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Bipolar News
May 2, 2006
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Prisons/Jails the New Asylums
Poynter.org - St. Petersburg,FL,USA
... as severely mentally ill, meaning that they fit the psychiatric
classification for illnesses such as schizophrenia, major depression and
bipolar disorder. ...
Bipolar Disorder conference is May 5 in Hampton Falls
Portsmouth Herald
The sixth annual Erik Cogswell Memorial Conference on Bipolar Disorder -
What Works: From A to Z - will be held on Friday, May 5 at Faro Gardens,
Route 1, Hampton Falls. Registration is from 8:30 to 9 a.m. and the
conference is from 9 to 4 p.m.
Living with bipolar disorder
Portsmouth Herald
Mike Fongeallaz once went five days without sleep. "No one knew what was
going on. I had the TV on and no one figured it out" says the 21 year
old.
"But I was going nuts. I started talking to inanimate objects."
Long road to mental wellness
Detroit Free Press
Mental illness doesn't always intrude into a person's life as a single
disease with clearly defined symptoms. Ask Dana Parker. For more than 20
years, she struggled off and on with depression, anxiety and panic
attacks. She still managed to earn a college degree, get married, have a
son and dote on him, and hold down a job as a university admissions
counselor.
For mentally ill, reform falls short
The News & Observer
A lack of options hinders the transition from institutional to community
care.
It's the system that's crazy
Sun-Sentinel Sun, 30 Apr 2006 0:14 AM PDT
Seeking help for his mentally ill son, writer finds that jails are now
asylums.
Helping Katrina Survivors: Psychiatrists Provide Insider Views
Psychiatric Times
In times past, Louisiana psychiatrist Harold Ginzburg, M.D., J.D.,
M.P.H., has worked with refugees in Vietnam, Thailand and the
Philippines and evaluated the psychological health of Russian villagers
living in areas contaminated with radioactive fallout from Chernobyl.
The Cutting Edge of Sadness
Psychiatric Times
The past decade witnessed major strides in our understanding and
treatment of affective disorders in adults, children and adolescents.
One of the baffling problems in child and adolescent psychiatry was the
question of psychiatric illness spanning a lifetime. The existence of
depressive disorders in prepubertal children has been generally
recognized and acknowledged since the 1960s; however, only
New anti-psychotic drugs carry risks for children
USATODAY.com via Yahoo! News
None of the six anti-psychotic drugs approved by the Food and Drug
Administration for adult schizophrenia and bipolar disorder (manic
depression) is approved for kids, but doctors can prescribe them as
"off-label" medications. Many experts say there is growing overuse of
these powerful drugs.
Adult anti-psychotics can worsen troubles
USA Today
A couple of years ago, Evan Kitchens was taking five psychiatric drugs,
says his mother, Mary. Two were so-called atypical anti-psychotics,
approved by the FDA for treating adults with schizophrenia or bipolar
disorder. At the harrowing nadir two years ago, she wondered whether her
son would survive, let alone live a normal life.
Mary Chapin Carpenter: Depression has 'caused me a lot of pain'
The Herald-Sun
Mary Chapin Carpenter could barely compose herself. Pulitzer
Prize-winning editorial cartoonist Doug Marlette, the moderator of
Carpenter's discussion of the creative process with author Kaye Gibbons
at the 2006 N.C. Festival of the Book, had just asked the two to talk
about their experiences with depression. Gibbons, author of "Ellen
Foster," explained that she used to believe she was bipolar.
After nightmarish years, new dawn for 16-year-old
USA Today
For Camille Houston, atypical anti-psychotic drugs have been a lifeline.
A rush to overprescribe?
USA Today
Rising numbers of U.S. children are taking a new generation of
anti-psychotic drugs called atypicals. Although the six drugs can be
helpful in treating children with mental illness, critics say that the
drugs are overprescribed and that many kids suffer serious side effects
from drugs they never needed.
New antipsychotic drugs carry risks for children
American Psychological Association
Nancy Thomas remembers the bad old days when she had to wear long-sleeve
clothes to church to cover bite marks all over her arms from her
daughter Alexa's rages.
Residents remember those lost to suicide
CentralOhio.com
Cyondah Cornish, 8, reads a poem written by her mother, Angie, in memory
of her late father, Gene Jr., during the Into the Light for Suicide
Prevention candlelight vigil on the square Monday evening.
Walk this way: Nita Lawrence puts her heart and sole into planning
the Mental Health Association's 26th annual VIP Walk-a-thon.
Decatur Daily (Decatur, AL); 4/30/2006
Byline: Patrice Stewart
Apr. 30--When health problems struck close to home, Nita Lawrence
marshaled support for a cause that has become dear to her heart. For the
26th annual Mental Health Association VIP Walk-a-thon, she will bulldog
those donations and then lead the pack around Rhodes Ferry Park on May
12. The goal is $26,000, and Lawrence stopped people to ask for
donations as she saw them in the park Wednesday when she and others
involved in previous walks gathered for a planning session. "I would
love to change the image of mental health," she said, because those
diagnosed with mental health diseases are looked at differently from
those with cancer, heart disease and diabetes. "Mental illness carries a
stigma, and if I could change that even a little bit, my life would be
worthwhile," said Lawrence, 76. "One out of four people suffers from
mental illness, and a lot of people don't realize that. And those with
mental illnesses need drugs to get better, just like cancer patients
do." For years, she has turned to the Mental Health Association in
Morgan County for support, and she tries to return that favor by raising
thousands of dollars for its programs through the annual walk-a-thon, as
well as helping sell tickets for the yearly Celebration of the Arts and
the Mind, assisting with Operation Santa Claus for the mentally ill, and
other projects. A former six-year Mental Health board member, Lawrence
remained quite active after her term. In 2004, she earned the
organization's Mary Cockerham Dobbs Award, which recognizes those who
have been touched by mental illness in their personal lives and have
been a help with Celebration of the Arts and the Mind. This year
Lawrence will chair the walk-a-thon for the third time. Some years she
serves as a team captain, and she's been a VIP fund-raiser and a walk
member. About 16 years ago, when her mother was 82 and beginning to
repeat herself and show other signs of problems, Lawrence moved her to
Decatur, where she and her husband Bill had lived since 1957. Gladys
Moffett was diagnosed with dementia caused by mini-strokes, and Lawrence
sought help at the Mental Health Association's support group for
families of Alzheimer's patients, attending until her mother's death in
2001. Seven years ago, after her husband, Bill, died of cancer, Lawrence
began attending the association's support group for widowed persons.
Today she is one of the facilitators of the group, which now operates
out of the Hospice of the Valley's Bereavement Center, and helps others
get through a rough time. Ten years ago, one of their four children was
diagnosed with bipolar disorder, requiring medication and a change from
her busy professional life. "A lot of people think those with forms of
mental illness should pull themselves up by their bootstraps, but they
can't, because it's often a chemical imbalance requiring proper
medication. As long as they stay on the medication, they can function
normally, but if they get off of it, they have problems again," Lawrence
said. She pointed out that many of the tragic homicides and suicides
that have occurred involved people who were off their prescribed
medication. Her personal connections "are the reality of why Nita works
so hard for us," said Sue Brantley, executive director of the Mental
Health Association in Morgan County. "Her main focus has always been the
walk, held during Mental Health Month each May. "She's put in many hours
and raised a lot of dollars through the years, but she says this year
will be her swan song, after leading the walk to a record-setting year
in 1998 and then, in 2003, to the second largest amount ever raised by
the walk," Brantley said.
Lawrence said she competes against herself each year to raise more
than she did the year before. The first year she raised $500. "I didn't
know I was supposed to raise more," she said, but she's made up for that
since. "We want to get as many people as we can to walk," she said, but
they start by asking people to serve as team captains and try to raise
at least $500 each by recruiting five "VIPs," who each agree to raise or
contribute $100. Last year Lawrence was a "VIP" and raised more than
$10,000. This year, she's trying to recruit 60 team captains, so call if
you can help, and she'd like to get every mayor in Morgan County to
walk, too. And don't be scared off by the term "walk-a-thon"; this is
more like a leisurely stroll to the Holiday Inn for a breakfast, with
T-shirts and prizes handed out. "Nita involved me in the walk a long
time ago," said Mental Health Association board president Gail Warth.
"What hasn't she done? And she's the best fundraiser we've ever had."
Lawrence's theory is "If you don't ask, you won't get anything," so she
asks everyone she sees, saying, "It's almost time for the walk again."
You may also spot Lawrence serving as a greeter at the Racking Horse
Celebration, working the polls on election days, answering phones and
handling mailings at First United Methodist Church, or working on the
golf tournament as a local board member of the American Cancer Society.
She tried Relay for Life for the Cancer Society, too, but found the
timing too close to her Mental Health Walk-a-thon. Lawrence's theory is
that if you're working for good causes and helping others, "you don't
have time to worry about your own problems." What: 26th Walk-a-Thon to
benefit programs of the Mental Health Association in Morgan County When:
Friday, May 12, 7 a.m. Where: Rhodes Ferry Park to the Holiday Inn To
sign up or donate: Call Sue Brantley, 353-1160, or Nita Lawrence,
353-8882
Copyright (c) 2006, The Decatur Daily, Ala.
Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News.
For information on republishing this content, contact us at (800)
661-2511 (U.S.),
(213) 237-4914 (worldwide), fax (213) 237-6515, or e-mail reprints@krtinfo.com.
COPYRIGHT 2006 The Decatur Daily
This material is published under license from the publisher through
the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding
rights should be directed to the Gale Group.
Long road to mental wellness: Native Detroiter finds her way back
with the help of her family and a Wayne State program.
Detroit Free Press (Detroit, MI); 4/30/2006
Byline: Patricia Anstett
Apr. 30--Mental illness doesn't always intrude into a person's life
as a single disease with clearly defined symptoms. Ask Dana Parker. For
more than 20 years, she struggled off and on with depression, anxiety
and panic attacks. She still managed to earn a college degree, get
married, have a son and dote on him, and hold down a job as a university
admissions counselor. But her precariously balanced life tumbled apart
when her marriage collapsed and her symptoms snowballed into full-blown
paranoia. Dana was convinced that her home was bugged and that spies
trailed her. She spent hours in her car chasing buses, whose signs she
felt compelled to follow to pursue clues. Today, four years since her
worst breakdown, Dana, 37, of Detroit, is healthy and happier than she
has been in many years. She is enrolled in a master's degree program in
social justice at Marygrove College and recently launched a Web site for
Dig My Roots, her new nonprofit organization, digmyrootsfoundation.org.
Dig My Roots will provide support services for mentally ill people in
adult education, trade school or college programs. Dana's turnaround
comes with help from a strong family network and a new Wayne State
University School of Medicine program that takes a different approach to
schizophrenia and other psychotic disorders, at a time when many
providers have exited the field. Though 2.5 million Americans have
schizophrenia, mental hospital closings during the past three decades
often leaves them and their families with little more than support
groups and periodic psychiatric visits to refill prescriptions. The
Wayne State program is one of the first in years to offer more in metro
Detroit. Dana is among the first to benefit. Hers also is a story of a
strong man who loves her for all her complexity, a devoted mother
determined to see her healthy again and a 10-year-old son with unusual
wisdom about his mother's illness. Dana has her own word to describe her
journey. She calls it a miracle. The onset of disease She was a
ballerina and a tomboy. The younger of two girls, she was her dad's
sidekick. They would play basketball in the backyard of their stately,
six-bedroom Sherwood Forest home in northwest Detroit. But she also took
dance lessons three times a week for more than 10 years and learned good
posture and refinement by attending teas and debutante balls with the
Jack and Jill service organization, "to make a lady out of me," Dana
said. An impeccable dresser, well read and articulate, she is the latest
of several generations in her family with college degrees. Both of her
parents were Detroit Public Schools teachers. "She was a happy child,"
said her mother, Mamie Parker. She saw no early clues that her daughter
someday would develop a chronic mental illness.
Dana has attention deficit disorder, but it didn't become an issue
until high school, when she pursued a challenging math and science
curriculum at Cass Technical High School. "She rushed through things,"
her mother said. "She didn't stay focused on one task." Dana's life
changed in a single night, when she was 12. She heard her father cry out
from his bedroom. It was Dana who called 911. Sidney Parker died five
days later from a brain aneurysm, at 41. Dana had lost her closest
friend. She describes her father as "the kind of man who could dine with
the president and who also would invite a homeless man to dinner." He
bought dozens of shoes for kids at Clinton Elementary and tutored them
on weekends at his home in "weekend drill camps," assisted by Dana and
her mother. Dana became profoundly depressed and had to take medication.
Mamie Parker took Dana to a psychologist, who assured her he found no
problem, beyond the typical depression expected with mourning. Be
patient, Mamie Parker recalls him telling her. From then on, mother and
daughter were inseparable. Mamie Parker attended her daughter's
basketball games and helped with her studies. They traveled to France
and Africa. Dana graduated from Cass and received a degree in behavioral
and social services from the University of Maryland. She flirted with a
career in law, first getting paralegal certification from American
University in Paris, and then pursuing a pre-law curriculum at two
Washington, D.C., schools before she settled on a job as an
undergraduate admissions counselor at her alma mater.
An impressive job she did on a brochure led to a series of university
committee appointments and promotion to senior admissions counselor, a
job involving considerable travel. By then, Dana was married and the
mother of a son, Zachary Wood. After his birth in 1995, she developed
anxiety and racing thoughts. When Zachary was diagnosed with a
gastrointestinal disease at age 4, Dana became more stressed, running
back and forth to his school, doctor's offices and her job. She started
seeing a psychiatrist and was diagnosed with bipolar disorder.
By then, her husband, an accountant, was growing impatient with her
erratic behavior and mood swings. Dana admits to not taking medicine her
doctor prescribed, because she feared she'd gain weight.
Now, she wonders if she would have been helped more by a different
medicine, one that better fit her mental illness. It came, a few years
too late. Worse, then better As her marriage of five years
disintegrated, Dana became very emotional. She grew obsessed with signs
and colors. She kept a notebook of license plate numbers, thinking each
meant something to her. "It was horrible but it was wonderful," Dana
says. As much as the images frightened her, they also brought a sense of
incredible energy and euphoria that came as her mind raced at full
speed. She interpreted billboards and bus signs as directions and felt
compelled to follow them, sometimes for hours. She no longer hid her
obsessions from her son. They had a signal. If she winked at him, that
indicated someone was watching her. At the same time, she helped him
with his homework, taught him how to shoot a lay-up and held down her
job. Six months after her separation in 1999, Dana met Daniel Mathis, a
friend of Zachary's basketball coach. The coach thought the two would
make a good couple. He didn't run when Dana told him she had bipolar
disorder. When she confided that she thought her home was bugged, he had
a security firm come over and sweep the home for devices. Then he
brought over his father, a minister, to reassure her. When that didn't
help, Mathis didn't leave. "That's what is amazing about him," Dana
said. "He never got off the ride."
Unmedicated at times, or insufficiently medicated with drugs only for
manic depression, Dana slid into total paranoia in late summer 2002. "It
all came to a head one day when I picked up Zachary and took him to a
park," she said. She parked next to a car with the keys in it. Convinced
her car had a hidden camera in it, she ordered her son into the
stranger's car, over his protests. As she drove away, the car's owner
chased and stopped her. He realized he knew her. Seeing she was
troubled, he drove her back to her car. Dana called her mother. Fearful
she would lose custody of Zachary, she pleaded to be hospitalized. Mamie
Parker drove to Maryland immediately and arranged for a mover to load up
Dana's possessions. Dana was admitted to Detroit Receiving Hospital in
August 2002. A team of psychiatrists diagnosed Dana with schizoaffective
disorder, a combination of the paranoid symptoms of schizophrenia with
the mania, depression and anxiety of mood disorders. They prescribed
different medicines. In three weeks, she started to feel better. Just
before Christmas, she was released from the hospital. Her paranoia was
gone. Focus helps her cope
Back at her mother's home, Dana started to recover. But she remained
tense and tentative. Her psychosis returned. Her psychiatrist tried one
drug then another until he found three that worked. Mamie Parker had her
own idea. An accomplished quilter and seamstress, she coaxed Dana into
working on a quilt to give Zachary for Christmas. "It really helped me,"
Dana said. "Instead of focusing on all the stimulation and people, I
could focus on the quilt and its color...I thought back on the
experience and it was like my roots pulled me through." Her mother, who
had retired, returned to work, teaching science at Ralph Bunche
Elementary in Detroit, to buy and furnish a condo for her daughter and
grandson. She also started to learn about mental illness. By 2005,
finally free of all her psychotic thoughts, more relaxed and gaining
confidence, Dana was stable enough to be ready for more.
She enrolled in an intensive outpatient program for people with
psychotic disorders that had just opened at Wayne State. It was started
by Dr. Matcheri Keshavan, who joined WSU last year as professor and
associate chair of the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral
Neurosciences.
Keshavan says early intervention can spare people from devastating
recurrences. "The longer they go untreated, the harder it is to get them
back into the community," said Keshavan, who splits his time between WSU
and the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine. People with
schizophrenia and other psychotic disorders need help with goal-setting,
memory and organization skills to counteract poor motivation and
antisocial symptoms that medicines poorly address, he said. The program
offers group and one-on-one counseling; strategies for motivation and
goal-setting, and help with drugs. A companion program is studying
children of people with schizophrenia, to look for early warning signs
in a group at higher risk of the disorder. The work is funded with
grants from the National Institute of Mental Health, the Flynn
Foundation and, recently, a $1-million, three-year grant from the state
of Michigan. Keshavan and other experts in the field say it's too soon
to know whether early intervention and intensive therapies pay off.
"Early intervention is like motherhood; everyone will vote for it," said
Dr. E. Fuller Torrey, a leading schizophrenia expert at the Stanley
Medical Research Institute, a Washington. D.C. area mental health
organization. "But the jury is still out whether it makes a difference."
Small-scale ideas "I've learned to small-scale my ideas," Dana said.
"Before, my ideas always were too broad." Two A's and a B for fall
semester boosted her confidence. . "Understanding what the illness is,
is the most superior coping skill," Dana said.
She no longer feels shame about her illness. Mathis, now her fiance,
and son understand, too.
Copyright (c) 2006, Detroit Free Press
Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News.
For information on republishing this content, contact us at (800)
661-2511 (U.S.),
(213) 237-4914 (worldwide), fax (213) 237-6515, or e-mail reprints@krtinfo.com.
COPYRIGHT 2006 Detroit Free Press
This material is published under license from the publisher through
the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding
rights should be directed to the Gale Group.
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