Gage's Page

09/27/2022

It is a constant battle with AHCCCS to make sure Gage obtains the healthcare to which he in entitled. Those 30 years don't have to exist and systemic negligence is rampant for the mentally ill.

Schizophrenia can cut nearly 30 years off a person’s life, and that’s no accident. We have carved people with schizophrenia out of our healthcare system and left them to deteriorate. We are committing systemic negligence.

People with schizophrenia deserve effective healthcare, just like anyone else with a serious neurological disease. We can’t afford to wait any longer; it is literally endangering our lives. Learn more about what we’re doing to help people with schizophrenia get the healthcare they deserve: https://sczaction.org/public-policy-priorities/

07/31/2022

988 Su***de & Crisis Lifeline educational magnets are now available in the SAMHSA store. Help spread the word to those who are struggling in your communities.

07/06/2022

Music therapy is incredibly important. Especially in mental illnesses with a large degree of internalization. Honestly, Gage is alive today because of an mp3 player and headphones he uses to alleviate auditory hallucination. But it's more than a mere drowning out of voices, it positively affects his mood in so many ways.

Clients can improve depressive symptoms, develop positive relationships and address loneliness, grief and loss.

05/29/2022

The hypocrisy regarding mental health and gun violence is sickening. "Even if you were to do everything possible to eliminate mental illness, you'd really only be addressing around 3% of the violence in this country," said Dr. Reena Kapoor. Mass shootings are not the result of a mental health care crisis. We have a mental health care crisis by continually slashing programs (research and societal) aimed at their care, but this absolutely does not equate to gun violence.

Gage was jailed in Texas for a month for a ludicrously small amount of ma*****na (less than a joint) two years ago. The jail refused to evaluate him or, to even give him his prescribed anti-psychotic medication. Every politician talking about the "lack of mental health care", come from states that continually rank dead last in mental health care funding. Gov. Abbott has cut $20 million dollars in mental health care funding in Texas.

Please, spare us all the hypocrisy.

After the school shooting in Uvalde, Texas, experts are stressing that most gun violence is not committed by mentally ill people. In fact, mentally ill people are more likely to be victims of violence.

04/23/2022

For many years, Gage has thought he is Jesus. It comes and goes in severity, but some degree of religious immortality has been persistent. His theological quest resulted in him knowing, well, every religious document written from the King James version of the bible to the New Testament, the Torah, and Quran. He remembers these writings even when he has difficulty remembering how to tie his shoes.
Believing you are immortal means you're an obvious danger to self. He’s said many times that bullets, knives, even busses, go through him with no harm. I used to constantly tell him this thinking was dangerous (it is) but, of course, in his reality, he had no choice. When your world is full of snipers on rooftops, people bursting into flames, and hordes of knife-wielding people chasing you down the street, yet you don’t get harmed, immortality seems the logical explanation. Immortality provides cognitive cushioning against nightmarish atrocity.
I used to think I needed to fall on a side here. My “yes” or “no” triggered firmly into the “no” camp to keep him safe. It’s obvious I’m not religious, yet I completely understand, psychologically, where his belief he is/was Jesus emanate. It stressed me to not have the best possible response and to alleviate this, I’d put my finger on the “no” side of the cognitive scale because it provided some measure of immediate relief. I’ve since realized that it’s ok, sometimes, to be ambivalent. To not, always and reflexively, choose quick decisiveness over relative accuracy. That paradoxical thinking isn’t the villain it once was and that cognitive flexibility allows me to make a decision, or not make a decision, in a more broad and inclusive way.
I don’t shut him down when he talks about his perceived immortality anymore. I don’t condone it either. Progress is never made arguing over things I can’t control. I still don’t have the perfect response to his thought processing of religious immortality that can put him in danger, and likely never will. And that’s just going to have to be ok.

04/07/2022

Pharmaceutical compliance among the seriously mentally ill has always been the largest challenge to having successful lives in a society rather than institution. This is a leap forward in our understanding of how typical cognitive-behavioral therapy often does not work in those with an smi, and what can be done instead.

Renowned psychologist will lead a LEAP training seminar for Connect Summit County.

03/11/2022

I think the most profound words ever uttered are “I know who I am”.

I visited Gage yesterday in a place where the rules change almost daily and are dependent upon who you ask. I used to be able to bring him food and we could visit in the same room. COVID put an end to that for a while and, supposedly, I could bring him food again according to his case manager. So, I did. Because one thing he’s good at (very much genetic) is eating. Apparently, the only way he can now eat the food I bring him is if we sit in separate rooms with glass dividing us, like prison. I was told that we can only visit in the same room if I don’t bring him food. What a ridiculous choice and why this is the rule du jour, f**k only knows.

So, he ate, and we tried to talk by yelling through slits in the glass. For the first time in a very long while, he’s lucid and reflective. Although he still has violent delusions at times, they’re less frequent and intense. For now, anyway. I often forget that he’s a grown man. I expect that’s common for any parent but perhaps magnified in his case. Especially when he talks about his future as an adult in one breath and asks me to bring in his Curious George he’s had since he was 5 in the next. Maybe we should all have more of that dichotomy of being old and young simultaneously.

I’ve been accused of having the grace of an epileptic chimp with Tourette’s (I can’t argue), but his overwhelms me often. He’s not angry, depressed, or self-victimizing. Given what he’s been, and is actively going through, some vestige of those things seem almost a given. I mean, I know some who play the victim card by having a bad hair day. But he doesn’t do that, and never has. Blame is the antithesis of hope and I absolutely admire and respect him for never going there…even when it would certainly seem justified. When I brought this up with him and asked if he ever felt like blaming anyone or anything, he said “No, because I know who I am”.

Wanting those things we already have should probably occur far more often than it does.

03/03/2022

I've been diagnosed with "walking depression" (different name, same thing). It's insidious and very difficult to be self aware of.

The phrase “high-functioning depression” has been the subject of conversation on social media and in the news after the death of Miss USA 2019 Cheslie Kryst on Jan. 30. Here’s what experts think about the label.

02/13/2022

This page is apolitical. I don't care about your political preferences honestly. Insurance companies and lobbying against providing adequate coverage for mental illness, however, is shameful, degrading, and has likely contributed to many deaths.

Dozens of companies and groups have intensified their lobbying in recent months as congressional efforts have gained momentum.

02/13/2022

I took this picture of Gage on his birthday 10 years ago almost to the day. Right before the world became full of catatonic monstrosity that I’ll never see, but have come to rule his life, and to a large extent, mine.
Humans are often creatures of stale expectation measured by one artificial milestone after the next. A sadistic merry-go-round of New Years lies, the next promotion at work, the next paycheck, the next vacation, the next relationship, the next…day. Carrot meet stick. And what we can’t come to expect for ourselves, we often lump onto our kids because if a parent’s next big thing doesn’t fit into their lifetime then, via some miracle of genetic immortality, it’ll fit into their kids right? I’m guessing parenting by angst has likely filled psychologists offices with offspring more than most things.
My expectations for Gage, before his schizophrenia, have always been relatively modest. Nice round pegs in nice round holes of education, work, successful relationships (with some heartbreak thrown in for good measure), and sure…perhaps kids of his own. Oh and, some measure of him finding happiness in those things would have been nice. My current expectations for him are obviously quite different. I expect him to live independently, with a large amount of assistance, at some point. I expect him to not hurt himself. I expect him to not hurt others. Most of my previous expectations have long gone. That is what it is. I’m not angry about it.
Happy Birthday Gage. I love you enough to never tell you those monsters don’t exist. They do, even if just in a very small synaptic gap. My expectation for you isn’t to ignore them. That’s not possible. But I will always expect you to find some measure of happiness despite them.
Yes, even I can jump on the merry-go-round sometimes. I’ve earned it.

01/22/2022

Please never do this. It's no more possible to diagnose yourself, or others, with a mental illness than it would be to set a broken bone or diagnose an autoimmune disorder. It's also every bit as dangerous.

Mental health professionals recommend seeking out help from trusted sources who are licensed, certified or have a doctoral degree.

01/11/2022

Often, there’s never a great way to introduce an idea, or thought. So, I won’t pretend I know how.

Relatively recently, Gage has had increasing internalization regarding some horrific circumstances. You see, schizophrenic delusions don’t just result in auditory hallucinations (“voices”), but can be olfactory, tactile, or visual. Sometimes, these all interact simultaneously. Gage admits to, unexpectedly and without any known trigger, seeing his mom/girlfriend/faceless female entity being r***d and tortured. This was as real to him as reading this post is to you. This wasn’t some vague feeling or hunch he had, it was, to him, reality and happening right before his eyes right this second. When he is inside of this delusion, he would hit those he thought were responsible. This would often include anyone in the vicinity; other patients, staff, anyone. He would have severe remorse and guilt after the fact, but for a while, it was happening with increased frequency. I must admit, I was unsure how to approach this with Gage. In his mind, he was being the protector when, in our reality, he was being the aggressor. There is no amount of cognitive-behavioral therapy, or any kind of psychotherapy besides chemical, that works inside of significant delusion. The medical/chemical must come first for therapy to even stand a chance. There simply is no reasoning with an aberrant reality.

Following many consultations with his psychiatrists at ASH, amid my overt threats to them that something had to be done to alleviate these delusions and to be creative with his formulary, he seems to be showing improvement on his new medication regimen.

Even inside of a serious mental illness, people need to be held accountable for their actions. This I understand, maybe more than some. I’ve spent the better part of 17 years, academically and personally, trying to understand why he is who he is. There is no known genetic basis for his condition and the environmental exposure aspect are things I examine academically, empirically, and ploddingly. For many years, I needed some explanation of why, knowing I’d likely never have it. While I don’t really need those answers as much as I have in the past, I’ve learned many things along the way. About him, the world, and myself.

I’ve learned that parenting never stops. I’ve learned that, sometimes, you must yell and legally threaten an uncaring system that is mostly concerned with protecting themselves rather than doing what is best for the patient, or the public. The responsibility, my responsibility, is to do whatever it takes to protect Gage, and the public. There is no hierarchy in these goals, and they are both of equal importance. It is often a full-time job, and then some, trying to bend a system to your will of what’s right, and fair, and protective, in the face of bureaucracy and litigiousness.

More than anything, I wish Jared Loughner’s parents had understood these things a decade ago.