Bestselling Author and Mental Health Advocate
(2-23-18) In this two-minute SAMHSA Gains Center vignette, I describe how stigmatizing it is to be transported to a mental facility by the police, rather than in an ambulance or by a family member. I realize there are times when someone is so psychotic that calling the police is necessary, but it is always less traumatic for family members and a person, who is in crisis, if they can avoid police involvement.
Tomorrow: How important it is to change the culture at police departments.
(2-22-18) SAMHSA’s GAINS Center recently interviewed me about my family’s story and the need for mental health reform. In this first of four short segments – each 2 to 4 minutes long – I was asked to describe two much different encounters that my son had with law enforcement and how handcuffing someone who is sick and transporting them in a police squad car is traumatic.
As always, I appreciate my son’s willingness to allow me to share our story. Thank you Kevin.
(My reference to one-in-four fatal police shootings involving an individual with a mental illness is based on a Washington Post survey. The Treatment Advocacy Center puts the percentage much higher, writing “at least half of the people shot and killed by police each year in this country have mental health problems.”
Tomorrow: In a perfect world, how should someone who is in crisis be transported to a treatment facility.
(2-20-18) What would you do if you won the lottery? Everyone has thought about it. Instant wealth. Travel the world first class? Buy multiple homes? Expensive cars? Indulge yourself with luxuries?
Maxine Clark and Bob Fox are two St. Louis, Mo., based philanthropists who are using their self-made wealth to dramatically help others, especially children. Maxine’s interest in kids should be no surprise. She’s the founder of Build-A-Bear Workshops! (Yes, my granddaughter has three stuffed animals from our local store.)
I was lucky to spend time with Maxine – (Bob was sick with the flu) – when I spoke recently at the Spirit of Provident Annual Gala, a fund raising event and celebration hosted by Provident, a mental health provider founded in 1860 by James Yeatman to help the sick and the poor in St. Louis. What you read is not a misprint. It was founded in 1860!
Provident was honoring Maxine and Bob at the gala, but the day before that event, the couple arranged for me to speak at the Clark-Fox Policy Institute at Washington University in St. Louis. My keynote was entitled Misguided and Misdiagnosed: Mental Health and the Criminal Justice System. After my speech, one of my favorite advocates, Susan W. McGraugh, a professor at Saint Louis University School of Law, who works with indigent, incarcerated clients, spoke eloquently about what services were available in St. Louis and what needed improvement. Later that night, Maxine hosted a private dinner for me with community leaders to discuss such topics as jail diversion, better police training, and affordable housing.
I explained that the first step is always for a community leader with clout (a judge, sheriff, or local official usually) to step forward and organize (force) all of those who have some connection with mental health/substance abuse (nearly everyone) to sit down at a table and find ways to collaborate. I said that night what I always say – that it is impossible to provide meaningful mental health services in your community unless you want to talk about supportive housing, job opportunities, easy access to mental health community services, transportation, specialized veterans programs, criminal justice reforms (such as jail diversion), helping children and giving people hope.
Pete Earley returns to talk more about mental health advocacy and lots of other things. He tells of how he came to co-author a book with Jessie Close and talks of his days writing his own spy novels and several books with former Speaker of the House, Newt Gingrich. He also shares stories from his days as a reporter with the Washington Post, including being part of a “special” squad of reporters. Pete shares some information on some of his forthcoming books and projects, and finally, he advises everyone of what we can do to help advocate for mental health in our own ways.
(2-16-18) Consider item one: “We are committed to working with state and local leaders to help secure our schools and tackle the difficult issue of mental health,” Trump said in brief remarks at the White House following the Florida school shooting.
Consider item two:
Mass shootings by people with serious mental illness represent the most significant relationship between gun violence and mental illness.
People with serious mental illness should be considered dangerous.
Gun laws focusing on people with mental illness or with a psychiatric diagnosis can effectively prevent mass shootings.
Gun laws focusing on people with mental illness or a psychiatric diagnosis are reasonable, even if they add to the stigma already associated with mental illness.
Mass shootings by people with serious mental illness represent less than 1% of all yearly gun-related homicides. In contrast, deaths by suicide using firearms account for the majority of yearly gun-related deaths.
The overall contribution of people with serious mental illness to violent crimes is only about 3%. When these crimes are examined in detail, an even smaller percentage of them are found to involve firearms.
The mass shootings at Virginia Tech, in Tucson, in Aurora, in Newtown, and at the Navy Yard were clearly related to untreated mental illnesses. There were abundant warning signs.
Author D. J. Jaffe argues that individuals with untreated serious mental illnesses are, in fact, more dangerous than the average American. He writes, “Denial of a link between violence and untreated serious mental illness serves the needs of neither the ill nor the public.”
So who is correct?
(2-12-18) The worst moment of my wife’s and my life began with a simple text. “Alex didn’t come home from school. I’m worried.”
I was away on business. This was unlike our Alex. Our sixteen-year-old son usually came home every day after school. We tried to call him and got no answer. We called family and friends but no one could locate him.
Hours later the police found him.
He had left school early. He was in a park and had tried to cut himself. A man and his daughter had seen him and asked if he needed help. Thankfully, Alex had said ‘yes’ and they had made a call.
The police brought him home. I cut my work trip short and came home the next day. I heard my wife cry for help as soon as I walked into the house.
My son was stabbing himself.
Pete Earley is the bestselling author of such books as The Hot House and Crazy. When he is not spending time with his family, he tours the globe advocating for mental health reform.
As a former reporter for The Washington Post, Pete uses his journalistic background to take a fair-minded approach to the story all while weaving an interesting tale for the reader.