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Snow Day

It is snowing here in Charlottesville, VA.  It is the kind of snow that is beautiful but stops everything. And,  I am torn between the childhood glee of a snow day and all the adult responsibilities I had scheduled for the day.  Unfortunately or fortunately, depending on your perspective, it will probably all melt tomorrow with a predicted high of 48 degrees.

While trying to revise my plan of action, I looked up and saw my Christmas tree. Early in the week, I was commiserating that I had yet to take down my artificial Christmas tree.  I was just starting to take the tree down, when I stopped and looked out my sliding glass door.  The peaceful white landscape looked like an angel's blessings sprinkled from heaven.

Being a snow bred Midwestern gal, I reminisced about all the wonderful snowy Christmas days I had enjoyed.  This year's holiday season was challenging and unseasonably warm.  My sister is seriously ill from cancer, this was only the second Christmas without my Dad, and a lot of the burden to keep the family hangin' in there fell upon me.  It was a struggle to focus on self care and recovery.

Since New Year’s Day, I have been very busy with work and launching my New Year's resolution to go to the gym at least 3 x week.  In previous years, when my “Martha Stewart Mentality” was more important than my recovery, I would have ignored the gym and my needs in order to get my apartment back into ship shape order.  Then, I would have fallen into HALT (Hungry, Angry, Lonely and Tired) Mode and used all my old destructive coping skills to escape (food, drink, sleep, pills). 

This year I also made a resolution to remember that “Insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results”.  I vowed to step out of my comfort zone and risk doing things different.  For the most part, I have succeeded and when I fell down a bit, I didn’t stay down. 

So in the spirit of breaking out of the box and doing positive things even when they feel embarrassing and ridiculous, I didn’t take the tree down.  Instead, I plugged the lights in, made a cup of coca, lit some candles and put on a Winter/Christmas Album.  I needed a break from my frenzied days and got to have my own Christmas time.  The reflective time I didn’t really have this year.

Tomorrow, I will be off to the Virginia General Assembly to advocate for improved mental health and addiction services.  I am sure that my mental health and recovery will be more solid since taking this time to relax and center myself today. I am confident that I will be able to manage the stress of reviewing multiple bills and coming up with an effective political, advocacy strategy.   (I hate politics, but believe that it is important for the voices for people in recovery to be heard).

And my weekend goal is to take down the decorations while rooting for the Green Bay Packers to win (remember I am a snowy Midwestern gal!).

Remember, as the Celine Dion song says, “Don’t save it all for Christmas Day…Find  a way, to give a little love everyday.  Don’t save it all for Christmas Day.  Find your way, ‘cause holidays have come and gone. But, love lives on, if you give on.  Love…Don’t save it up for Christmas Day”.  Love to you, BE.

*Beth Elliott works for the recovery website www.thesecondroad.org. You may also reach her at elliottbeth10@earthlink.net

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The Inevitable Abandonment

I commend my soul to destiny.
Saving strays, one puppy by one,
Sick kittens and broken men,
Mainstays of my crusade:
Fixing the broken to heal myself.

Compassion belies deep grief,
Bottomless sadness of unanswered whys.
A child unrescued becomes a woman driven

To find meaning in a trampled world, to undo.
I repeat my past; this time will make it right.

Troubled sleep brings no relief;
I feed the feral cat who waits,
We are both untrusting, wary of speeding cars,
Precarious life.
For now, we’re safe.

-Copyright Sarah Berk Goetz, Material Used with Permission, 2006

Our Journey

Words and music by Robin E. Hubert

Chorus

It’s about up, it’s about down, it’s about turning life around.
It’s about peace, it’s about tears, it’s about love.
It’s about joy, it’s about pain, it’s about desperation’s reign
It’s about getting off the floor, and wanting so much more,
It’s about walking on this path we call our journey, It’s our journey.

Verse

Repeat Chorus

Bridge

Repeat Chorus

-Copyright 2006 by Robin E. Hubert

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Eight Myths About People with Psychiatric Labels,
that Negatively Impact Their Interactions with the Legal System:

1. Psychotropic drugs and hospitalization are benign interventions
2. Family members of people with psychiatric labels are universally benign and well-intentioned
3. People with psychiatric labels are liars
4. People with psychiatric labels who choose not to take medication prescribed by their doctor are more lacking in insight than all the other people who choose not to take the medication prescribed by their doctor (the majority of patients in the U.S.)
5. People with psychiatric labels don't know what is helpful to their own recovery, the "if they want it, it must be bad for them and if they don't want it, it must be effective school of mental health treatment".
6. People with psychiatric labels are not as traumatized by the use of force: -handcuffs, being tied down, being put in isolation, strip searched, as people without psychiatric labels would be/are and it has no effect on their trust of the MH system or sense of moral agency.
7. Prejudice and discrimination against people with psychiatric labels is somehow different to prejudice against other groups, doesn't do harm to them and/or is justified.
8. Lying to people with psychiatric labels is ethical conduct for professionals both medical and legal, and doesn't effect future trust and use of these professionals by the people to whom professionals have lied.

- Alyson Hymes prepared this list to use in speaking to a UVA Law School Class.

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October 20, 2005

As I walk down the beach,
the water caresses my toes.
I think about the last time we were together
Together - here on the beach
How we shared our thoughts, our feelings, our goals
Today, the beach is empty, but for me
You are not here.

I miss your voice, your smell.
I miss how I feel with you.
I stop and face the sea, trying to see across to the other side.
Trying to see you.
I hear a plane beyond the clouds.
Maybe it brings you back to me.
The water reaches up and caresses my toes.
I turn and walk home.

-Rebecca Ward, Copyright 2005

I think it's human nature to want other people to change to suit our own picture of what they could or should be. It would be so much easier if other people would just become who we want them to be because we wish it. But the reality is that we are who we are with our individual talents and strengths and weaknesses and we can't change to suit others' wishes.
I don't mean we can't all grow, of course we can and I wish that for all of us. But I am bothered when I find myself wishing other people would be more like myself or more like what I conceive their best self to be rather than accepting them for who they are now and what they can offer in the present.
Every single person who is involved in the mental health consumer/psychiatric survivor/ex-patient movement has something to offer to us. Some bring their passion, some bring their anger which gets them and us moving, some are extremely knowledgeable about the issues, some are just beginning to learn about the issues but are very good at reaching out to others just starting out in the movement. Some bring us sweetness and humor, without which we would not survive; some bring us organizational and technical skills without which we would not go far.
We need to start valuing each person's strengths and talents and seeing how much we really have when all our talents are woven together into the patchwork quilt that is the consumer/survivor/ex-patient movement.

- Alison Hymes January 30, 2006

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13th December, 2006
To the Honorable Virginia Governor Tim Kaine,

Dear Governor,

We have observed that in the Mental Health System that the N.G.R.I (Not Guilty Reason Insanity), population is detained in the System, far longer than what seems to be reasonable length of stay in the facilities. Frequently as long as four to ten years on up to a lifetime is the Hospital stay.

This is due to the fact that a N.G.R.I. acquity is bound by the terms of the F.R.P. (Forensic Review Panel), in Richmond and the Internal Forensic Privileging Committee. (Plus the Treatment Team of the Hospital which bows to the F.R.P.'s convictions. On top of this is the Court Judge who is neither a Psychiatrist nor a Psychologist, or a M.D., who is trying to decide what to do over the report issued by the Hospital. They are influenced by the F.R.P. who are not even at the site to see the Client. F.R.P. makes recommendations that are both jaded by Histories that are too extensive and most of the time in error.

Court proceedings: a requirement by law is that the Treatment Team state in it's reports to the Courts that a Client must be re-hospitalized because they can not go against the words of the F.R.P. The step system is used for gradual release, with all the delays; near perfection is demanded, which is totally unreasonable.

Sooner or later the N.G.R.I. acquity is going to make a mistake that will cause him or her to be detained longer. Your Honor, all of the above is a travesty. Please look into the matter, Your Honor, and see what can be done to shorten these stays.

Sincerely.

A couple of N.G.R.I. Clients

Edwin H. Kline, Sr.
Steven M. Hornstein