Mental Health

Much was made of the tragic, self-inflicted gunshot death, of Sen. Creigh Deed’s son over Thanksgiving. It once again focused attention on Virginia’s broken mental system. I have written regularly about the large number of over-medicated inmates and their “thorazine” shuffle, how prison psychiatrists write prescriptions for “cocktails” of multiple anti-psychotic meds with little or no actual treatment being offered.

      And it is even worse. Forget the long-term health concerns from poorly managed anti-psychotics; there is the lack of coherent mental health care on site that is equally appalling.

      The prison employs three women in a “psychology” office. Problem is, none are psychologists. All three have BAs in psychology but nothing further. They serve as “gatekeepers” – they make “treatment” recommendations – for the D.O.C. psychiatrist who literally is a “Doc-in-the-box.” Medicated inmates speak to the psychiatrist via videoconference for less than 5 minutes every 90 days. There is no other medical treatment except blood work (these psychotropic drugs can cause liver damage).

            The “psychologists” are quick to offer diagnosis and place an inmate in a category: bi-polar disorder; schizophrenia; depression; there is a “top ten” list and men are neatly packaged into them. But, without meaningful one-on-one care all that is done is place the men in a drugged stupor. And these labels – so easy to attach – become self-fulfilling. These labeled men then tell you they can’t “help” their behavior. They have a “disorder.” And they use the disorder as a crutch; and they believe they are entitled to disability and release from prison without addressing why they did what they did. They are lied to repeatedly about their condition and then over-medicated and under treated. They go home and fall back into the same self-destructive lifestyle. And they return.

            That isn’t mental health. Many men here have significant psychological issues. However, the answer isn’t always high doses of mind-numbing chemicals and catch all diagnoses chosen from the newest DSM like one would order off a menu. Legitimate mental health education requires one-on-one treatment and regular assessment and control of prescription medication. That doesn’t happen in here.

            Like most things involving the Virginia Department of Corrections, mental health treatment exists only as words not as a real program. The cost – to provide actual in-patient treatment – would be staggering. Instead, the men are treated like cattle at a slaughterhouse. Each night forty to forty-five of the seventy-two men I reside with line up for pill call. And they have their pills placed in small Dixie cups – Seroquel, Prozac, trazadone, thorazine, the list (and the pill colors) are endless.

            They take their pills, numb their minds, and stagger back to their bunks. Some day they will be released; but what are the ramifications for DOC’s mental health failure? What indeed.

Olio

I work one or two crossword puzzles every day. You soon learn from doing that many puzzles that certain clues will appear in almost every puzzle you do. For example, a three letter name for “Woody’s ex” is always “Mia.” And so it goes. For a four letter word meaning, “A mix;” the word is always “olio.” My blog posting this week is a mix of a number of topics, it’s an olio.

Early Counts

            Since I arrived here in 2009 there have been three “standing” counts – everyman at the foot of their bed, standing, electronics all off. There are standing counts at 11:30 a.m., 6:00 p.m., and 10:00 p.m. At night, there are bed check counts at midnight and 3:00 a.m. Then, at shift change, there is a bed check count (all men on or in their beds) at 5:45 a.m.

            A week ago, a memo came out from the warden which explained, in part, that department directives require all “counts” between 5:30 a.m. and 9:30 p.m. to be standing counts. Apparently, LCC has been out of compliance for years!

            Starting Monday, February 3^rd at 5:45 a.m., the lights will come on, a whistle will blow, and everyone will assemble for a standing count. Guys’ll bitch and moan – it’s the nature of the place – and then drag themselves back to the rack to sleep until 8:00 a.m. (bed areas must be made and cleaned up). Later that day – at 9:30 p.m. instead of 10:00 we’ll assemble for evening standing count. Then lights – and noise – will lower at 10:00 instead of 10:30.

            Change never goes over well inside a prison. But, this one should be no big deal.

 The “Race” Debate

            I had words with a member of NOI the other morning over – of all things – the school’s African American History quiz and contest. Every February, as part of “African American History” month, the LCC school sponsors a history quiz. The top three scores are presented dictionaries by the school and recognized in the school monthly newsletter. Since 2006 the quiz has been called “African American History.” Of course, since 2006, the aide responsible for running the quiz was an African American teacher’s aide. He was caught up in the great December computer caper and transferred out. Time was running short and the quiz was in danger of not getting out. The principal – my boss – asked me to take the quiz on, which I did. And that’s what led to …

            “No white man can truly understand my people’s history.” Say what? I’m not sure what pissed me off more, him standing in the dayroom spouting his ignorant claptrap or his diatribe on our chalk board. “This quiz is an afront [sic] to Africans like me. We aren’t African Americans!!”

            Not one to back away from a battle with a half-wit, I said, “Hey Socrates, if you’re going to write a political epistle, at least spell your words correctly. It’s a-f-f-r-o-n-t.” I then told him I drafted the quiz. “But you don’t know what we’ve been through. You can’t be responsible and sympathetic to our plight.”

            “Really? What do you know about what it means to be Armenian, or Jewish, or Scotch? Can you have empathy for the Chinese or Italian experience in America? Should I, as a white tutor, only help ‘my kind’?” The dayroom was silent as I lit into him about ignorance and race-baiting. Then it was over; he walked away less sure of the stupid position he espoused.

            And that’s one of the problems with prison; it’s a toxic stew of uneducated, ignorant crap that feeds their obsessive self-pitying. Prison sucks. It is demeaning and counter-productive. But – and this is an important but – most of us did the crimes that landed us here. We aren’t innocent. We did stupid – and in some cases horrible – things. That doesn’t make the system less insane, but it should cause you to focus on real improvement, real education and job skills, not some chin-rubbing wanna-be philosophizing.

 Mental Health Continued

            Last Sunday night, the CBS News show “60 Minutes” interviewed Virginia State Senator Creigh Deeds. Deeds described in great detail his son’s mental health issues and the tragic incident that unfolded at the family farm Thanksgiving weekend. Deeds said society doesn’t treat mental health like cancer or heart disease (he’s right). He then talked about the bill he’s proposed in the Virginia legislature to allow mentally ill people to be held 24 hours (instead of the current 6 hours) to find available bed space for in-patient treatment.

            The bill seems to be a common sense approach to a tragic and glaring problem in Virginia’s mental health umbrella. So why then does the Virginia Sheriff’s Association oppose it?

            “We’ll have to babysit ‘those’ people for 24 hours,” the VSA spokesman said. “It’ll cost $4.5 million for the extra manpower.” Really? So the Commonwealth is willing to spend $1.25 billion each year on prisons, a system where over 50% of the inmates suffer from diagnosed mental illnesses. Holding mentally ill people in prison, pumping them full of psychotropic drugs so they spend the days like zombies, that’s a good use of a billion dollars plus. But $4 ½ million, whoa we can’t afford that. Kind of makes you wonder who really is crazy.

 Peter Seeger RIP

            On January 28^th, folk singer Pete Singer passed away at the age of 94. Seeger was part of a great collection of men and women who wrote and sang beautiful folk songs – songs of everyday people – that meant something. “Where have all the flowers gone?” That was Pete Seeger.

            He sang with Woody Guthrie. He sang for civil rights, and social equality, and cleaning his beloved Hudson River. He abhorred violence and militarism, yet during the Second World War he enlisted. Hitler and totalitarianism of the Fascists had to be stopped.

            In his twenties, Seeger joined the American Communist Party. Then he saw that Stalin and the Soviets were as bad as Hitler and the Nazis. He quit the party. America in the ‘50’s wasn’t so forgiving. He was blacklisted and spied on by Hoover’s FBI. He never quit smiling, he never quit singing.

            One of my favorite Seeger stories involved seeing him in concert at Vassar College during my high school days (1976 or ’77). Seeger was at the Poughkeepsie, New York School (my hometown back then) and he began to sing his song “Goodnight Irene.” He told the audience, “You can sing any song lyric to this tune.” Even now, almost 40 years later I find myself singing dozens of songs to the tune of “Goodnight Irene.”

            Pete Seeger wanted people to know he wasn’t perfect. None of us are. But as the character William Wallace said in “Braveheart,” “Every man dies, but not every may lives.” Pete Seeger lived.

            “Irene goodnight

              Irene goodnight
              Goodnight Irene
              Goodnight Irene
              I’ll see you in my dreams."

           

The Senator's Son

A lot of attention was directed toward State Senator Creigh Deeds as Virginia’s new Governor – Terry McAuliffe – was sworn in. In less than one week, the outgoing Governor recognized Senator Deeds return to work during his farewell “State of the Commonwealth” address. Face it; Senator Deeds presents a compelling story. It is a story, unfortunately, that is widely ignored and swept under the proverbial rug except when violence erupts. Then – and only then – do we ask “why?” Why indeed.

            As everyone knows, shortly after Thanksgiving week a 911 call was placed by a neighbor of Senator Deeds. The Senator had been discovered staggered and bleeding as he walked along a rural roadway in Bath County. Deeds had been stabbed numerous times. Police went to the Senator’s house and during a guns-drawn search, found the body of Deed’s son, dead from a self-inflicted gunshot wound.

            Within a day the public learned that the Deeds’ son had suffered from serious mental illness. Interestingly, it has not been disclosed what this actual diagnosis was. A bright, quiet kid, his mental disorder led him to leave William and Mary College and – just days before his suicide – a failed attempt by his father (Senator Deeds) to have the young man hospitalized. For another few weeks (just like after the VA Tech massacre) Virginia’s mental health apparatus was on full display. The picture was not good.

            And now, with Senator Deeds healing from his physical wounds while grieving the death of his beloved son, the politicians gather again in Richmond to kick off yet another session of the General Assembly, and they say, “Something must be done about mental health.” Please, give me a break.

            His name is Gary. Of course, it could be Thomas or Tyrone or a dozen other names. Gary is thirty-five and suffers from schizophrenia. Each day, both morning and evening, Gary takes a combination of psychotropic medications. The pills dull his senses to the point that he sleeps upwards of twenty hours a day. It’s the only way DOC has found to turn off the voices in Gary’s head. That’s right; Gary hears voices, multiple voices. The pills work most times. But, there are other times, like last week …

            So Gary’s up three days straight. Even doped up with enough crap to stun a bull moose, he’s up twenty-four straight hours for three days. He’s fidgety. “What is it?” I ask, when a friend of Gary’s asks me to write up an emergency grievance to get him to medical. “It’s the voices,” the guy tells me. “They’re talking non-stop and telling him all kinds of crazy shit.” So I file the emergency grievance and I put in it, “psychotic breakdown,” words Medical knows Gary doesn’t know, and an hour later he’s called to medical. I see him a short while after that. “How’d it go?” I ask. “Ok. I’ll see the Psych tomorrow on video conference and he’ll adjust my pills.”

            That’s right; the psychiatrist isn’t actually on site. He handles multiple prisons via “video conference.” Five minutes on camera and a new script is written. More pills prescribed. It’s economics. You’ve got over one-third of the men here on psychotropic meds. That’s the extent of DOC’s psych treatments unless you’re unlucky enough to find yourself sent to Marion – that’s the state prison for the criminally insane.

            How bad do you have to be to end up in Marion? Try this: I’m at the receiving unit, also known as “hell,” and there’s a nineteen year old kid so wacked out that every night he’d scream “help me Jesus, they’re killing me!” He’d yell like that for hours until 4:00 a.m. when he would shout like a rooster “cock-a-doodle-doo.” And, paper, bars of soap, and profanity would be unleashed against the front of his cell. That young kid was shipped to Buckingham a level 3 prison. He was crazy, not criminally insane.

            Yeah, mental health should be a priority for the state. Almost half the Virginia DOC inmate population suffers from some mental disorder or illness. Here’s the irony: Tens of thousands of Virginians suffer from a mental disease or disorder and the state uses the criminal justice system to control them. Schizophrenic? Hear voices? That’s no excuse. You break the law, you go to prison. Then, all the prisons do for your mental condition is load you up with drugs. You need mental health services in the Commonwealth? Go to jail. At least you’ll get meds.

            I’m sick of politicians and private citizens wringing their hands every time a young Mister Deeds appears on the scene. Collectively, we don’t give a shit about mental health. It’s only after the poor, sick bastard acts out that we talk about it. You want to see how much Virginia cares about mental health? Come inside a prison during “pill call” and watch the hundreds of zombies stand in line for their hit of Prozac, or Thorazine, or Seroquel, or all three.

            There’s another young Mr. Deeds out there and Virginia’s only solution right now is to let him act out then watch him kill himself or send him to prison. That’s harsh, and vulgar, and way too accurate.

 

Senator Deeds

Virginia State Senator Creigh Deeds, who unsuccessfully ran for Governor four years ago, was brutally stabbed by his son the other day. After the attack, the younger Mr. Deeds took his own life with a gun.

Less than twenty-four hours before this family tragedy, the son Gus Deeds was being evaluated for a mental disorder. As with the tragedy at Virginia Tech, once again Virginia’s mental health network has shown itself to be badly managed and incapable of providing needed help in time of crisis.

Unfortunately, Virginia’s answer to effective mental health treatment is to wait for a mentally ill person to commit a crime then lock them up. The Commonwealth’s prisons and jails are full of mentally ill men and women. Hundreds line up here nightly for psychotropic drugs. Like the TV show, “The Walking Dead,” you see them with their slow gait and zombie stare.

This should outrage the citizens of this state. How many more Gus Deeds must there be before people begin to address the complex issue of mental health and stop using prisons for holding the mentally ill instead of getting those in need adequate care and treatment?