TREATMENT ADVOCACY CENTER
Visit our web site www.psychlaws.org
May 30, 2003
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1. INCARCERATING BIPOLAR SIBLING – National Public Radio, May 22, 2003
2. EXPAND TRAINING – El Paso Times , May 28, 2003
3. WHY WASN'T FARB KEPT AT HOSPITAL? – The Herald-Sun, May 23, 2003
4. CHILD POSSIBLE VICTIM OF MURDER-SUICIDE TRY; GRANDMOTHER IS CHARGED – The
Salt Lake Tribune, May 28, 2003
5. LODMELL COULD HAVE BEEN COMMITTED UNDER NEW LAW – Salt Lake Tribune, May 29,
2003
6. MENTALLY ILL OFTEN ABLE TO MAKE CHOICES – Salt Lake Tribune, May 29, 2003
7. UC-BERKELEY STUDENTS BEAR WITH EXTREMES OF MENTAL ILLNESS –University Wire,
April 30, 2003
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1. NATIONAL PUBLIC RADIO,
May 22, 2003
[Editor’s Note: As is often brought up on the floor of Congress
by right-wing Republicans, National Public Radio is not known as a bastion of
conservatism. Reformed assisted treatment laws or “a national tracking system
for violent, self-destructive, psychiatric patients” seem hardly likely to be
held as inviolable goals by NPR or those who work for it.
Severe mental illnesses, however, respect political persuasion as little they do
differences of race, nationality, or gender. And having a loved one with one
often allows bitter experience to delve exceptions into long-held tenets. Time
and again we see assisted treatment reform receive support from unexpected
quarters in a legislature. A politician with either a relative or close friend
with a severe psychiatric disorder is usually the catalyst. Although we know
nothing of her previous personal beliefs, imagine how the experience of Lisa
Suhay could affect her.]
Morning Edition (10:00 AM ET)
INCARCERATING BIPOLAR SIBLING
BOB EDWARDS, host:
Medical researchers have been successful in creating treatments for an array of
mental illnesses. But drugs are worthless if the patient refuses to take them.
Commentator Lisa Suhay's brother is mentally ill and violent when off his
medication. Tomorrow a judge will decide his future.
LISA SUHAY reporting:
I helped put my bipolar younger brother in prison. Knowing that breaks my heart,
but it keeps my family safe. When he's stable, he's a shy man and he plays
guitar like Segovia. It never lasts. For 15 years he's danced all over the
cracks in the foundation of our medical and legal systems. He's often been
homeless, surviving through luck and cunning. He is over age 18; that means by
law, hospitals, police and treatment programs can tell us nothing. We have no
right to know where he is or how he is, no right to help. We can't protect
ourselves or our community.
He was sentenced to four years probation in a halfway house with no family
contact after I testified before a grand jury that he made terroristic threats
to harm my children and others. In the dead of night he repeatedly called me
saying, 'I'm going to take away everything important to you starting with your
kids so you'll know how it feels to be me.'
And in January he destabilized. He smashed up his rooms in the halfway house and
took off. Nobody notified us he was rampaging. I let the kids play in the yard
alone and walked the dog at night unwary. News of his flight finally came from a
relative he'd called. Caller ID showed the psychiatric ward at Bellevue Hospital
in Manhattan. He checked himself in for a breather. This has happened
repeatedly. In New Jersey, he can check himself out. In New York he needs a
doctor's approval, but the hospital doesn't know his history and releases him
after several days on medication when he seemed just fine. This usually goes on
until he hurts someone and gets arrested.
This time I called and faxed everyone from police to state senators. I begged
for help until New York and New Jersey prosecutors, police and the hospital
agreed to have him picked up upon release. He was transferred from the hospital
to prison in February where he waits resentencing. Even if the judge rules that
he belongs in a treatment facility, I worry that the shortage of state
psychiatric facilities in New Jersey will force him to remain in prison.
He called my mother from Riker's Island maximum security prison saying, 'My
sister hates me.' Jail is not the answer to mental illness because you can't
rehabilitate a disease. But without enforced medication and monitoring, he will
either die violently or kill one of us.
We need a national tracking system for violent, self-destructive, psychiatric
patients, coordinating agencies and families to ensure the patients' continued
treatment and everyone's safety, otherwise I'm afraid someday I'll face the
family of a person he has hurt or killed as they ask, 'Why didn't you stop him?'
I'm afraid the answer will be that I needed help and nobody listened.
EDWARDS: The comments of Lisa Suhay, author of the children's books, "Tell Me A
Story," and "Tell Me Another Story."
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2. EL PASO TIMES (TX), May 28,
2003
[Editor’s Note: There is having a reformed law that allows people
with a severe mental illness to be placed in treatment before they reach extreme
crisis, and then there is using it. Below our Executive Director, Mary Zdanowicz,
brings the difference to the readers of the El Paso Times.]
Letter to the Editor
EXPAND TRAINING
El Paso police officers need better training if they are really taught that
"only people who are a danger to themselves or others should be taken into
custody for a psychiatric evaluation," as an officer was quoted as saying in a
May 7 Times story, "Police may alter training to deal with mentally ill."
Texas law allows a peace officer to take a person with mental illness to a
mental-health facility based on "evidence of severe emotional distress and
deterioration in the person's mental condition to the extent that the person
cannot remain at liberty." (Texas Mental Health Code, sec. 572.001b.(2)).
Waiting for a person to actually become dangerous before getting treatment puts
police, the mentally ill and the public at risk. Intervening before a person is
actually threatening themselves or others is not only legal, it is common sense.
Texas has one of the better commitment laws in the country,
but it is only good if it is used to prevent tragedies like 26-year-old Juan
Gomez's unnecessary death.
Mary Zdanowicz
Executive Director,
Treatment Advocacy Center
Arlington, Va.
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3. THE HERALD-SUN
(Durham, N.C.), May 23, 2003
[Editor’s Note: Like the Texas law that Ms. Zdanowicz described
in her letter, that of North Carolina is among one of the better ones in the
country, permitting the provision of care before imminent danger arises.
Although we understand why the editors of the Herald-Sun suggest that its
state’s assisted treatment laws need revision, that is not the case. Passing a
reformed assisted treatment law is a battle only half-won until law enforcement
and mental health professionals consistently apply that law.]
Editorial
WHY WASN'T FARB KEPT AT HOSPITAL?
Chapel Hill psychiatrist Linmarie Sikich went to the heart of the issue
Wednesday when she said involuntary commitment of a mentally ill individual is
"a really difficult process." The trail of death left by Roderick Farb earlier
this week shows why it should be easier.
Four people, including Farb himself, died Monday when he opened fire at the
Mebane home of his estranged wife, a male friend and her 9-year-old daughter. He
had sought help at UNC Hospitals earlier this month, complaining of suicidal
depression.
For some reason, one that likely went to the grave with him, Farb walked out of
the UNC psychiatric clinic on May 5 before a specialist could see him. Wisely,
the clinic staff asked the Orange County Sheriff's Department to pick up Farb
and return him to the hospital, where he underwent an evaluation resulting in
his involuntary commitment.
Yet, for reasons still unexplained Thursday, the hospital unconditionally
released Farb on May 6 - even though a psychiatrist who met with him late in the
day affirmed the need for Farb's involuntary commitment. Hospital documents
obtained by The Herald-Sun through a court order noted that Farb was "no longer
in need of inpatient hospitalization."
Two weeks after his release, Farb went on his killing spree. The hospital
records dutifully show that he owned a gun.
The Roderick Farb case has eerie overtones of the infamous Wendell Williamson
incident in Chapel Hill. In 1995, Williamson, then a UNC law student who had
been under treatment for paranoia and other manifestations of psychosis, donned
camouflage gear and opened fire with an M-1 rifle on a downtown street, killing
two people and seriously wounding a police officer.
Here is the most disturbing parallel between Williamson and Farb: In 1992, a
psychotic episode resulted in an attempt to have Williamson involuntarily
committed. He fought the attempt vigorously, and a judge ruled that on the basis
of the information available to him, Williamson was not dangerous and should be
released.
In American jurisprudence, committing a person against his or her will to a
mental hospital puts in motion a balancing act between the constitutional rights
of an individual, which favor liberty, and the less specific rights of society
to be protected from someone with the potential to do it great harm. This is why
Dr. Sikich said an involuntary commitment is such a difficult process. In some
respects, it should be, because involuntary commitment has been used by
governments to silence dissent or otherwise remove troublemakers from the public
sphere. The former Soviet Union was notorious for using psychiatry in defense of
the state.
Nonetheless, it seems obvious that people as unhinged as Roderick Farb meet even
the most minimal standard for involuntary commitment, which can last up to 15
days under a court order.
It is far better for medical specialists and public safety agencies to act in
the belief, and within the scope of the law, against a disturbed person who
shows all the signs of becoming one of those proverbial ticking time bombs. It
may be, too, that the laws governing involuntary commitment need to be revised
to better protect society from the violently mentally ill.
In the meantime, UNC Hospitals has an obligation to society, too. The hospital
must explain how a man in the throes of suicidal depression, a man estranged
from his wife and known to own a gun, fit the profile for involuntary commitment
on May 5, but on May 6 was declared no longer in need of it. Something didn't
compute at UNC, but in the circuits of Roderick Farb's angry and rapidly
decaying mind, it added up to three plus one equals four deaths.
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4. THE SALT LAKE TRIBUNE,
May 28, 2003
[Editor’s Note: The signs were clear that Kelley Jean Lodmell
needed help, and badly – arrests, past violence, a history of untreated bipolar
disorder, and a deteriorating condition. Paying the price because she did not
get treatment was her granddaughter.]
CHILD POSSIBLE VICTIM OF MURDER-SUICIDE TRY; GRANDMOTHER IS CHARGED; SNAKE
RIVER SEARCH CONTINUES; SUSPECT NEEDED HELP, RELATIVES SAY
By Elizabeth Neff, Steven Hunt and Michael N. Westley, The Salt Lake
Tribune
IDAHO FALLS, Idaho -- The search for a 19-month-old Utah girl resumes this
morning in the Snake River, where police believe the toddler perished in an
aborted suicide attempt by her grandmother.
Kelley Jean Lodmell, 38, was charged here Tuesday with the kidnapping and murder
of her granddaughter, Acacia Patience Bishop.
"We have reason to believe she intentionally jumped into the river to commit
suicide and kill the baby as well," said Idaho Falls police Sgt. Steve Hunt.
Lodmell disappeared with Acacia around 6 p.m. Sunday evening. The toddler's
mother, Casey Lodmell, had left Acacia in the care of her grandmother, Kelley
Lodmell's mother.
A nationwide Amber Alert was issued for the child, and Lodmell was found Monday
after she ran into a hydropower plant on the banks of the Snake River diversion,
wet and saying the girl had fallen into the water.
Bonneville County Magistrate L. Mark Riddoch ordered Lodmell held without bail
after a court hearing via closed-circuit television.
The charges were based on both physical evidence and statements made by Lodmell,
said prosecutor Dane Watkins. He declined to elaborate.
For two days, teams of divers and searchers using a helicopter, boat and rescue
dogs have combed the waters near where a pair of child's shoes and a doll were
discovered on the riverbank.
Lodmell's mother and stepfather, Linda and Dick Lodmell of Salt Lake County, say
the woman has bipolar disorder and a history of paranoid schizophrenic behavior.
They contend authorities could have done more to help her after her latest
arrest in a string of three criminal episodes.
Lodmell, who had recently been living in her car, was arrested in January after
she threw a pocketknife at a police officer while drunk.
But officials at the Utah Division of Adult Probation and Parole say Lodmell had
previously completed an intensive inpatient program for mentally ill defendants,
had been assessed as a moderate risk offender, was staying in contact with her
probation officer, and had been referred to outpatient mental health programs.
Lodmell also had taken Acacia for a short time last year, but in that incident,
Casey Lodmell found Acacia within a half-hour at an acquaintance's apartment.
Family members kept watch on Lodmell and considered seeking a protective order
to keep her away from the child, but did not imagine she would be capable of
this, said Dick Lodmell.
Linda Lodmell said her daughter was doing laundry at the home Sunday while she
and her husband were baby-sitting Acacia. Kelley Lodmell disappeared with Acacia
when Linda Lodmell was putting her vacuum cleaner away.
Dick Lodmell, a social worker who works with special-needs children and their
families, said he told Lodmell's probation officer his stepdaughter had lied
about living with them and was living out of her car. He said he was worried
that, since she could not afford medication, she would not meet the terms of her
probation.
"I pleaded with [the probation officer] to get her into treatment, and I said
she is mentally ill, she hears voices, she's bipolar, paranoid," Dick Lodmell
said. "She does pretty good if she has a job and a place to stay.
"They turned her out and said she could operate, and I assured him she could
not."
Leo Lucy, regional Adult Probation and Parole administrator, said he was aware
that members of Lodmell's family had pushed for an inpatient program. But he
said defendants are rarely ordered to repeat the same inpatient program, and
said Lodmell was "progressing normally."
"She's functional and she was employed," Lucy said.
No one anticipated the alleged kidnapping and homicide, said Jack Ford,
spokesman for the state Department of Corrections, which runs the probation and
parole division. "We have had no problems with her."
Lodmell's short criminal record began in May 1999, when she
crashed her car in Salt Lake City while driving drunk on a suspended license and
injured a passenger.
According to court records, Lodmell was ordered to complete substance abuse
therapy, community service and pay a fine, but she failed to comply.
Third District Judge L.A. Dever issued bench warrants on two different occasions
before disposing of the case in February 2000 by ordering Lodmell to serve 30
days in jail.
Seven months later, Lodmell was arrested for firing a BB gun at a child playing
in a neighboring yard. The child suffered puncture wounds in the back and thigh.
When Salt Lake County sheriff's deputies arrived, Lodmell told them, "Yeah, I
did it and I liked it," according to court records.
The shooting incident occurred at 4564 S. 785 East, near where Lodmell's mother
and stepfather live.
Charged with third-degree felony aggravated assault, Lodmell pleaded guilty as
charged. She was sentenced to probation and given credit for 56 days she already
had spent in jail.
That time, Lodmell completed her court-ordered probation, which included a stint
at Orange Street, an inpatient program for mentally ill female defendants.
But in January, Lodmell turned up drunk and belligerent in the lobby of the
Century 16 Theatres, 3300 South and State Street. When two South Salt Lake
police officers arrived, Lodmell had a can of beer in one hand and a pocketknife
with a 2- to 3-inch blade in the other.
The officers pepper-sprayed Lodmell, who threw the knife at one officer who had
to duck to avoid being hit, according to South Salt Lake Detective Darin
Sweeten.
Arrested for aggravated assault, Lodmell later admitted drinking most of the day
and also using marijuana, according to court documents.
She told jail officers she had been living in her car during the previous month.
But she said she had been working at a fast-food restaurant for two years and
was employed at a retail store before that.
Lodmell pleaded guilty to misdemeanor counts of threatening to use a dangerous
weapon in a fight, intoxication and disorderly conduct. Lodmell -- who spent 60
days in jail awaiting resolution -- was sentenced April 21 to 18 months of
probation, including 40 hours of community service, mental health counseling and
drug testing.
Third District Judge William Bohling, who runs the 3rd District mental health
court for nonviolent misdemeanor offenders, said the criminal system can do only
so much. The courts cannot order someone to stay on medication once the person
is off probation, he said.
"If a person has gone beyond the probation period and the court has basically
closed the case, there has to be a new charge before that person is brought back
into the system," he said. "It's tricky business. You have the interest of the
civil rights of people with mental illness . . . and you just can't go and force
them to do something they don't want to do, including taking medication."
But people can be civilly committed if it can be legally proved they are a
danger to themselves or others.
"The truth of the matter is that people with mental illness, you never cure,"
Bohling said. "You stabilize them and as long as you can keep them on their meds
and on their program they do pretty well. But they are vulnerable to the things
in life everyone else is."
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5. SALT LAKE TRIBUNE, May 29,
2003
[Editor’s Note: Pursuant to the recently enacted expansion of
Utah’s commitment standard, it appears that Kelley Lodmell could have gotten the
assisted treatment that could have saved both her from deterioration and the
life of her granddaughter. The lacking was not in the way, but the will.]
LODMELL COULD HAVE BEEN COMMITTED UNDER NEW LAW
By Ashley Broughton, The Salt Lake Tribune
Mental health advocates say a change in state law that took effect early this
month -- a measure inspired by another family tragedy -- might have helped
Kelley Jean Lodmell.
Lodmell had been diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia and bipolar disorder,
family members have said, and her behavior had worsened since the mid-1990s.
"The system will not help us," Lodmell's mother, Linda Lodmell, said earlier
this week. "We don't know what to do with her."
She did not say whether the family previously had made any formal attempts to
have Kelley Lodmell committed.
The Susan Gall Involuntary Commitment Act, passed during the last regular
session of the Legislature, makes it easier to commit mentally ill people for
treatment against their will.
The law changed the state's standard for involuntary commitment. Previously,
people had to demonstrate an "immediate" danger to themselves or others in order
for a judge to decide to commit them. Now, they must demonstrate a "substantial"
danger.
Lodmell "could have fit that bill, absolutely and positively," said Vicki
Cottrell, executive director of the National Alliance for the Mentally Ill-Utah.
But, she said, families of those with mental illness remain unaware of the
change and uneducated about the process of involuntary committal. And "who has
better information about the person than the family?"
It is up to the family, however, to take the initiative and approach the
relative's doctor or service provider, she said. "I've had family members call
me . . . and I tell them, 'You don't just say it once. You bug them and bug them
and bug them,' " Cottrell said.
Officials at Valley Mental Health, however, said they have not seen an increase
in families seeking to commit loved ones -- and do not expect to.
"The procedure has been available for a long, long time," said Jed Ericksen, the
organization's associate director of adult services. And the change does not
allow the trampling of civil rights for those who may be mentally ill, he said,
adding that even those who are civilly committed still can stop taking their
medication or leave treatment once released from an inpatient facility.
Ericksen compares involuntary commitment to visiting the dentist. A patient
would not ask for a tooth to be pulled, he said -- instead, he or she would
leave that decision to the dentist. "The decision as to whether an involuntary
admission should occur or not is up to the emergency staff in the various
facilities," he said. "Our idea is, that's really what ought to happen."
Kelley Lodmell had been under the supervision of the criminal justice system,
Ericksen said, which would take precedence over any civil action. "It's a much
more lasting and much more potentially powerful method of social control," he
said.
Amendments to the law, which took effect May 5, were inspired by the Dec. 14,
2001, death of Susan Jenkins Gall, a Granite District teacher who was slain
allegedly by her mentally ill son, Lenny Gall. Friends and family members have
said she tried for years to get help for her son, who reportedly had been
diagnosed with bipolar disorder and also experienced delusions.
Now 26, Lenny Gall is set to stand trial later this year on first-degree murder
charges.
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6. SALT LAKE TRIBUNE, May 29,
2003
[Editor’s Note: Everyone is entitled to an opinion. Even
opinions, from the same incident as the last item, like:
“Strange as it sounds, it's quite possible Lodmell even liked it this way --
found comfort in cartwheeling along day to day, picking fights, driving drunk,
trying to convince others the television set was infested with bugs that talked
to her.”
That does not mean that one must agree with such statements. You’ll see below
that Ms. Mullen’s comprehensive research does not seem to have uncovered the
profound effect of anosognosia, the physiological effect that can leave even
those most overcome by severe mental illness physically incapable of
appreciating that they are in fact sick. Some make choices, some are incapable
of them.
As the window for responses to Ms. Mullen’s column below is still open, we
thought some of you, especially those in the Tribune’s readership area, might
want to submit a letter to the editor concerning it.
You can do so to:
Public Forum
The Salt Lake Tribune
P.O.Box 867
Salt Lake City, Utah 84110
Or by email to letters@sltrib.com ]
Commentary
MENTALLY ILL OFTEN ABLE TO MAKE CHOICES
By Holly Mullen,The Salt Lake Tribune
Searchers kept dragging the Snake River on Wednesday for a sweet little baby's
body, while the sad details of her grandmother's existence kept trickling out.
What we know so far about this woman, Kelley Jean Lodmell, comes from her
relatives, who say she pinballed through life overwhelmed by mental illness,
living out of her car, wreaking havoc on others and finally ending this mad
journey in an Idaho Falls jail, accused of drowning 19-month-old Acacia Patience
Bishop, while also attempting to kill herself.
As Lodmell's mother and stepfather look solemnly into the TV cameras, accusing
the "system" of abandoning their daughter, of letting her "fall between the
cracks," keep this in mind: This is a family's grief and shame and pain talking.
As easy as it is to blast bureaucrats who bungle delivery of vital services, and
as often as that criticism is justified, this is not one of those cases.
Kelley Jean Lodmell got help for her bipolar disorder and paranoid
schizophrenia, and plenty of it. While doing time in the Salt Lake County Jail
and on probation for infractions related to her illness since 1998, she received
psychotropic drugs and counseling.
She could have been taking government-funded meds right up through last weekend,
when she appeared at her mother's home, and stole away with Acacia. But like
many others grappling with mental illness, she chose to go it alone.
Strange as it sounds, it's quite possible Lodmell even liked it this way --
found comfort in cartwheeling along day to day, picking fights, driving drunk,
trying to convince others the television set was infested with bugs that talked
to her. There is familiarity in this way of life, and honestly, snuffing it with
medication is sometimes the last thing a mentally ill person wants.
Listen to Mitzy Stewart, program manager of Safe Haven, a residential treatment
center for the homeless mentally ill, managed by Valley Mental Health. Stewart,
a soft-spoken social worker, has been associated with Safe Haven for 11 years,
has seen every type of mental illness and knows that some people cling to their
disease, untreated, because they want it that way.
"There are a lot of reasons people stop taking medication," Stewart said,
sitting in the break room inside the rehabbed west-side warehouse of 24
apartment units for mentally ill, homeless adults. "The older generation meds,
like Haldol and Thorazine, can have horrible side effects. Medications have a
leveling effect. Frequently a person who is medicated will talk about feeling
flat, blunted. They like the highs, they like the creativity they associate with
those highs. Life on medication is not necessarily comfortable anymore."
Stewart is quick to note she knows nothing of Lodmell's case (she was receiving
services for a long while from Valley Mental Health) but suggests she might have
fit in at Safe Haven, provided she accepted the basic rules: getting along with
staff, showing courtesy to other residents, keeping her apartment clean.
She would have been encouraged to stay on her medication, though legally she
could not be forced to do so. Still, there are Safe Haven residents who are
unmedicated -- one man, Stewart says, has lived peacefully for 10 years in a
community eight-plex owned by the agency.
He follows the rules.
Kelley Jean Lodmell chose not to, with possibly the grimmest of consequences. So
as the details of this tragedy unfold, remember, you can't believe everything
you hear. Especially when grief is doing the talking.
*****************************
7. UNIVERSITY WIRE, April 30,
2003
[Editor’s Note: Knowing how wrong mainstream papers often get
issues concerning severe psychiatric disorders makes this piece by a Berkeley
undergraduate all the more exceptional.]
UC-BERKELEY STUDENTS BEAR WITH EXTREMES OF MENTAL ILLNESS
By Sarah Mourra, Daily Californian, Berkeley, Calif.
After Desmond Moore's first manic episode, ambulance workers found him collapsed
on an Oakland, Calif., street, pants unzipped, following a sleepless night in
the Oakland County jail.
"Imagine you are extremely aware of everything going on around you, and you're
moving really quickly," Moore says. "At the time I was wild and crazy, and out
of my mind."
The day before Moore had jumped into a taxicab with no money, overcome by an
impulsive need to get out of town. After being let out of jail and found on the
street, Moore was taken to John George Psychiatric Hospital in Hayward, Calif.
Clinicians diagnosed Moore, a UC Berkeley sophomore at the time, with bipolar
disorder, a psychiatric condition characterized by cycles of depression
alternating with periods of mania.
The disorder, which often manifests between the ages of 18 and 24 years, easily
disrupts the lives of students like Moore, who left school in 1996 following the
incident in Oakland. Although he returned in 2000, he left again the following
year after a violent confrontation with police.
University Health Services counselors have seen a sharp increase in students
with bipolar disorder, says Deborah Begley, a social worker at the Tang Center.
National surveys affirm this trend.
Begley attributes part of this increase to a greater awareness of bipolar
disorder in the media, leading to earlier diagnoses. Bipolar students who may
not have been able to attend college in the past are now entering universities
with the help of medical treatment.
The reason behind the onset of the disorder among college-age students is
unclear. A strong correlation exists between those with the untreated disorder
and substance abuse. Professionals disagree whether drugs are the trigger or the
self-medicative cure.
Forty-one percent of those with the disorder use substances when their illness
is not successfully managed. Only 13 percent use them when their illness is
under control, according to Ron Elson, chief psychiatrist at University Health
Services.
"Drugs and alcohol can sometimes make something worse that is already there," he
says. "It can destabilize people who may be OK and often push them over the
edge."
Gabe Melero, a UC Berkeley senior in his seventh year, says bipolar disorder
runs "up and down the family tree." Self-medication was a remedy learned from
family members.
"Among the males in my family the attitude has historically been that if you're
feeling bad, you can take something for it -- but you don't go to a doctor for
that something," Melero says. "Anglo culture would classify that as
self-medication, but in my family it's called something else."
Moore, who is black, also faced cultural perceptions about the disorder
following his diagnosis.
"In the black community they look at mental issues and people who are on meds as
being extremely weak," he says. "Everybody turned their back on me. I had people
telling me this had happened because I was having sex with white girls. I was
made to think that I had a spiritual problem -- so I stopped my meds and started
reading the Bible."
Moore says these were some of the reasons his father cut off support. This left
Moore homeless until he entered a rehabilitation facility and managed to get
back into UC Berkeley in 2000.
The low-energy depressed states of the condition often result in self-isolation
and thoughts of suicide.
Suicide rates in young people have increased dramatically in the past few
decades, according to the National Institute of Mental Health. More than 90
percent of suicide victims suffer from a serious psychiatric illness at the time
of their death.
"All I would want to do was put on some Frank Sinatra, climb into my bathtub and
take all my pills at once," Moore says. "You don't just want to die, you wish
you were never born. You ponder that every day for months."
Melero, who was diagnosed with bipolar disorder his third year, says suicide
seemed like the only option during the spring of 2001. He felt the lithium he
was taking to stabilize his mood was not working. So Melero took an overdose of
Xanax, a central nervous system depressant used to treat anxiety and insomnia.
To Melero's surprise, he woke up the morning after taking the pills. He says he
knew immediately that he needed to go home.
"Suicide comes with the pain and tunnel vision of bipolar disorder," says Jon
Pennington, a UC Berkeley graduate student diagnosed with the condition. "People
cannot see their way out of their own pain. Many of us have been there."
While suicidal thoughts characterize the depressive side of the disorder, the
manic state is marked by hypomanic creative energy that quickly escalates into a
hypermanic state of frenzied activity and paranoia.
Melero compares the intense high of the manic state to doing cocaine.
"You have a lot of energy, and you're very egotistical," he says. "Towards the
end you become delusional -- suddenly every security guard in every store is
staring at you, suddenly people on the street are laughing at you."
In one hypomanic episode, Melero wrote an entire short story in one sitting.
"I felt like I was king of the world," he says. "But I could also feel myself
losing control of everything in my life. The way I looked at (my manic state)
was that famous people behave like this all the time. But at the same time I
felt myself completely frazzled."
The seductiveness of these energetic states often leads people to discard their
medications.
Others face difficulties just getting the right level of medication.
Misdiagnoses further complicate bipolar disorder. Physicians sometimes mistake
the depressive episodes for chronic depression and prescribe antidepressants
like Prozac. Without mood stabilizers like lithium or Depakote, antidepressants
only aggravate the condition.
"The way things work with the assembly line HMOs is that if someone seems
depressed they give out antidepressants, pat them on the butt and send them
home," Pennington says. "But taking antidepressants without mood stabilizers
will send them right into a manic state."
Because of the intensity of the depressive states, school
can become a monumental task for students with bipolar disorder.
"I would sleep during the daytime and miss classes," Melero says. "I didn't see
the day for weeks."
Beset by severe depression during his third year, Melero did not attend classes.
Although he failed both semesters, he obtained a retroactive withdrawal from the
university.
While Melero says most faculty members have responded to his needs, several have
made things more difficult.
One semester he missed about four weeks of class because of depression. He
approached a professor to explain his situation and asked about making up missed
work. The professor responded with an e-mail that read, "I think it would be
better that you not come back at all."
Such situations can also put students on financial aid in a bad position because
falling under units means losing financial aid.
"If someone in a wheelchair said they couldn't come in for a few weeks because
of meningitis nobody would kick them out," Melero says. "But being bipolar is
like an invisible disability."
Still, students at UC Berkeley have a place to share these
experiences. Melero, Moore and Pennington have regularly attended the Tang
Center bipolar support group run by Begley and Elson. It has helped them out of
the isolation they often feel and provided space to get feedback on different
medications.
"There are a lot of people tripping out who don't know why," Moore says. "You
convince yourself that you're just moody. People can go their whole lives
without ever going to a hospital. But if left unchecked you can find yourself
running down the street one day and not having any idea why."
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