post

2021 Promo Reel – No One Cares About Crazy People from Gail Freedman on Vimeo.

(2-06-23) Please watch the powerful and moving clip from the documentary No One Cares About Crazy People by Gail Freedman, a talented director, producer, and acclaimed documentary maker who hopes to finish the film by year end.

Freedman’s documentary was inspired by Ron Powers’ 2017 nonfiction book by the same name, but the film quickly expanded into a story about multiple families struggling with serious mental illnesses and their tireless efforts to get help for their loved ones.

If you have a family member with a serious mental illness, love someone who does, or have a diagnosis, you can’t help but be moved by the familiar plight of the families and inspired by their gritty determination to improve our mental health care system.

Freedman told me she wants to harness “the power of documentary storytelling as a tool for change – to help galvanize public discussion, awareness and action around our profoundly broken systems of care for those with serious mental illness.” Thankfully, she accomplishes her goal.

Freedman began by interviewing best-selling author Ron Powers, the father of two sons with schizophrenia. Kevin, his youngest son, ended his own life at home just before his 21st birthday. That tragedy thrust Powers and his wife, Honoree Fleming, along with their surviving son Dean, who continues to struggle with the illness, into what Powers described as the “sub-nation” of those with serious mental illnesses.

“The madman is a man, in effect, without a country,” Powers said. “Certainly without a country that gives a damn whether he lives or dies, as long as he just stays the hell out of sight.”

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Image by Ben Kerckx from Pixabay

(1-25-23) A critical shortage of hospital beds for individuals with serious mental illnesses has prompted repeated calls for the elimination of the Institutions of Mental Disease or “IMD Rule.”

The National Alliance on Mental Illness supports getting rid of it, while consumer groups and disability advocates oppose changing the law. The last serious attempt in Congress to end the IMD exclusion happened when former Rep. Tim Murphy (R-Pa.) introduced the Helping Families in Mental Health Crisis Act, back in 2015, but Murphy’s efforts were blocked by Democrats and civil rights groups.

Now newly elected Rep. Dan Goldman (NY), is considering reintroducing legislation to repeal the IMD rule,  and the hope is that he will instead introduce a bill to limit its reach, rather than attempting to eliminate the rule.

 The fact that Goldman is a Democrat and the bill is named in honor of a woman who was pushed in front of a New York subway by a man with untreated mental illness may help it get some traction.

But while the debate about the IMD exclusion always focuses on fears that our nation will return to mass re-institutionalization, another stumbling block will be the expense to Medicaid if the IMD is dropped. Supporters of the IMD Rule claim it will cost the federal government billions of dollars if Medicaid starts paying for mental health hospital beds.

Cheryl Roberts recently wrote about Goldman’s efforts in a New York Daily News editorial. Judge Roberts runs the Greenburger Center for Social and Criminal Justice, which I’ve written about on this blog.

Congress must stop blocking mental health clinics from needed money 
An Editorial by Cheryl Roberts. First published in the New York Daily News

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(1-5-23) A skilled author can use fiction to tell powerful truths about the reality of serious mental illnesses and those whose lives are touched by it in ways that nonfiction often can’t convey. So I was delighted when I learned that Jordan P. Barnes, already an accomplished author, had written Late Blight in the Koʻolaus: A Novel. 

Because of his own experiences with addiction, he is especially well-suited to pen a novel about the challenges that individuals face after leaving a hospital and returning to a community. I asked him to tell me about his novel since I’ve not had a chance to read it yet.

Dear Pete,

A little over eleven years ago, I pulled the needle out of my arm for the last time and embarked on an arduous journey of recovery that would change and challenge me in ways I could never foresee. Now, with over a decade of clean time behind me, I am fortunate in many ways and owe much of my success in overcoming heroin addiction and homelessness to the endless support of my parents.

My parents never gave up hope on me, despite the fact I’d long given up hope on myself. I was also facing multiple felonies at the time, but with my parent’s support, I entered a two-year inpatient treatment program in 2011 and have been working on bettering myself ever since.

Today I am a husband, homeowner, father of two, and an independent author.

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(1-3-22) I’ve always enjoy promoting books about mental health, including those that I’ve not yet read but pique my interest. This week, I’m posting guest blogs by two authors telling their personal stories.  I’ve asked them to describe why they wrote their books and provide a short excerpt. 

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