Search Results for: violence

(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.

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Public fears of violence on the street by discharged (mental) patients who are strangers to them is misdirected. The people at the highest risk are family members and friends who are in their homes or in the patient’s home.

(6-23-16) In a study released this week, the Treatment Advocacy Center investigates a subject few like to discuss: family violence, specifically homicides committed by persons with mental illnesses. 

Because of stigma, we always begin every conversation about violence by explaining that individuals with mental illnesses are no more violent than the general public and, in fact, are more likely to become victims than perpetuators.

And that is exactly how the authors of RAISING CAIN: The Role of Serious Mental Illness In Homicide begin their 48 page study.

But they quickly explain their rational in writing about murders committed by persons with mental disorders:

It is…politically incorrect to study the relationship of family homicides to serious mental illness, especially in the United States, where the concept of “recovery” is the dominant theme in writing about individuals with mental illness. (But) …it is not discourse about family violence and homicides that is a major cause of stigma against all people with mental illness; rather, it is the family violence and homicides themselves. Until we confront the causes of family violence and homicides directly,  the stigmatization of persons with serious mental illness will continue to be an enormous problem. Yet, to ignore that a small percentage of persons with mental illness can be violent seems disingenuous.

This reasoning should not surprise anyone who is familiar with TAC, which is one of a few advocacy groups that speaks openly about violence. What did the authors of the report find:

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On Monday (1-11-15) I posted a blog about pathology and gun violence. Long-time mental health advocate and former member of the national Board of Directors of the National Alliance on Mental Illness, Graham L. Champion today offers his point-of-view about gun violence and mental illness. He can be reached at  psllc06@gmail.com

Deliver Us from Evil

by

Graham L. Champion

During our lives, most everyone of us has at some time or another uttered the words “deliver us from evil.” It may have been as part of the Lord’s Prayer or after a particularly heinous act that we have witnessed or been informed about by the press or it might simply be the result of some action in our life that was particularly disturbing. Evil comes in many different forms from violence to harassment to intimidation to mention but just a few.

In recent times, we have seen senseless mass killings in a variety of different locations. Virtually every time one of these mass shootings happens the media is quick to speculate that if the event was not terror related —  it must have been committed by someone who is mentally deranged. Mental illness has become the “go to” explanation for why someone goes out and shoots up the landscape.

Just as predictably the discussion goes to the issue that we, as a society, need to find a way to better identify those with mental health issues and prevent them from having access to firearms. It is without question that those individuals living with a serious and chronic mental illness, during times of crisis, should not be allowed to purchase a firearm. With that premise in mind, we, as a society, must begin to destigmatize mental health issues and provide treatment for those living with a diagnosed mental health issue.

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Bravo to John Oliver who in twelve minutes manages with humor to say what many of us have been trying to tell the public for years!

 

MICHAEL C. BIASOTTI’S BRIEF TESTIMONY BEGINS AT 35:37 and ENDS AT 40:27

“We have to stop pretending that violence is not associated with untreated serious mental illness. We have to stop pretending that everyone is well enough to volunteer for treatment and self-direct their own care. Some clearly are not.’  –Michael C. Biasotti

U.S. Representative Tim Murphy (R-Pa) continued his campaign last week to reform our nation’s failing mental health system by holding what his colleagues described as one of the best hearings in recent memory about serious mental illnesses.

Entitled: “Where Have All the Patients Gone? Examining the Psychiatric Bed Shortage,” the Commerce and Energy Subcommittee heard from a panel of ten experts who not only discussed current barriers to getting treatment but also provided the subcommittee with a primer on why jails and prisons have become our new mental asylums.

Today’s blog post focuses on testimony by Michael C. Biasotti, Chief of Police and Immediate Past President of the New York State Association of Chiefs of Police, and the parent of a daughter with a serious mental illness who has been involuntarily committed more than twenty times. 

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I’m still getting calls from the media about the stabbing last week of Virginia state senator Creigh Deeds by his son, Gus, who later committed suicide. The emphasis has changed from outrage about a shortage of treatment beds to questions about family violence. Talking about violence always gets tricky. No one wants to increase stigma so I’m careful to point out that individuals with mental disorders are more likely to be victims than perpetrators.

Still, violence inside families is a reality.  A poll of National Alliance on Mental Illness family members found that 39% had been threatened by an ill family member or had their property destroyed. A similar poll of NAMI members in Massachusetts found that 50% of families had to cope with violent behavior. In 80 percent of cases where someone became violent, it was the parent who was the victim.

I was happy to hear over the weekend an interview on National Public Radio’s Weekend Edition with Gary Mihelish about his adult son who lives with a schizophrenia. I first met Gary when he invited me to speak in Helena at a NAMI convention. It was one of my first speeches and Gary was kind enough to treat me during my visit to a historical tour followed by a buffalo steak! Gary did a fantastic job in the NPR interview, not sensationalizing violence but discussing it candidly and also talking about his son’s recovery. It is easy to understand why Gary was awarded NAMI’s highest honor for his years of service locally in Montana and also nationally by serving on the NAMI board.

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