For my first blog post of 2023, I thought I’d write about the mad among us. It seems fitting when I think about all the crazy stuff we read on the internet, all the distortions and lies, whether it’s about covid and vaccinations or the unhinged views of some politicians.
What initially sparked this post was an older article in Maclean’s magazine by Brian Bethune about author, Susan Doherty, who delved into the damage wrought by schizophrenia. Doherty’s non-fiction book, The Ghost Garden, profiles some of the mentally ill she met. t’s a thoughtful piece about those who live with the label, what they’ve been through, how they’re viewed, and how they survive.
My Experience in Mental Health
My first job after graduating with a Master of Social Work was on a psychiatric ward at the Winnipeg General Hospital. I came prepared to do family therapy with those diagnosed with a psychiatric illness. I was naive. I didn’t appreciate the fact that a stay in a hospital bed was costly and therefore there was a rush to get patients in and out quickly. As well, I didn’t appreciate the hierarchy of that setting. The doctor was king and the rest of the staff supporting players.
I can’t write about the mentally ill I encountered in my work, because my work was confidential. I have no permission to write about the people I treated or saw being treated. However, I did base my second novel, The Rubber Fence, on how I felt about my work in mental health. I incorporated what I knew about the treatment at that time and the kind of mental illnesses I came across. Not much has changed since then.
A Guessing Game
What I learned was the fact that treating the mentally ill is still a guessing game. Even today. Psychiatrists have a diagnostic manual that assists in labelling patients, a necessity for treatment.
The DSM-III was the diagnostic manual psychiatrists used in 1972, the year I worked on a psych ward. It’s since been updated a number of times. But did you know that in 1972 homosexuality was considered a psychiatric illness? In my novel, The Rubber Fence, set in 1972, Dr. Dennis Williams is a psychiatric intern, just like my protagonist, Dr. Joanna Bereza. But Dennis, like most gay men of that time, does not divulge his homosexuality. He remains in the closet. His character was loosely based on a psychologist I knew in the 70s.
The field of psychiatry continues to be a minefield. The mind is still the most unexplored part of our anatomy. It’s easy to misdiagnose. I saw patients labelled schizophrenic and then months later, labelled manic-depressive (today’s bi-polar disorder). And with all the street drugs out today, patients can come in with toxic psychosis, a psychotic reaction to any combination of street drugs and/or prescribed ones.
We Are All Vulnerable
Anyone can be pushed over the edge of sadness or anger. We are all vulnerable. It’s a matter of degrees. If you can imagine, what if all of your family and community supports vanished, how would you react? Would you be calm? Would you rage? Professionals in the mental health care field continue to debate nurture vs. nature. No one comes into the world with a blank script. Who we are and how we act is dependent not only on our genetics but also on our environment.
What Nature Tells Us
Take a flower, any flower. Its seed dictates it’ll be a certain height, colour, size, and scent. But if you plant that flower in a hostile environment, one that doesn’t provide the sun or shade it requires, nor the nutrients, it’ll wither and die. Same for us folks. We need a hospitable environment in order to thrive. We need that support system, the love and the care to achieve our full potential.
Prince Harry’s Revelations
Prince Harry, the Duke of Sussex, has just published his memoir, SPARE. I don’t plan to read it, but I’ve watched a number of his interviews during which he talks about his book. In it, he’s candid about his mental health challenges—the times he resorted to drugs to numb his pain over his mother’s untimely death—and about his wife Megan Markle’s thoughts of suicide—when she was being attacked in the British Press.
No matter what you think about Prince Harry’s public revelations, his honesty about his own struggles with depression is a gift to the public. By revealing his private pain, he gives permission to others to share theirs. We know that letting our pain fester gets us nowhere. It can build and crescendo into violence against others or it can build inside until hiding it becomes unbearable. Prince Harry, like Elton John and others who’ve publicly shared their challenges, has normalized the fragility of being. In other words, “there but for the grace of God, go I.”
Shrinkproof
Back in the 1990s, I wrote a screenplay, titled Shrinkproof, based on my work experience on a psych ward. Prince Harry talks about writing SPARE as a catharsis. Well, writing Shrinkproof was a catharsis for me, too. I was traumatized by what I observed on that psych ward in 1972. I could not fathom patients getting shock treatment, even though there are apparently some who’ve benefited. I didn’t see it.
My script got me a literary agent in Toronto and Vancouver. My screenplay was sent to Jodie Foster’s and Meg Ryan’s agents. Though Ms. Foster’s agent thought Shrinkproof had merit, she passed on it. Selling a screenplay is not for the faint-hearted. A screenwriter has to find a producer willing to live with the story for several years through casting, filming and post-production. When my agent had difficulty finding a producer, I abandoned the idea of selling the script and turned it into a novel, The Rubber Fence. So close, but no cigar.
Today’s Mental Health Challenges
Today, we are told frequently about the mental health challenges of our youth. We are told that anxiety are depression are rising. Young people have to contend with the negative consequences of being on social media, as well as their fears about the future with climate change, Inflation, the cost of living, and the threat of nuclear wars. Hatred and madness are evident on all social media platforms. There’s no escaping it if you get on your devices.
Every generation has its unique challenges. Were we better off in previous generations? Did we have less to contend with? I’m not sure, but it was definitely different. When I was a teen fifty years ago, I worried about the atomic bomb. It had been used in World War II, wiping out two cities.
There were young people in my day who couldn’t admit they were gay, or bi-sexual, or any other gender without being targeted.
We didn’t have the crisis of homelessness we have today, but we’ve always had people struggling to find a home. They were called hoboes. There were less of them, but then we didn’t have the amount of street drugs we have now. There was no fentanyl or oxycontin. There were bad drugs but they were harder to get. And the world was less populated. There wasn’t the kind of global trade we have today, where both guns and drugs flow freely across borders pulling the vulnerable under.
As for housing, expectations were different, too. It wasn’t unusual for a single person to live in a rooming house, with just a bed, a hot plate and a shared bathroom. Most young people didn’t have a car. They used public transit or borrowed their parent’s car or walked to get to another place. Our meals weren’t exotic and homes were smaller. The ingredients we can get today weren’t available back then. Our supermarkets were a small fraction of the size they are today. There was no credit card, cell phone, internet, streaming services, and no one I knew ate at a restaurant. Everyone saved for a rainy day. And yet we felt well off.
I’m not saying it was better. It was different, so it’s hard to compare. Like apples and oranges. We had our challenges. As for the mad among us, I had friends who ended up in the asylum. Even a relative. Mental ilness has always existed, because in the end, we are all fragile.
So best to take care of ourselves. Surround ourselves with loving family and if that’s missing, loving friends. Have a good meal, a good sleep, and exercise. It’s amazing what a walk in nature (and it’s FREE) can do for your spirits.
Comments
Wishing you a fabulous new year. I’m looking forward to blogging more. I also look forward to your comments. Please feel free to give me your thoughts.
