(3-29-16) (This is the first of several personal stories which I plan to post periodically in memory of a loved one with mental illness. Lest they be forgotten.)

The Son I Wish You Knew

By Laura Pogliano

My son Zac was 16 when he had his first psychotic episode. Seven years later, he died of heart failure in his apartment. Of all the hellish components of my child’s life with schizophrenia, perhaps the most heart wrenching for me was that no doctors or caregivers ever knew my child before he became sick. They came to know him after he was drastically changed by illness, paranoia and the effects of medication.

Early on in his illness, when I begged doctors to save my child, I was speaking of his personhood, those intangibles that made Zac my son. His dry humor. His patience and compassion. His musical talents. His ‘old soul.’

When I first learned of his diagnosis, the specter of my son becoming a lifeless, chronic schizophrenic patient haunted me. Reconciling the loss of a child is incomprehensible; reconciling the loss of a child who is still living defies description. This unique kind of sorrow may be unintentionally compounded in mental illnesses by the very people who fight alongside you, knowing very little about the person they’re saving, or what he’s lost, despite endless conversations about how he compares to his baseline self.

At Zac’s wake, for the first time in seven years of his illness, I suddenly began remembering my own son. Looking through hundreds of photos for the wake, I kept seeing his broad smile and thinking, Wow! He was so handsome, and so happy. His life became so consumed with medical care, so overwhelmingly a sick life, I’d forgotten the son I knew. That’s the son I want to write about. That’s the son I wish you knew.

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(3-27-16) If you are a Christian, Easter is a sacred day of worship, remembrance and family so I will ask for your forgiveness for posting a blog on Easter. But I want to alert you to a news story in today’s Richmond Times Dispatch by Sarah Kleiner, who thankfully is continuing to probe the preventable death of Jamycheal Mitchell in Virginia.

Kleiner discovered there were 115 empty beds available in the state’s 1,500 bed system during the four months that Mitchell spent psychotic in jail waiting to be sent to Eastern State Hospital. He was one of 34 prisoners waiting for a bed at Eastern State Hospital in Williamsburg. Another fifty others were waiting for beds at other facilities, according to earlier reports.

All of those prisoners could have been assigned a bed but weren’t. Instead, they were left to languish in jails for an average of three months.

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(3-25-16) A letter by a distraught but courageous mother whose son has both autism and a mental illness was the most read article on my Facebook page and author’s website this week and, so far, the entire year. It was shared more than 180 times on Facebook and was seen by an estimated 100,000 readers.

Why did this mother’s letter resonate with so many readers? (If you missed it, you can read it here.) 

It’s because she is not alone in her suffering and her frustration about our broken mental health care system that is failing so many of our loved ones.

In addition to her letter, I posted blogs this week about the death of Jamycheal Mitchell, the 24 year-old African American with mental illness who literally wasted away in a jail cell waiting for a bed in a state hospital. Three prominent Virginia newspapers have published editorials about Mitchell’s preventible death, joining in the chorus of advocates demanding to be told how a prisoner was allowed to starve himself to death while under the watch of the for-profit, private NAPHCARE medical staff and state mental health officials.

The mother’s letter to me and Mitchell’s death are the latest examples of why we need significant reforms that have yet to come from Congress or state leaders.

Here are three snippets from emails sent to me by readers who were touched by the mother’s letters, followed by comments lifted from the editorials about Mitchell.

I feel her pain – literally. She spoke for so many of us who face the same things day after day. I know the agony of trying to make things better for a child (and now a grandchild) when they don’t understand why they even have to exist because they are in such pain.  Also the fear of the future and what it might bring.  I hope she has access to support – NAMI has been my lifesaver.  Just sharing with others and knowing that I am not alone is helpful.  I am sending love and prayers to her. –B.

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(3-23-16) Mira Signer, the executive director of the National Alliance on Mental Illness in Virginia, has joined with former state mental health Inspector General G. Douglas Bevelacqua, and the Virginia NAACP Portsmouth chapter in calling for a Justice Department investigation into the horrific death of Jamycheal Mitchell, the 24 year-old African American who died in a Portsmouth jail waiting for a state hospital bed.

Yesterday, the state Department of Behavioral Health and Developmental Services released a troubling investigative report that showed Mitchell had literally been overlooked and forgotten while being held some four months in jail. An autopsy showed Mitchell had suffered a heart attack caused by starvation. He had lost more than 10 percent of his body weight while being incarcerated — more than 34 pounds.

This happened while he was under the care of a private for-profit firm, NAPHCARE, hired by the jail to provide mental health services to prisoners. The department also revealed that the employee who it had hired specifically to monitor inmates waiting for state hospital beds had not met with Mitchell the entire four months that he was in jail.

Sarah Kleiner, a reporter with the Richmond Times Dispatch, joined me in filing FOIA requests for information about the Mitchell case before the department finally released its report yesterday. In a story published this afternoon, Kleiner noted that a growing number of mental health advocates in Virginia are asking for federal investigators to step in.

Bringing in the feds would be a slap in the face for the Office of State Inspector General, which still has not released the results of its investigation,  and to the disAbility Law Center, which is Virginia’s Protection and Advocacy for Individuals with Mental Illness Program. The disAbility Law Center has shown no public interest in the case and has not joined NAMI and the others in calling for a federal probe. The OSIG is supposed to be an independent investigative body but Bevelacqua resigned from his post there after he said his bosses soft pedaled his investigation of state Sen. Creigh Deeds’ preventable tragedy.

Bravo to Signer, Bevelacqua, the NAACP and Kleiner for keeping a spotlight in Richmond on the Mitchell case. It’s time for national NAMI and Mental Health America to join this call for full disclosure of what happened in that jail. How did a prisoner with a serious mental illness literally starve himself to death without someone intervening?

Advocates call for federal investigation of death of Va. man jailed for stealing junk food

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(3-22-16) An Eastern State Hospital employee was “astonished and distraught” when she opened a desk drawer last August and discovered that a Virginia judge had ordered Jamycheal Mitchell to be sent from a Portsmouth jail to the mental hospital to be evaluated.

The judge’s order had been issued more than three months earlier but had been overlooked in that desk drawer until she discovered it — five days after Mitchell had died of a heart attack caused by starvation while in jail.

That disclosure is one of several troubling admissions revealed yesterday when the Virginia Department of Behavioral Health and Developmental Services  finally released an edited version of the investigation that it conducted into the August 19, 2015 death of Mitchell, a 24 year-old, African American inmate with a serious mental illness who’d been charged with petty larceny and trespassing after stealing $5 worth of snacks from a convenience store.

Last week, I posted a blog that questioned why three Virginia agencies responsible for investigating the Mitchell tragedy hadn’t made public their investigations. The DBHDS released copies of its 29-page report, minus the identities of the employees who investigators questioned, without comment based on separate Freedom of Information requests filed by Sarah Kleiner, an investigative reporter at Richmond Times Dispatch, and by me.

When called by reporters for comment, I said that I was “furious and outraged” by the report. “Jamycheal Mitchell was lost in plain sight because of incompetency and indifference. This kid died because no one in that jail and no state mental health official did anything to help him. Shame on them. Imagine if he was your son. Now there will be lots of finger-pointing and lawyering up, but no real changes. That’s been our sad history in Virginia. This is because officials will blame the victim, as they did in the Natasha McKenna case, and legislators will not put any more money into mental health services.”

What did the internal investigation reveal?

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(3-21-16)

Dear Pete,

I really don’t hardly know what to say. For almost 20 years I have fought, sacrificed, even literally bled trying to save my son. At times, we have had almost miraculous “victories” and, at times an equally balancing amount of “losses.” I thought it was bad when he was autistic and had seizures. I had no idea how “easy” we had it then even though it was such a hard time. After the diabetes and the mental illness hit — I do believe I have seen a glimpse of what Hell must be like. Psychosis. Schizoaffective disorder depressive type.

There are times I see my son and there are times I see a distortion of something that can not be recognized. During the distortions I am so afraid. Afraid he will hurt himself. Afraid he will hurt others. Afraid I won’t be able to see it or stop it in time though God knows I am trying.

Ironically, the times I DO see my son are some of the most painful. That is when I see him in an agony that I can’t make better. I promise him. Oh honey, when the meds are right you will feel better. Oh honey, when we get “fill in the blank service” you will want to live. Oh honey, just keep fighting. He looks at me with such appeal. Such hope that mommy can make the boo boo’s go away. But there is never a time when it really IS better. I fight against a hill of sand, clutching and desperate to stay in place. A hill where “victory” is simply found in not slipping farther down. Progress is an elusive dream that motivates — yet never is realized.

We are one of the “blessed.” Top 1%. We have been able to provide an assisted living home with support for him. But the cost has been massive and while I am grateful — I don’t know how much longer we can provide what is the barest minimum that he needs. Enough to keep a semblance of stability. Not enough for growth. That cost is beyond our reach. How long till he decides he wants to walk out anyway with a delusional idea that he will be fine on the streets? What happens when the money runs out and I have nowhere else to find him help? Even as a 1% family we can’t afford the services he needs much longer. My God how my heart breaks for those not as fortunate — I am so grateful for whatever time we have. He can’t come home. I can’t risk the danger to his younger brother and sister. What happens next? No one disagrees that he will hurt himself or others and yet there IS NO HELP. I can get on a wait list . . . .

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