50 replies to this topic

[Todd Gross]

There was an interesting bit (again on NBC) about a hunter and his buddy in a sporting goods store. Said this fellow came in "who just looked out of place". Pink hair "like cotton candy", ear rings (did Holmes get piercings in the last few weeks? Who dyed his hair?) and "eyes that looked like silver dollars. He looked totally out of it. My friend and I commented about how he looked out of place again. He was looking at an AR-15, and we just thought that that was not the kind of gun somebody like him ought to be buying."

But the store sold the guns to a guy who looked flat whacked-out, didn't they?

Now, I'm a firm supporter of the right to keep and bear arms. I'm of the opinion that governments- any governments - are better to be trusted with an armed citizenry. As I've stated here, I am also an advocate of universal health care, which requires mental health care. I'm also a person once empowered to place individuals on involuntary psychiatric holds, and deeply aware of the responsibility carried with that power. Even so, I was known as someone a little quick on the trigger to admit somebody - especially if they seemed actively or even potentially homicidal. It was kind of a chuckle amongst the professional staff, but after eight years in that particular position of responsibility it turned out I was not wrong. Not once. With mental health care for everybody, it seems reasonable to me that there could be a "clearance card" for buying and owning firearms. Okay, so we'd lose 2%-3% of cops, but I bet that percentage would be radically lower than the general population. Same for things like tear gas, Mace®, samaurai swords, Humvees and fertilizer. (You need a ton of fertilizer, you better be a farmer!) I do not believe just anybody should be able to own just anything. Some people own stocks and rip people off for billions. Money is a potent weapon. So are automobiles. There are people who should not drive. Sure, they can own cars,just not drive them. Again I'm talking about responsibility. Over the years I have found that most people with problems are very aware that they have problems. It's the few that have gone psychotic enough to generate slaughter scenarios that the rest of us have to be aware of, watch out for, and not be afraid to intervene. IOW, go nuts and look bizarre, get a free mental health evaluation. No harm, no foul. Do not sell the random pink-haired silver-dollar-sized-eyed an assault weapon. That abdicates responsibility, and put profit ahead of plain good sense. This is why I railed a bit earlier over the word "senseless". It all makes sense, and it's not that hard to understand. We have sex education (typically a hideous failure), why not heve psych education? We have a nationa lproblem with obesity, (big surprise when technology reduced our need to go do things to sedentary keyboard activity - such as I am doing right now - while increasing desire by advertising for fast and comfort food) but we are not policing food. Instead we are encouraging activity and educating about eating better. This may take a while, but once facts (I mean facts, which rules out a lot of nutritionists and dieticians) become common knowledge the problems will fade to more of a normal distribution. I see an analogy to racism. Racism still exists, and results in some horrific incidents. There is, however, much less frequent incidents and a social atmosphere that frowns upon racism. We have a long way to go with racism (as I'm afraid we are shifting from an anti-Black bias to an anti-Hispanic bias), and we have even longer to go to curb violence. One way to do this is promoting health. One important factor in that is overcoming denial and accepting such problems exist. A radical change in behavior is a signal that there is something happening. Some signals are very clear and should be recognized by everyday folks. Bringing it back to the Aurora shooting, what we have is a series of people who saw the signals and - for whatever reason - chose to not intervene. Yes, I am talking about Holmes' mother. She knew he was capable of such an act, and may have done nothing. (That remains to beseen.) Neighbors must have noticed the quiet guy suddenly turned into a pierced flamingo, and may have seen him carrying in assault rifle, shotgun, six thousand rounds of ammo, and some explosives. Certainly they noted he was "blasting the techno music" which was totally out of character. (This was why he booby-trapped his flat, I think. Cops would respond to a noise compllaint, when there was no response would force their way in, setting off the booby trap, injuring officers and possibly blowing up the building, which would get a huge EMS response, which would draw resources away from him as he went to the theater to shoot people.) The personnel in the sporting goods store. The staff and faculty at his school. Nothing happens in a vacuum. People knew. People either did not act or could not act. (Police response would have been "We can't do anything until he does something".) Without a mental health safety net,I'm guessing those who observed felt powerless to act, and likely just did not know what to do.

I feel like I'm both babbling a bit, and yet without some context what I need to say makes little sense. In all the mass shootings we have heard of, been traumatized by, have experienced, there is an element of social failure. We can, and must, do better. We already care. Now we must take that caring and use it to gain knowledge. We must use the knowledge to act. Sometimes we will tromp all over someone's civil rights. So be it. Better higher taxes to pay for lawsuits from an indignant innocent person than letting one person slip through the safety net and act horribly.

The whole thing makes me terribly sad. I'm injured. Society has been injured. I do not like being sad. The circumstances make me feel like a failure, as I was not superhuman enough to intervene. This is a symptom of my own neuroses, feeling responsible for something I have no involvement in. I use this incident to explore myown thoughts and feelings. I cannot change the facts. I can change myself. I can resolve that feeling of neurotic responsibility without abandoning caring nor the striving to improve myself. Every little bit I improve myself improves the quality of interaction every time I interact with other people. Maybe that makes a bit of difference. If that is all I can do, it is enough. For if everyone, or even most, improve themselves a little tiny bit after such a horrid event, the cumulative improvement will improve society. We heal by keeping the wound clean and not making it worse. Politicizing the incident or using it for anything but furthering understanding is like poking at the wound. We all heal together, just as we were all wounded together. We can certainly tolerate others groping for understanding; so long as they intend to learn, not propigate ignorance.

Seeking understanding is seeking Truth. And the truth will set us free.

Mental health is a whole 'nother topic but it is incredibly difficult to diagnose until it is too late. And you don't want to incorrectly diagnose. And a lot of people who are doing the diagnosing have their own interests at play.

Can't write more because I'm on my way out the door. It's an incredibly complex issue. At what point would you force a close friend or relative to seek mental help for his problems? What would you do if you suspect someone you loved had severely dangerous potential? Could you possibly suspect that someone you loved could shoot up a movie theater, even if they acted in a dark, disturbed manner? And if it wasn't someone you loved, would you even care or would you just get out of their life and not think of them again?

(NOTE: I thought starting a new thread on this subject might be a good idea as not to completely derail the thread about the tragedy in Colorado.)

The awareness of mental health issues has come a long way in recent decades.

But there is still a stigma and the associated undereducation with mental health. Organized religion and different cultural mores and taboos have not helped in many cases either. Mental illness is often viewed as excuse for inappropriate behavior which absolves them of the consequences of their actions. Let's not forget that there are those who stand to profit off the current model of mental health and it is not necessarily in their interests to change things.

I think a lot of the reluctance to truly address this topic on a national level comes from a primal fear. When someone's behavior becomes so significantly different from the group's baseline, it scares the group. At that point, it simply becomes easier to segregate and isolate the "crazy" person so the group can return to "normalcy" faster.

The thing is, no one is "perfectly normal" or "completely sane". We all have something that affects us, though it varies by degree and issue(s) from person to person. That also defines us as to who we are. "Normal" is a lot like "utopia": Great in theory, damn near impossible in reality. But a frank, open discussion can bring about greater understanding and maybe get us closer to a new definition of "normal".

I always remember a coworker saying that everyone in the world was crazy except her. I told her at that point, insanity becomes the new baseline "normal". Her "normal" makes her the aberration and therefore, "crazy". She told me to shut up and pouted for awhile after that.

What are your thoughts and ideas on the subject?

[Miqque Loveland]

Every one of us has a degree of every sort of mental disorder we have thus far identified and named. We are each a bit paranoid, a little schizophrenic, a tad depressed and a touch manic. We all are a bit autistic and somewhat narcissistic. We are all sociopathic and have anger issues. We are, every one of us,batshit insane. Some are better at hiding it than others.

Back during the automotiveindustry crisis I saw an interview with a high-ranking female Ford executive. Flat affect. Comments completely delusional from the base of being a borderline personality (seeing others as objects). In short, about as psychotic as I have ever seen anyone, except the ones I've seen are in a locked unit somewhere. Not this babe. Nope, drawing down a couple million a year and total looney-tunes. Not only on the loose, but in a position of authority. Most people asked "Why is the auto industry in trouble?" Answer, they had psychotics in charge. Flat out.

Most people, hearing about mental disorders, throw up their hands, claim there is no understanding it, and hurry to write it off.

Thing is, the mental functioning of humans is within certain limits and can be understood with not all that much study. Automotive mechanics is hard, psychology is easy. We all come with the same equipment (some damaged in delivery) and react in identifiable patterns once used and stressed. We can go back to the sage advice of "Know Thyself" and settle the matter. Too many are flat afraid of learning, and terrified of being told they may just be wrong about the way they act in the world. God help us if we say they are basing their actions on a false premise or premises - especially if these falsehoods were learned from their parents.

People need to stop being so cowardly afraid of their own minds.

Let the discussion fly.

[The Lorcan Nagle]

Mental health awareness, or the lack thereof is a huge issue in Ireland. There's a big ingrained mentality especially amongst men that you should be stoic and stereotypically patriarchal and not have problems. And aside from that leaving a whole bunch of Irish people who won't talk about their problems, it makes an atmosphere that's not very receptive to anyone talking about their problems at all.

This is changing, but very slowly. There's a good few people I know in the psyhiatric system in Ireland - some of them working via the public health system which isn't fantastic (but better than nothing) - and it's a real uphill struggle on so many levels.

[Jim Ohara]

Every one of us has a degree of every sort of mental disorder we have thus far identified and named. We are each a bit paranoid, a little schizophrenic, a tad depressed and a touch manic. We all are a bit autistic and somewhat narcissistic. We are all sociopathic and have anger issues. We are, every one of us,batshit insane. Some are better at hiding it than others.

No, we're not. That kind of talk cheapens real mental illness. It's like saying everyone has some sort of physical illness. We don't. Most of us are perfectly healthy and normal. Only a select few are physically ill in a debilitating way, and for those people life is completely different and full of unimaginable challenges.

Real mental illness is as horrible as having no eyes, no hands or no legs. It is having a brain that betrays you, that you can't control. It's not knowing fantasy from reality, from thinking the most absurd things are utterly real. It's the world you know betraying you, and the people within laughing while it happens. It's this physical condition that no-one can see, and none can understand. Imagine living every day in agony, surrounded by people who think you can get better by talking about it. Or by dulling your mind by keeping you full of drugs - drugs that turn you into an empty vessel.

We don't see mental illness very much. Not true mental illness, because it's rare and it's not part of normal society. When you encounter it, it's very frightening and devastating to think about. It deserves respect, it deserves care and a society that accepts that you brain is just another organ in your body, and it can go wrong as easily as your kidneys, your lungs, or your stomach. Except there is no surgery. Hell, there's no real medicine. There's just living with it.

[Ben the Obiwomble]

One thing I've noticed over the last couple years, more so from politicians on the right, is this idea that you, as an individual, must be in total control of your life at all times! If something goes wrong, you should have a perfect Batman-like contingency plan to deal with it. In the correct proportion, there's nothing with this but it's being applied to a dumb extreme. None of us know what will happen to us tomorrow, nor can we truly prepare for all eventualities. Yet, in this outlook, if your health fails then it is because you failed. Your mental health has become worse? You must be a weak individual then, just fix yourself and stop being a burden on society!

It's a repellant outlook and I find myself wishing all manner of horrendous 'accidents' upon those who advocate it - and yeah, I have political individuals in mind - so they are forced to throw themselves and depend upon the mercy of the callous systems they so enthusiastically championed. The attitude remains one of machismo: Man up! Pull yourself together! Get better! I did it, so can you! If you can't, then you're simply not trying! But, if your mental or physical health isn't good, due to circumstances outside of your control, all this attitude - and its proliferation by media - does is actually worsen the overall situation. Not only are you ill, it's your fault you are ill!

[Miqque Loveland]

Jim, I know where you're coming from. And while I respect you, in this, you're incorrect. When we see what you are calling "real mental illness" what you describe is the full-tilt-boogie overwhelming pure form of a particular disorder. Like I said, we all start off with the same equipment, but some gets damaged along the line. Due to genetic structure, one can indeed be "born schizophrenic". Or autistic. Or whatever label we're currently using. Some people have maximum problems from before birth. That, however, is not optimal for survival. Even now people hide away their "crazy" family members. Sometimes, some places, they even kill them. It is only in the past century or two that such problems are approached medically.

Let me tell you a story. In an English asylum, around 1880, a flu broke out. Nasty intestinal thing. Everybody caught it, and everybody was puking. Think about pre-washing machine days, pre-vacuum cleaner, and an asylum full of puking people. Somebody decided to treat people with a folk remedy, a distallate of an otherwise useless plant called rauwolfa serpentia - wolfdragon weed. It worked. People stopped puking. The plant was then researched. Around 1930 the plant distallate was marketed. By 1950 the antiemetic drug Compazine was on the market. Research also unearthed some non-quantifiable notes. It seems in that asylum, and in case reports that came out later, individuals who were psychotic saw a lessening of symptoms when treated with Compazine. By around 1960, a new drug, also from the root plantrauwolfa serpentia was on the market. Thorazine. The first "antipsychotic".

Before the drug was found, the disease was not specified. We've had five completely different versions of The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) since. Some disorders were dropped. Names have been changed. (I hear there's a new name for Baron Munchausen by proxy - the very name indicating best guess as to the nature of the disorder was based on a fictional character.)

We are going to see a lot more of this. I have high hopes for the ongoing Human Genome Project. But for quite a good while we must accept the cold fact that some people can be born with a maximum disordeer. I think that's your referent for "real".

In this discussion we are not talking of the fully florid psychotic from birth. That's a horrible thing. We hopefully are talking about people who are closer to the "normal" of the bell curve, and move outward into the standard deviations as they become older, are stressed or undergo trauma. These are the folks that can be most helped at our current level of knowledge.

What we have is everybody with their own tweaks, preferences, superstitions, illogic, "hobbies", likes and dislikes. In the view of others, these can be seen as "nuts". That's where social criteria kicks in, as does that Great Demon known as In My Opinion. Science trumps opinion. There is a hell of a lot to learn.

[Arjan Dirkse]

The whole mental healthcare system is not too bad here. Maybe as good as it gets. Any kind of standard mental healthcare that is deemed necessary is covered by basic health insurance. But things may be getting worse, our health minister a while back claimed that most of the people who are currently burdening the system by getting mental help could instead settle their problems by talking about it with friends or neighbors - instead of talking with an actual therapist. It's a terrible thing to say, yet as often is the case, there is a kernel of truth in it. The actual cost of mental healthcare is staggering, and often the effect is minimal. People can go talk with their therapist for years, and still kill themselves. Mental healthcare needs to become much better I think, in order to justify the cost.

I understand what you say Miqque, that "everybody is batshit insane" idea. But Jim's reaction to it is also justified. Except for real neurological damage, the beginnings of mental illness are pretty much present in everybody. We all have moments of confusion and difficulties coping with life, and reality. It's just the point where our brain becomes too confused, the coping too unmanageable, that real mental illness begins.

[Noel Luperon]

Every one of us has a degree of every sort of mental disorder we have thus far identified and named. We are each a bit paranoid, a little schizophrenic, a tad depressed and a touch manic. We all are a bit autistic and somewhat narcissistic. We are all sociopathic and have anger issues. We are, every one of us,batshit insane. Some are better at hiding it than others.

No, we're not. That kind of talk cheapens real mental illness. It's like saying everyone has some sort of physical illness. We don't. Most of us are perfectly healthy and normal. Only a select few are physically ill in a debilitating way, and for those people life is completely different and full of unimaginable challenges.

I think the two of you are having a difference of degrees only.

O'hara talks about mental illness from a debilitating, crippling standpoint. Severe autism, reality-shattering schizophrenia maybe. Yes, that exists, yes, it is like a severe failure of an organ and limb, an extreme case, and if I recall, this is something you live with in your own family too.

Loveland is talking about something different, more in tune with the Colorado crimes. What do you do with functioning people with mental issues? Authentic medical issues, perhaps not as severe as something that withdraws you from reality, but strictly speaking, mentally ill. Someone who is in a PhD course but depressed, narcissistic and past a barrier inside his own mind where he is willing to commit a crime and now armed to the gills, but still going to school, still OK if slightly weird to his neighbors.

In a live and let live Western urban society of today, how do you approach this person? Who must? Is it the neighbor knocking on the door, "hey, you should come out more!"? Is it the people looking at the well being of students in college, "we have kept our eye on you and you seem to avoid company, are you depressed in some way?"?

Events like these make people ask the same question, "how can we stop this?", and the diagnosis and treatment of a dangerous set of mental aberrations is one way, maybe. I would agree with it, but I'm unsure myself of how to do it in the USA's current health industry situation, its concern for privacy and lack of gun control.

[Miqque Loveland]

Ben - The "conservative" POV is real wrong. These folks are walking time bombs of mental illness. What they are doing is called "blaming the victim" - a heinous form of the ego defense projection. Root is from primitive superstitions of being "cursed by God" (or "gods") and coming down with a disease was obviously because one was an evil person. Contrarily, a healthy person was "blessed" - simply because they were healthy or long-lived and despite whatever horrible things they did or said.

Little else makes me angrier. I figure five to seven years of therapy, or I can strangle them to death on the spot. It's so hard to not give in to what is efficient, cost-effective, and cheers me up so very much in the process.

The "conservatives" (they're not, they are narcissistic) put forth and promulgate false information. Lies. We are not "cursed by God" when we get cancer, a gene got flipped that should function differently. We are not evil persons if we get an influenza - it's a damned virus. And so on.

"When you point a finger at me, there are three more fingers pointing back at you."

And don't even bring up the Tea Baggers. Most of them are ready for a rubber room.

Noel - Mr. Holmes was in school. As such he was required to meet with instructors. As it is coming out we see he was about to drop out. Why is again the question. Was he getting nuts, and could no longer perform under the increased pressure? Or was the increased pressure driving him insane? We'll see. What annoys me is he was pursuing a degree in neuroscience. Were ALL the teachers so oblivious they did not notice anything wrong or different? Sure was not that way when I went to school. Everybody was required to meet with every teacher every course. Part of that was a simple thumbnail evaluation - "Is this person nuts, or likely to go nuts?" If so, they were referred for counseling and a note to the Dean of Education. Just in case. Apparently mr. Holmes did not have the benefit of this involved style of education.

But this is Colorado. They still accuse people of being witches here. I figure Colorado medicine and education is about 1950 levels. It's scary.

[John Mosby]

I think there's a difference between people with personalities that may or not be prone to depression, anxiety, bi-polar etc and reactions to that....and those which could be more defined as severe mental illness (not to dilute the effect of the others). There are people who, similar to alcoholics, can be highly functional and who don't demonstrate the more obvious 'tells' just as there are people who, in hindsight, others say were clearly troubled from the start.

The trick is spotting such signs and working out the degree of effect. It's great if you can spot a problem and diffuse and assist the person before something extreme happens, but there are those people who will positively thrive in environments that feed that (for lack of a better word) 'dysfunction'.

You will never be able to spot every person who needs help, particularly if they don't ask for it, but it's far too easy for a society to wash its hands of those that it deems high-maintenance and less 'cost-effective' in an ever more cost-driven medical-financial climate. In the meantime, every single person should be able to get cost-effective access to a consultant if they feel they need advice and positive mental care.

[Jim Ohara]

We are going to see a lot more of this. I have high hopes for the ongoing Human Genome Project. But for quite a good while we must accept the cold fact that some people can be born with a maximum disordeer. I think that's your referent for "real".

That's not what I'm talking about as real, and you don't simply get to tell me I'm wrong. I stand by my statement: when you say every one of us has some sort of mental disorder I think it's the kind of talk that distracts from genuine mental problems. Some of us have emotional problems brought on by circumstances that can cause anxiety, depression, self mutilation, rage and so on. That's a psychological issue, treated with therapy and time. Some people have brain chemistries that aren't right. Scientific, measurable, diagnostic-able symptoms that cause their brain to malfunction like a broken tendon. But most of us have neither.

I'm surprised no-one has linked the Colorado shooting to the Virginia Tech shooting yet. Seems to be the same profile.

[Johnny Henning]

I have to agree with Jim to a serious point. Mental idiosyncrasies, though detrimental, are in no way comparable to actual mental disorders in the same way that being 20 pounds overweight is not the same problem to any comparable degree as being actually obese.

At the same time, I have to believe that social ills are worsening actual individual ills. We have so much lying and harmful behavior in our politics, business. entertainment, advertising and society at large that it just seems to encourage self-destructive, self-obsessed and unhealthy choices on the individual level. It just feels like it is too easy to get sick - physically and mentally. And even disconnecting from participation in social activities leads to isolation and paranoia.

Edited by Johnny Henning, 22 July 2012 - 01:08 AM.

[Robert B]

I think the two of you are having a difference of degrees only.

O'hara talks about mental illness from a debilitating, crippling standpoint. Severe autism, reality-shattering schizophrenia maybe. Yes, that exists, yes, it is like a severe failure of an organ and limb, an extreme case, and if I recall, this is something you live with in your own family too.

Loveland is talking about something different, more in tune with the Colorado crimes. What do you do with functioning people with mental issues? Authentic medical issues, perhaps not as severe as something that withdraws you from reality, but strictly speaking, mentally ill. Someone who is in a PhD course but depressed, narcissistic and past a barrier inside his own mind where he is willing to commit a crime and now armed to the gills, but still going to school, still OK if slightly weird to his neighbors.

In a live and let live Western urban society of today, how do you approach this person? Who must? Is it the neighbor knocking on the door, "hey, you should come out more!"? Is it the people looking at the well being of students in college, "we have kept our eye on you and you seem to avoid company, are you depressed in some way?"?

Events like these make people ask the same question, "how can we stop this?", and the diagnosis and treatment of a dangerous set of mental aberrations is one way, maybe. I would agree with it, but I'm unsure myself of how to do it in the USA's current health industry situation, its concern for privacy and lack of gun control.

A bunch of this is basically what I was going to say. I don't agree with Jim in this thread. Well, I do in that I think there are too many mental-health ailment diagnoses these days. And I blame the pharmaceutical companies. But I also think too many people are quick to self-diagnose and then use that diagnosis as an crutch.

But I also think mental health issues operate in a more subtle range of degrees. Just because someone isn't crippled by a mental-health disorder doesn't mean that it can't be a pretty big problem for them.

Edited by Robert B, 22 July 2012 - 02:39 AM.

[Ogul]

I tend to agree with Miqque, in general. A "mentally ill" mind is just one that is completely out of touch with reality, but everyone has the potential to get there. It's just a brain that is miswired or produces too much or too little of various chemicals, and there are all sorts of ways to reach the same destination. Maybe a "crazy person's" mind is in a bad shape because they were born with a brain defect or a chemical imbalance, maybe they're that way because a purely physical disease or trauma messed up their previously healthy brain chemistry/mechanics, maybe they're that way because purely mental traumas caused them to rewire their own thinking in an unhealthy way. In any case, the degree of this damage varies from person to person, and I do think that most people have some slight degree of mental instability to them, but only in the sense that one could say that most people have some "athlete" in them, just because they're capable of a pick-up game every now and then, while very few people have the capacity, either through nature or nurture or combination of the two, of being prized "professional athletes."

I think what's important is to try and figure out what causes various mental disorders, what those unhealthy brain structures look like, what causes those unhealthy brain structures to develop, and perhaps what can be done to either reverse the process, or at the very least bypass the effects, such as providing externally a brain chemical that they should have, but are lacking. I don't believe that radical intervention is necessary for most people, any more than most athletes need personal trainers, fancy barometric chambers and other expensive equipment, that sort of thing, but it does help for people to be aware of their own mental fitness, and to improve their own condition where possible for a reasonable effort.

I do think that we tend to be over-medicated, if only because we don't understand the drugs nearly well enough yet. If a drug has a measurably beneficial effect on treating a crippling mental illness, then sure, give it to people that can't function without it, but if someone only has a slight tendency towards that issue, maybe they can do without for now, until such time as we fully understand how and why the drug works, and can figure out ways to reduce potential side-effects.

Btw, two interesting sources on mental health. One was a 60 Minutes piece last week on Autism. It pointed out that interacting with the iPad was apparently very therapeutic for many with severe autism,but not for all of them. It also pointed out how a portion of the brain in people with autism is very different than in the average person. Temple Grandin's brain is on the left, a "normal" one is on the right.


Another story that I found interesting is from the guys at Penny Arcade, usually known for their funny web comics, but less known for both having some degree of social anxiety disorder. They did an episode of their show (in the link) devoted to their personal use of Lexapro to treat it, and why they believe it really helped them.

[Christian U]

That's not what I'm talking about as real, and you don't simply get to tell me I'm wrong. I stand by my statement: when you say every one of us has some sort of mental disorder I think it's the kind of talk that distracts from genuine mental problems. Some of us have emotional problems brought on by circumstances that can cause anxiety, depression, self mutilation, rage and so on. That's a psychological issue, treated with therapy and time. Some people have brain chemistries that aren't right. Scientific, measurable, diagnostic-able symptoms that cause their brain to malfunction like a broken tendon. But most of us have neither.

I think you're not actually on the other side of what Mique said, it's more a matter of terminology here. I get what both of you mean, anyways, and I think you're both correct.

True mental illness is a horrible thing and in no way comparable to the kind of troubles that Mique is talking about. Those are mental health problems, though, and he's right that they're very wide-spread indeed.

It's like saying everyone has some sort of physical illness. We don't. Most of us are perfectly healthy and normal.

But most of are have been physically ill, or will be, at some point of our lives.

I talked to Mike F about this last month in the pub; I've seen a lot of small or big mental problems in my generation of people in recent years, from anxiety attacks and depressive bursts to full-blown mental breakdowns (in one case with added paranoid delusions) and I see a lot of teenagers who have already been diagnosed with depression and similar. I'm coming round to the view that mental health trouble is something that actually happens to many, maybe even most, of us at one point or another in our lives, just like we'll break a leg or have a serious physical illness at some point.

So, you know, both correct. And I think Jim's right in insisting that you have to make a difference between a full-blown mental illness that you are born with and the kind of mental health problem that develops in our lives.

[garjones]

There's an interesting article in this week's Time magazine which discusses suicide in the armed forces (I have the paper version but it's likely online). More members of the US army killed themselves than died in combat in Afghanistan. It's not confined to the USA, I know it's a big problem with the British forces too.

Reading it and the accounts they have of two cases there do echo some of what Miqque said. The stigma attached to mental illness, and one of the guys that killed himself was suffering from anxiety, not schizophrenia or manic deperession, makes it difficult to prevent. It mentioned a lot had been spent on help and counselling (of course you can always do more) but the primary issues was the soldiers felt they'd be judged and held back in their careers for confessing to these things.

If they had a physical injury that wouldn't happen, if it happened in combat they'd get a medal.

I get Jim's point that we don't want to equate minor issues with severe mental illness and what Roberts says of the risk of over-prescribing (like the number of kids on drugs for behavioural issues) but there is a point that a physical illness is one whether I have a cold or cancer, we just understand one is way more serious than the other. I would still find it easier to explain to my boss that I had gout of the flu for missing work than had a panic attack.

[Christian U]

I would still find it easier to explain to my boss that I had gout of the flu for missing work than had a panic attack.

That's the thing, isn't it? And it's a really difficult thing to understand that that is not something you have any control over whatsoever, that it really is a sickness and that you are in no way to blame for it or just will it to go away.

And the taboo connected to these problems really is a factor that makes it all a lot worse. There was a recent case in which a football player here committed suicide, which could probably have been prevented if he had managed to talk about his depression.

Even non-soccer fans were shocked by the sudden, tragic death of Robert Enke, the goalkeeper for Germany's national team, who committed suicide by leaping in front of an express train near the city of Hannover on Tuesday night. The nation practically came to a standstill on Wednesday — German TV carried nonstop coverage of Enke's death, and hundreds of fans converged on the soccer stadium in Hannover to sign a condolence book and light candles and place flowers at the gates.

It wasn't just the suddenness of Enke's suicide that gripped Germany, but the surprise that a player seemingly on top of his game with an adopted infant daughter could have struggled so massively — and so privately — with depression. Teresa Enke, the goaltender's widow, broke down at a news conference on Wednesday as she explained how her husband had tried to conceal his depression from the media out of fear that their 8-month-old daughter, Leila, would be taken away if it became public. "I tried to be there for him, to give him hope," she said. "I drove to training with him to help him get through his depression, but he didn't want to accept help anymore."

http://www.time.com/...l#ixzz21MluTnaj

[Arjan Dirkse]

That's the thing, isn't it? And it's a really difficult thing to understand that that is not something you have any control over whatsoever, that it really is a sickness and that you are in no way to blame for it or just will it to go away.

And yet there is also a factor in certain forms of mental illness which you do have control over...although it doesn't work in the short term, but it is something that comes with time and training, and often failing many times before you succeed. For instance, some forms of anxiety can be overcome by certain "exercises." I think you can compare it to how some physical ailments, like back pain or morbid obesity, can be overcome by physical therapy, or by changing lifestyles. In a lot of cases, patients who are suffering from mental illness are not helpless, although it can be a symptom for them to tell themselves they are helpless.

It is difficult to strike the right balance, I think. Mental illness is generally very different from physical illness. Of course people need to be empathetic, but telling people that they have no power over their ailments isn't the answer.

[Christian U]

And yet there is also a factor in certain forms of mental illness which you do have control over...although it doesn't work in the short term, but it is something that comes with time and training, and often failing many times before you succeed. For instance, some forms of anxiety can be overcome by certain "exercises." I think you can compare it to how some physical ailments, like back pain or morbid obesity, can be overcome by physical therapy, or by changing lifestyles. In a lot of cases, patients who are suffering from mental illness are not helpless, although it can be a symptom for them to tell themselves they are helpless.

It is difficult to strike the right balance, I think. Mental illness is generally very different from physical illness. Of course people need to be empathetic, but telling people that they have no power over their ailments isn't the answer.

Oh absolutely, yeah, there's a lot of things you can do, it's just easy to understand that you can't just decide to not be sick anymore.

And I think we also need to realise is that you don't have have yourself completely psychoanalysed in depth in dealing with every case, nor do you have to have pills prescribed. There's a lot of relatively simple ways to help with behavioural therapy.

[garjones]

And the taboo connected to these problems really is a factor that makes it all a lot worse. There was a recent case in which a football player here committed suicide, which could probably have been prevented if he had managed to talk about his depression.

A recent example happened with Gary Speed, the Wales football manager. A handsome guy, rich and he'd just come off winning 4 out of his last 5 games and his team flying up the world rankings. Nobody could understand it.

On 26 November 2011, Speed appeared as a guest on the BBC One television programme Football Focus,^[72] with presenter Dan Walker later describing Speed as being in "fine form".^[56] After the programme finished at 1pm, Speed chatted to various other pundits at the MediaCity studios in Salford before joining former team-mate Alan Shearer to watch the Manchester United versus Newcastle United match at Old Trafford, a short walk from the studios across the Manchester Ship Canal.^[73] After the match ended, at 5pm, Speed drove home to Huntington, Cheshire, about an hour's drive from Greater Manchester.^[73]
The following morning, just before 7am, his wife Louise found his body hanged in the garage of his home. She telephoned the ambulance service at 7:08am and the police were also informed. They confirmed him as being dead and the police announced that they were not treating his death as suspicious. Although the facts were not fully established, it was reported that Speed committed suicide.^[74][75][76] His death was announced to the public by the Football Association of Wales a few hours later.^[77]

In such macho environments as sport and the military it must be harder than your average office worker such as myself where I would feel some stigma whether it be real of imagined.