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Middle Aged Mental Illness

Have you ever paid attention to the ages of employees in almost any retail store? Where are all the 50 year-old plus people? With one exception, they just aren't there. The exception, of course, is WalMart. But that's a topic for another time.

Where are the middle aged people with mental illness? You don't hear about them like you do young people - it seems like it's always young people we read about after a mania landed them in the hospital or in custody. I would suspect society has flushed out middle aged sufferers. They learn how to hold a job and quietly fit into society. Or they're institutionalized - I recently read about an explosion of people with mental illness residing in nursing homes with elderly residents. Or they're homeless, or in jail, or dead.

Depending on the study you want to believe, up to 25% of those with bipolar disorder will suicide. I assumed the majority of those were student age, up to young adult. I just read an article that amazed me - the largest number of suicides among people suffering from a mood or other mental disorder is middle aged women.
Suicide spikes among middle-aged women

Amazing, but sad.

Today's Mental Health

Our family has a lot of experience with mental health issues. Bipolar disorder, or more specifically, behaviors that are the symptom of the disorder, killed a son 3 years ago. My late son's girlfriend came over today to wish my youngest daughter happy birthday. She told us of her plans to become a mental health nurse. Since Ryan died it has taken her 3 years so far to get her life moving in a positive direction, and hearing her say that brought tears to my eyes. Because I know, more than anyone else, she gets it. Gets what?

Mental illness is not curable.

Situational issues probably can be cured, for example, I think PTSD might go away over time. But those born with Bipolar Disorder, Schizophrenia, or other mood or brain disorders are going to have those disorders forever.

She understands that modern psychiatric medicine is, at best, like throwing darts. And the best you can expect from a medication is that it will make life more pleasant for those around the sufferer, and help them fit into a society that doesn't really want to understand. And of course, with luck, it will keep them alive. But that medication exacts a significant toll, more on that another time.

The world will be a better place when there are more mental health workers that understand mental health treatment should be based on compassion, and helping to preserve and cultivate the gifts that are often the result of a mental illness.

Bipolar Hope?

I was reading the blog I wrote chronicling the raising of my late son, who suffered from Bipolar Disorder. I started the blog in 2003 when my son was 19, and just graduated from high school. I maintained the blog until he died in 2008. But I read the early entries, and was reminded of the hope we had that each med would be his saving grace. Every parent goes through this, hoping that the med their child is on will ease their pain, and help them move towards normalcy. Usually, it doesn't work. It's all so futile, the doctors don't know what or how to prescribe, it's kind of like throwing a dart. And the meds often screw people up worse than the disorder. For anyone in this scenario I'd like to offer hope, but I really can't.

The Right Hand Doesn't Know What The Left Is Doing

A pair of articles from Psych Central:

July 22, 2010:
Alcohol May Be OK With Bipolar

July 23, 2010:
Higher Risk of Suicide in Bipolar Patients Who Abuse Alcohol

I know research changes quickly, but c'mon - the same publication, 1 day apart?

The Hidden Business Cost of Mental Illness

The Hidden Business Cost of Mental Illness - BusinessWeek.

Here's an excellent article on the impact of mental health issues in the workplace.

It's hard to focus on your work when your child is hallucinating.

I've experienced this so many times - "please come home, he's very manic and throwing things around..."

This stigma extends beyond those directly stricken to family members. Parents of children with mental illness are often viewed as guilty by association, unfairly perceived as the cause of the illness—the source of harmful child-rearing practices—when the origin is mainly biological. Parents and other family members feel shame and a sense of failure.

Nobody knows this better than my wife and I. Having lost our adult son to issues associated with bipolar disorder, we tried everything, and heard every piece of advice when he was growing up.

This is a very real problem, but I don't see any significant changes being made in attitude or workplace policies.

Featured Video: Deadly Bipolar Disorder - Jaco Pastorius

Jaco Pastorius was probably the most important and talented bass player of that generation, and perhaps since. My point of view is different from most, I lost a son as a result of bipolar mania. The disorder is more dangerous than anyone can imagine.

On this video he's playing bass guitar with Weather Report in 1978, you can't miss his flamboyancy. Check out the harmonics he's playing. I chose this song, as it's Weather Report's biggest hit, even though it's not Jaco's best song.


From Wikipedia:

In his early career, Jaco avoided both alcohol and drugs, but he became increasingly involved in alcohol and other substance abuses during his time with Weather Report. Bipolar disorder and psychoactive substance abuse disorders have a highly prevalent comorbidity, with a mutually detrimental inter-relationship. Alcohol abuse ultimately exacerbated Jaco's illness, leading to increasingly erratic and sometimes anti-social behavior.

He was diagnosed with Bipolar Disorder in late 1982 following the Word of Mouth tour of Japan in which his erratic behavior became an increasing source of concern for his band members. Drummer Peter Erskine's father, Dr Fred Erskine, suggested that Jaco was showing signs of the illness and, on his return from the tour, Jaco's wife, Ingrid, had Jaco committed to hospital under the Florida Mental Health Act, where he received the diagnosis and was prescribed lithium to stabilize his moods.

By 1986, Jaco's health had further deteriorated. He had been evicted from his New York apartment and had begun living on the streets. In July 1986, following intervention by his brother Gregory and ex-wife Ingrid, Jaco was admitted to Bellevue Hospital in New York, where he was prescribed Tegretol in preference to Lithium. He moved back to Fort Lauderdale in December of that year, again living on the streets for weeks at a time.

After sneaking onstage at a Carlos Santana concert September 11, 1987, he was ejected from the premises, and he made his way to the Midnight Bottle Club in Wilton Manors, Florida. After reportedly kicking in a glass door after being refused entrance to the club, he was engaged in a violent confrontation with the club bouncer, Luc Havan. Pastorius was hospitalized for multiple facial fractures and damage to his right eye and right arm, and had sustained irreversible brain damage. He fell into a coma and was put on life support.

There were initially encouraging signs that he would come out of his coma and recover, but a massive brain hemorrhage a few days later pointed to brain death. Pastorius died on September 21, 1987, aged 35, at Broward General Medical Center in Fort Lauderdale.

In the wake of Pastorius' death, Havan, a karate expert, was charged with manslaughter but later pled guilty to second degree murder. Because of having no priors and with time served while waiting for the verdict, he was sentenced to 22 months in jail and five years probation. He was released after four months in jail for good behavior. Pastorius was buried at Our Lady Queen of Heaven Cemetery in North Lauderdale.

Jaco, we miss you man. There are SO many ways bipolar disorder can kill you.

Carrie Fisher's "Wishful Drinking"

Carrie Fisher Finishes Our Sentences About Family, Work And That Bikini - Monkey See Blog : NPR.

Carrie Fisher's Wishful Drinking, her one-woman show based on her book of the same title, is a wry, hilarious, insightful, and occasionally touching theatrical memoir of the woman who grew up as the daughter of celebrity parents (Debbie Reynolds and Eddie Fisher); went on to become a film icon with her role of Princess Leia in the first three Star Wars films; struggled with manic-depression and substance abuse; and had emotionally fraught relationships with Paul Simon, the super-famous musician to whom she was very briefly married, and agent Bryan Lourd, who left her for another man after they had a child together.

I dig Carrie Fisher, always have. I haven't read either of her books, I seem to have developed some kind of a middle age ADD and find it hard to read. But there are a few books I'd really love to read, and hers are at the top of the list.

"So for me, for my mother, my grandmother, my father, my uncle, and for the common good, I must now kill you, and your brother."
The Blues Brothers - 1980

Mike Royko son Robert Royko gets 2½ years

I mean no disrespect by this, as I have (had) the highest respect for Mike Royko. But I can only guess how difficult it would be to grow up with him as your father.

Robert Royko, son of legendary newspaper columnist Mike Royko, was sentenced to 2 1/2 years in prison Tuesday for attempting to rob a bank on Chicago's Northwest Side with a fake bomb in 2005.

"I can't believe to this day that I did this," said Royko, 46, as he apologized to U.S. District Judge Wayne Andersen, who could have sentenced Royko to between 51 and 63 months under federal guidelines.

Royko's defense lawyers argued he struggled with bipolar disorder and was heavily medicated during the incident at the Associated Bank at 6355 N. Central Ave. He was arrested immediately by an off-duty police officer.

via chicagotribune.com.