Unacceptable Tradeoff

 I used to have major spells of disabling chronic depression, which really disoriented my life, causing me to lose jobs, and immobilizing me in a funk of deep despair for days at a time.  Beginning, finally, in 1986 I was treated successfully for depression, first with lithium (the first medicine that worked for me), which was then a little while later supplemented with Prozac--and gave rise within me to the well-known, nefarious Prozac dick--the limp, flaccid penis that massively interfered with what little sex life I had!  That's the subject matter of this poem below, written only earlier this month, May 2022, though I had been off Prozac, my depression successfully treated, since November 2004--GF

When I was younger,

a couple of decades ago,

and still romantically,

erotically, interested

and aroused,

my love life was

plagued by—

Prozac dick!

Yes, I had traded

my depression for a

flaccid penis,

one that could

still be aroused,

but couldn’t go

the whole way.

I’m still undecided

which was the

rawer deal—

the debilitating

depression,

or the eternally

wet spaghetti-like

Prozac dick.

Because, whenever the

erotic showdown came,

I was always the

disappointing ending!

 

 

A Sure-Fire Cure for COVID-19 Isolation: Reading Good Books!

 This short essay was published in the April 2022 issue of the Circle City Clubhouse newsletter.  The Clubhouse is an ineffective gathering and "recovery space" for mental health consumers, and usually its monthly newsletter is insipid.  If I may say so (and I do say so), my seven published articles to date in the newsletter is the only bright spot in that whole slew of back Clubhouse newsletters I've preserved.  I also say, the sound advice, incisiveness, and helpful content of the essay below speaks for itself--GF

Despite all the concerns during the COVID-19 pandemic over its bad effects on mental health due to isolation, I didn’t suffer these—because, unlike many others, when I was alone and quarantined, or did not feel all that safe and secure going out, I simply read a good book! I felt so happy and mentally well as I read, really enjoying the chance to catch up at last on all the reading I wanted to do.  So, I say to all who read this:  are you feeling lonely and isolated? Read a good book, and you’ll feel so much better!   Read several.  They will make you feel good about yourself, move you to treat yourself well, and not feel bored and isolated. I know from experience. Yes, get yourself lost in the printed word!  Works wonders on the psyche!

And—it works well also when one’s not worried about COVID-19 isolation.  Just getting lost in a good book is a joy in itself!

 

NAMI: Don’t Overlook Personality Disorders

 

Personality disorders are as common as clinical depression, bipolar, and schizophrenia, and can be as devastating to their holders as are these mor recognized mental illnesses—although personality disorders are more overlooked, as their sufferers seem more “normal” than those afflicted with depression, bipolar, or schizophrenia.  The Mayo Clinic’s website gives a good, concise overview of personality disorders, which are classified as mental disorders rather than, like depression, bipolar, or schizophrenia, mental illnesses.  The Mayo Clinic’s link, “Personality Disorders,” can be accessed here:  https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/personality-disorders/symptoms-causes/syc-20354463.  2014’s state-of-the-art handbook on what is currently known about personality disorders, Handbook of Personality Disorders: Second Edition (Livesley and Larstone, eds., Guilford Press; available both in hardback and paperback), notes that personality disorders are about 55% genetic and 45% environmental, and, in line with what the Mayo Clinic states above, can result both from parents with personality disorders, as well as abusive or chaotic childhood social environments.  There are many varieties of personality disorders, as both the Mayo Clinic and the Handbook of Personality Disorders attest, and sufferers from personality disorders can have problems with relationships, with employment and employability, and with schooling and graduation.  As a sufferer from personality disorder myself, I can attest to having struggled over my lifetime with all of these.  As persons with personality disorders get older, however, many of their symptoms are attenuated and they become more “normal,” though usually with ongoing relationship problems (for example, while I now have an intimate network of friends, they are paltry in number), problems with unemployment and underemployment (again, in my case, although a college graduate, I work a steady blue-collar labor job), and problems in schooling and graduation (it took me 11 years to finally complete the requirements for graduating with a Bachelor’s degree).  Sufferers from personality disorders are also troubled by extreme, over-the-top, emotional overreactions (I suffered these too, especially with anger, which triggered angry outbursts).

While personality disorders were described in the psychiatric literature as early as 1938, for a long time they were considered incurable; however, that has changed, and a variety of long-term psychotherapies have successfully been used for treatment (medication is not regarded as effective, except for symptomatic relief).  The Handbook of Personality Disorders list several psychotherapies that have proven effective; among them are Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, Dialectical Behavioral Therapy, mentalization, and an eclectic approach that combines techniques from several of the successful therapies (while the various schools of psychotherapy that are useful have differing theoretical perspectives, in practice, their techniques are overlapping and similar).  Personality disorders are also comorbid with other mental illnesses, particularly with depression and bipolar, according to the above-cited Handbook.  The point of psychotherapy in treating personality disorders is to enable the patient to see underlying defects in his/her thinking, and to replace wrong thinking with more realistic thinking.  This is a process that involves regular psychotherapy for a year or two, although in my case, successful psychotherapy has taken considerably longer, probably because  for 47 years (1965-2012) the  psychiatric therapy I was subject to at CMHCs was considerably wrongheaded and malfeasant, leaving me chagrined as a desperate, dependent outpatient—something that did not change until I started in 2014 with a private psychotherapist who used his particular version of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy

As for childhood social environment as a cause of personality disorders, the ACE study (Adverse Childhood Environment), based on a sample base of 17,000 clients of California’s Kaiser Permanente health insurance program, provides important clues to the kind of parents who are more likely to have children with mental health issues.  Specifically, there are four kinds of parents who are high-risk for creating such children:  parents who abuse, belittle, curse, or berate their children; parents who are mentally ill or have personality disorders themselves; parents who are alcoholics or drug abusers; and parents who have been imprisoned, or who engage in illegal activities.  In my particular case, both my parents definitely fell into the first category, and may also have fallen into the second, as they were both given to over-the-top outbursts of rage that would go on in tirades for 10-15 minutes at a time.

However, based on my experience as the holder of a personality disorder, with proper psychiatric treatment, with a stable job and a solid friendship network, even if small, the prognosis for recovery is solid and strong, even at a later age.  Given the prevalence of personality disorders, it is a shame that NAMI and other mental health advocates don’t recognize and educate on them nearly as much as they need to.

 

    

A Past Article Now Once More Worth Commemorating: In the Wake of El Paso, Dayton Mass Shootings, Trump Blames “Mental Illness”

This article was originally published in the Circle City Clubhouse newsletter while Trump was President, and was poorly received, with a disclaimer objection, probably because so many other Clubhouse members, my fellow mental health consumers, were Trumpists. However, I am convinced they completely missed the point, and that point of Trump's was to exonerate guns and blame mass shootings on an amorphous "mental illness," a direct attack on us mental health consumers, who are far more likely to be victims of violence (including self-inflicted violence) than we are perpetrators of violence toward others. It reinforces the mistaken public impression that we "mentally ill" are dangerous, drooling psychopaths, which is not the case at all. Hence, this timely republication in the wake of the mass killings by gun in Buffalo, New York and Uvalde, Texas.--GF

Here begins what I originally published in the Circle City Clubhouse: 

He specifically exempted—guns! His exact words, uttered publicly, were, “Mental illness and hatred pulls the trigger, not the gun.” However, the last several mass shootings have been perpetrated by people with no record of mental illness. And yes, while consumed by hate, these mass shooters have shared a very specific form of hate—a right-wing, anti-Jewish, anti-black, anti-immigrant and pro-Trump form of hate. From Dylan Roof right up to the El Paso shooter, who confessed to the cops he opened fire at the Walmart in El Paso specifically to kill people of Mexican descent. And not even Trump can deny that! But no. Instead of manning up to his own hateful and divisive rhetoric, Trump prefers, as he usually does, to find a vulnerable scapegoat. In the wake of the El Paso, Dayton massacres, it’s “video games” and that old standby, “mental illness” and the “mentally ill.” Yes, we, the “mentally ill” are the ones responsible, because we are drooling psychopathic monsters! Not the NRA, which opposes any reasonable gun control whatsoever; not the ability to buy legally military-style semiautomatic assault weapons designed for one purpose—to kill significant numbers of people in one burst. Not a paranoid Old West mindset that views guns and their ownership as synonymous with freedom and the American Way of Life, that insists on having the ability to purchase them with even fewer restrictions than are needed to buy a six-pack of beer! And once again, the “mentally ill” become easy prey, readily available scapegoats, for this deeply rooted societal malaise. We’re supposedly responsible, we who’ve sought and seek psychiatric help, we who’ve been psychiatrically hospitalized, we who gather in places such as the Clubhouse to work together on our full mental health recovery. We, we, we, are responsible! We, and, of course, video games. But never, ever, the divisive, hateful, anti-immigrant, anti-black and Latino, anti-refugee, rhetoric spewed out with sickening regularity by the Orange Carrot masquerading as President in the White House! Fellow mental health consumers, this isn’t the first time we, the “mentally ill” have been scapegoated for societal ills, and unfortunately it won’t be the last. We must be aware of the bigotry that awaits us wherever we go, how it will be animated on any pretext whatsoever, and we must educate the public and fight back accordingly. We must enlist the Clubhouse and all other institutions that serve the mentally ill to openly and honestly fight back. And realize, and make others realize, it is not we, those with “mental illness,” who are squeezing the triggers of those weapons utilized by the right-wing hateful to massacre innocents. We are but innocent victims also of El Paso and Dayton; this time, victims of irresponsible, inflammatory rhetoric coming out of the mouth of the Orange Carrot in the White House. And echoed so sadly by others who should know better, but don’t. Fellow mental health consumers, we must be prepared to fight back—lest we also end up as more victims of El Paso and Dayton.

The NAMI Papers

 The seven blog entries below are all contributions on mental health/mental illness issues originally asked for by Indianapolis NAMI, the leading mental health advocacy organization in the U.S., which, unfortunately, is not as effective an advocate on behalf of mental health consumers as is needed.  These articles were submitted to national NAMI for publication, and were all rejected, I think because they were just too damn good for NAMI's low-middlebrow standards.  What NAMI wants, unfortunately, are breezy, facile, feel-good articles that are essentially akin to the non-professional writer contributions to the Reader's Digest, leavened with a good dose of the superficial Power of Positive Thinking "philosophy" associated with Norman Vincent Peale and Robert Schuller.  However, as an extensively published actual writer and poet, including at the national level, I was not about to lower my standards to produce for NAMI such superficial, breezy pabulum.  Yet, my articles below definitely deserve publication, as any judicious reader will plainly see.  Hence, I have posted them on my "Politically Incorrect Leftist" blog in hopes of their finding the wider readership they deserve.     

NAMI and Parents

 

My late parents wouldn’t have been caught dead joining NAMI or attending a NAMI meeting.  Their attitude on mental health, mental illness, and seeking psychiatric help was made clear in their attitude toward me when I voluntarily sought psychiatric help—in doing so I brought shame upon the family!  My relatives had the same reaction.  My parents were clearly what psychologist Dr. Susan Forward called “toxic parents”—parents who were abusive, who were abusers.  Though my parents never physically abused me—they didn’t have to, they intimidated me by their constant screaming at me.  That is, when they weren’t ignoring me completely.  The noted Kaiser Permanente ACE (Adverse Childhood Experiences) study of 1995 delineates this clearly:  abusive parenting can cause lifetime mental health, relationship and addiction problems for the children involved.  And there are four particular classes of parents for whom this is notably true:  parents who regularly denigrate or belittle their child; parents who themselves suffer from mental illness; parents who have serious drug or alcohol abuse problems; and parents who are jailbirds, former jailbirds, or who are engaged in illegal activity.  My parents clearly fit into the first category, and possibly into the second category.  Although I had, according to the latest psychiatric research, a 55% genetic propensity to inherit the personality disorder I suffered from, my parents’ abuse made it certain, I believe we could say, that I had a 100% chance of having psychiatric problems.  Which I did for literally decades.  As I’ve written poetically, it takes only one thing to become a natural parent: “the ability to fuck”!  Biologically, sperm meeting egg produces a child.  Period.  Even when the parents involved are utterly unfit for parenting.  As were mine.  I realize this goes against the grain of official NAMI, but, frankly, Freud was really onto something when he posited that mental illness has its origins in parental failure.  He was indeed at least half-right, and the ACE study confirms it.  NAMI needs to reform its facile view that mental illness is entirely genetic and can’t be helped, and its naïvete about toxic parents and toxic parenting.  Bad, toxic, inappropriate parenting does play a key role in gestating mental illness.  Lest we forget or ignore.   

“Stigma” is not the problem; bigotry against the “mentally ill” is!

 

“Stigma” is just the symptom, the effect of open societal and individual bigotry against those deemed “mentally ill.”  It’s just like the “stigma” of being black in the South during the period of Jim Crow segregation.  Being a black person “stigmatized” one by the color of one’s nonwhite skin, but the underlying cause of the “stigma” was the open societal bigotry against those deemed “colored,” even to “one drop of Negro blood”!  As with blacks then, we “mentally ill” are deemed “inferior” simply because of who we are; and if we seek professional treatment for our “mental illness,” the bigotry follows us, follows us with the false “Aha!”:  “See, I told you he [or she] was one of those people!”

 

I suffered this bigotry openly from my family, for whom I allegedly brought shame upon the whole family for undergoing psychiatric treatment.  I also suffered this bigotry openly here in Indianapolis, where I’ve lived since late 1979, because one person, of whom one of her friends said “She had a narrow conception of mental illness,” badmouthed me publicly for twenty-six years, and which badmouthing still haunts me to this day, despite this person now being dead for over a decade; because, as a Quaker “saint,” she was believed automatically and uncritically, but none of those who believed her ever questioned me about it!  No, instead, they just shunned me, which is what this person wanted.  To her, I was more crippled because of “mental illness” than if I had been confined to a wheelchair!  And yet—this person worked as the head nutritionist of a well-known local hospital.  And had a Master’s degree.  Yes, even the educated and supposedly intelligent can hold onto truly infantile bigotries.  One of her friends even told me, “I avoided making your acquaintance for three years because I had heard you had ‘mental problems.’”

 

So, the “stigma” of seeking psychiatric help comes from the bigotry so prevalent out there; we are literally damned if we do, and damned if we don’t.  And it’s institutionalized, and in high places.  Such as, after a horrific mass shooting a couple of years back, President Trump proclaimed publicly that guns don’t kill people, the mentally ill kill people!

 

So, my NAMI friends, focusing on “stigma” doesn’t get to the root of the problem: the open societal and individual bigotry against those deemed “mentally ill,” and our damnation whether we seek or forego seeking professional help.  It is that bigotry that must be firmly extirpated, not simply its accompanying “stigma.”

 

Indeed, the “stigma” of being labeled “mentally ill” is far greater than the “stigma” of having an STD.  After all, the “stigma” of coming down with an STD can give one bragging rights:  “Well, if you had such an active sex life as I have, where not only do I get all I can handle and then some, you’d realize that sooner or later it was inevitable that I’d catch an STD.  Just the cost of doing the business of getting all the sexual pleasure I can.  And boy can I!”

 

Then there are those mental health consumers themselves who try to fight the “stigma” of seeking truly professional help by indulging instead in all kinds of New Age nostrums and pseudo-sciences.  Such as one mental health consumer I knew who was telling all her fellow mental health consumers, “Go off your medication, and let God heal you.” (By the way, she and her husband went off their medications and did thousands of dollars’ worth of property damage; and had to be ordered by a court of law to stay on their medications!)  Though, to be honest, the ofttimes horrific side effects of psychotropic medications make going off them seem a very attractive option to those who are on them.  But these are but two more “adverse side effects” of what is a wrongheaded approach to the “stigma” of “mental illness” in the first place!

 

Then there is the problem of wrongheaded, inadequate, and often just plain malfeasant psychiatry and psychotherapy.  This, too, results in, and feeds, “stigma.”  But the answer to that “stigma” is better, more affordable, more accessible, psychiatry; which means more good alternatives, not simply consignment to often wrongheaded, inadequate and malfeasant CMHCs, especially for those who lack private incomes, rich families, or strong insurance.  Money, and its lack, also feeds “stigma.”  But again, I must emphasize, it is not “stigma” as such that is the problem; it is the underlying bigotry that fuels the “stigma.”