I am sorry to have missed entering the discussion about Peace House last week but I was busy doing home improvement projects. I am a little old for such things but I was reminded of an incident when I was 18 years old and the choice I made. I was told of a man named Matt McAloon who always said, "There ain't nothin you really hafta do." One day, I was brought around to see him as he sat on his haunches in front of the saloon in Litchfield talking politics with other men. The tobacco juice ran down both sides of his chin. I decided then to just keep working hard all my life.
I am getting caught up and rested up now. Yes. Thank you for caring. I stopped in Peace House after reading about it. I went back a few times for the camaraderie, not that I had any illusion that I could help. They say the people who are designated "mentally ill" are the most sensitive among us. Having known many of them and having been one my self, I believe it. A poet who is left-handed said many poets are lefties and also many MI people are lefties. At Peace House in December, 2002, I noticed this poem on the bulletin board. It so struck me that I copied it down and got permission from Iceman, the author, who was there at the time, to print it if the occasion ever presented itself. Beauty in the Souls By Iceman They blew up the tower, They came from the sky, I watched it on TV, I started to cry, They tried to spread hate >From way up above It backfired on them, And now there's more love, We light candles and pray and love one another We all see the beauty in each sister and brother, Right now there's more kindness and much more sharing There's so much beauty and wonderful caring. Someone asked why people don't care about all the things going wrong in our society. Maybe the problem is people do care and they care so much. I was heartened by reading of many people who want Peace House to remain in some form some place. Maybe there really is an excess of caring. Gerald Jampolsky says in "Love is Letting Go of Fear," and other books that love and fear cannot coexist at the same time. Sometimes our caring can show itself as fear. For those who wonder what mental illness is and how it comes about, Clifford Beers wrote about his experience in 1908 in "A Mind That Found Itself." Based on the Fifth Edition of this book, still available in the library, he speaks of "the kindly skepticism of indulgent relatives.the inspiring indifference of unconvinced intimates..what the insane most need is a friend..contact with sane people." He quotes William James: "sodden routine and fatalistic insensibility [in mental hospital]." He talks of the mental patients' movement which was started in 1908, formally organized in 1912, and he was fundraising for it in the early 1920s. "'If fighting for the rights of a much older man, unable to protect his own interests, is the act of a rowdy, I'm quite willing to be thought one,' was my reply." Clifford W. Beers, Doubleday, 1945 (1st Edition 1908) The movement of mental patients to have a say in their own treatment is continued in the Support Coalition International which has more than 100 "spoke" organizations in 14 countries. Other organizations are working as well. (We do not count the organizations that are subsumed under the parent groups or State regulations.) In the State Senate, the Health and Human Services committees listened for 10 to 15 or more minutes at a time several times a week for many weeks, which went on for months, to providers, State and County employees, insurance people, parents, non-profits, anyone who was in favor of forcing debilitating medications on other people. (Heaven forbid that any one of them would volunteer to join the experiments of taking these drugs themselves.) This has gone on for years. When they finally announced they would hear from the public who were not making money off the unfortunate people, I called to get on the list. Our organization was allowed three minutes but was interrupted after one and one-half minutes. In the State House, under administration of the other party, I was given 15 minutes at 9:45 at night. Only two or three representatives were still there. Why this studied indifference on the part of elected officials to learn what is going on in the world? There are other ways of handling people who have problems in living and for a time show psychiatric disorders. Research from the Archives of General Psychiatry, Vol 37, Sept, 1980 and American Journal of Psychiatry, 135:5, May 1981, Hall et al showed that 100 consecutive patients admitted to a State psychiatric hospital were submitted to a barrage of tests. Results showed that 89% suffered previously unsuspected, unrecognized, undiagnosed, untreated physical illness. 28% were able to be discharged after treatment, 18% showed significant improvement. 65% of diseases were amenable to treatment. Everyone brought into the mental health system should have a thorough medical exam and treatment of whatever disorder is found. Every human condition does not need to be medicalized and psychiatrized. Many of us have recovered through integrating other kinds of health care along with the contemporary medical care that costs $1800 a day (Abbott NW) and takes the money that society should have for real needs. Louise Bouta Well Mind Association of Minnesota 4003 Pillsbury Avenue Minneapolis, MN 55409 612-823-8249 [EMAIL PROTECTED] www.wellmindminnesota.org TEMPORARY REMINDER: 1. Don't feed the troll! Ignore obvious flame-bait. 2. If you don't like what's being discussed here, don't complain - change the subject (Mpls-specific, of course.) ________________________________ Minneapolis Issues Forum - A City-focused Civic Discussion - Mn E-Democracy Post messages to: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Subscribe, Unsubscribe, Digest, and more: http://e-democracy.org/mpls
