The boy who cried wolf/more on shooting

After the 50's and the atrocities at Willowbrook state mental institution was reported on by Geraldo Rivera of then 20/20 fame...millions of the so called mentally ill were released from mentall institutions throughout the US with no after care. It is not surprising that such individuals got in all sorts of trouble. Is a fact taht most are victims of crime. I know I have been and never physically hurt anyone in my life. Unfortunately in my case due to waht happened to me in the past and the trauma of it is effecting me today. My diagnosis is just used for insurance purposes and I am entitled to collect my disability as waht I worked many years for.
Ihope I don't do this too much so I get help when I really need it as I do call people often if I need to talk.

More on shooting..

Unless mental illness runs in your family or a friend has it,is of little interest to you. Is the way we are as people. Well..now it's in every body's face. It has been for a while but we have been desensitizing selves to it. Columbine,waht happened in the Amish area of PA,random attacks at our high schools across the country,road rage,home invasions are wake up calls to us that Houston we have a problem! 9/11 brought terrorism to our door step as before it was over sees for the most part and the occasional downed air liner like Lockhead in Scotland.

No sane person would have done what happened today,even I who is a bit wacky, like many of us are, as got to be to live in world today. Because of waht I have gone thru in my life makes me more compassionate to others. I choose to get out of problem into solution and have used a variety of supports such as 12 step,meditation and yoga.

I learned early on it is up to me to be stable. Some however are more dependent on a system that doesn't clearly work. Some therapy and medicine tho is better than the alternative. Therapy has trained many of them tho to be sheep. They say what's bothering them and expect therapist to have the answers. She/he is but a guide and the answers lie within. They are different for each person as are ur experiences. Perhaps this man went off his meds or was in denial he needed them as I was as I wanted to fit in in my 20's and my friends said you don't need em. Thsi is a very hard thing to accept and live with but I do. I am accountable to those who say those who have this aren't and mental illness does clearly exist. It has for thousands of years. Such people were always persecuted by society for being different. Let's not push the homeless underground for fear of going into shelters like Guliani did to clean the streets of them. WAs a blessing the bottle bill passsed as it saved many innocent lives as crime was up as homeless did mug them for booze and drugs. Why were they on the street? Because they didn't know how to keep up an apt. Now there are agencies helping them do so which is getting some of the street(saw this on NOW on PBS).

Not all peope with mental illness (notice I don't say mentally ill as is a label and many love to put people in boxes so they can understand them. People are more complicated than that.) are slackers and NUTS. Some like Abraham Lincoln who had depression and yet helped free the slaves and was our president,Morley Schafer of 60 minutes,Brooke Shields,Jane Pauley (bipolar), inda Hamiton (Terminator),Virginia Wolfe (writer),Vivien Leigh (Gone wiht the Wind),Marilyn Monroe (borderline personality disorder brought on by early child hood sex abuse and a mother who had schizophrenia)...to name a few. These are the faces of mental illness.

Unfortuantely not all of us are famous but we are sisters,sons,daughters,wives,husbands,neighbors,actor(Ben stiller),comediens(Freddie Prinze). We live amongst you and you would never know we have it in some cases unless we shared it. Many don't for fear of stigma. I am not scared of it or the stigma of people who don't know of this illness. My job is to stop stigma and educate the pubilc of these disorders that have killed the Timothys (Timothy Bill named and pushed thru in Congress because of persistence of father who lost his 13 year old son as he killed self from depression). Fortunately I am creative and enjoy art,photography and writing so i can express my self this way. Many of us are artists as we tend to be sensitive . We aren't people peole but give our selves to our art. We feel things deeply both the bitter and the better. Perhaps taht is why we have this which can be a gift(like a Mozart,edgar Allen Poe) as well well as a curse (like a Timothy Mcvey who was a genius).

How many more of us must die on both sides of the fence for us to start running for mental illness like we do for breast cancer?! We see the commercials now about drugs. Marie Osmond came out and spoke on it and was in Women's Day for heaven's sake (she battles depression). Are we all not accountable for our actions? Or do we just live with what we have like another lives with a thyroid condition. The only difference is the first can speak on it without others running and calling her a nut as she walks by or behind her back. Do you know how strong I have had to be to have survived this long since I was diagnosed with depression at 16 ?

It is not just being down but memory loss,poor concentraton,rapid mood swings,cycling. I also can only do but so much in a day as I don't deal wel with laot of pressure and doing thisngs quickly. No I am not retarded (and even taht is not the correct term) I know I want no pity but empathy and the occasional hi and chat and acceptance as can say as I just passed my 45th birthday I have never known that. I accept ,love,understand and respect me. when will you?! I hope I live to see it but until then I do what I have to do daily and draw my strength from God. Is how I lose my anger to others who choose to talk about,laugh at and ignore me when I am with someone else (they talk to them) They think differently and I also my fear as I know I do not walk alone. "He who knows God never walks alone". God doesn't create junk. People aren't junk. Every life is precious. We didn't just lose 32 innocent lives but we also lost another life of the boy who was lost sadly so many years ago. Some may say taht is a blessing but..he didn't come into the world this way. He was a product of the cruel world we live in today.

I hope we learn some thing from what happened today and taht these poor souls didn't die in vain. I hope we all try support good mental health in our comunities so instances like this can be prevented in the future as this is the only answer to this riddle that is the human mind.