Tag: mental health

Therapist are Humans Too

My Fears About What The Sequester Means For Those In Need

by Torey C. Richards, LMHC4 Comments on My Fears About What The Sequester Means For Those In Need

Sequester-resultsI am not a politician and generally pay attention to politics just enough to know what I need to in order to be informed about the world around me, but this sequester has me concerned for a few reasons.

The number one reason is that whenever there are cuts, it seems like the people and places that need the most funding, are the first to lose funding and to feel it the most: the poor, the young, the disabled and the elderly.

About two years ago the state I live in had some major budget cuts that hit the mental health and substance abuse field hard.

In the company I work for, whole programs were shut down including precious juvenile justice and treatment programs. In the program I work in, we lost a handful of good counselors causing several schools to either be without a dedicated mental health/substance abuse counselor or for one counselor to have to split days between two schools when in actuality, most high schools could benefit from two full time mental health/substance abuse counselors on campus.

Nobody was happy about this. Not the counselors, the students or the schools, but due to budget cuts, we all had to find away to survive, as messy as it was. And now here we go again.

I am a mental health counselor, so of course I am always concerned about not only how budget cuts will effect me, but how they will effect society at large.

We were just having a big discussion about gun control and mental health reform a few weeks ago, yet according the the White House, an estimated 373,000 “seriously mentally ill” people may be without care. Where does that lead these people, many who need counseling, housing and medication to keep them from harming themselves or others.

Other programs that are subject to cuts that personally bother me include cuts to aid for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) and the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP), because I know many of my clients and students are on these programs and I know many of them need these programs to be able to keep the lights on in their apartments and food on the table. Most people don’t want to be on these programs, contrary to popular belief, but are on these programs because they need assistance.

On top of that, public housing may be cut by$1.94 billion. Working in an inner-city high school, I know that many of my students benefit from public housing, what does that mean for them and their families? Does that mean they may have to move back in to an overcrowded house with the child molesting uncle, or does it mean they will be homeless.

Speaking of homeless, other programs such as rental assistance and homeless programs are on the chopping blocks. Many of these people have fallen on hard times and are unemployed, did I mention unemployment checks will probably get smaller also?

A program called Head Start that many lower income and inner-city kids need to be able to make up for lack of early exposure to proper education, something that can change the course of a child’s life forever, may get cut by $406 million, which could mean 70,000 kids won’t have access to the program. That’s 70,000 kids that will be robbed of priceless early education experiences.

Special education may be cut by $840 million. I spent some time working in special education, especially with kids with autism and know the hard work and extra funding those kids need, not less.

There are a host of other programs that will be facing budget cuts, but these are the programs that are most near and dear to my heart because of the type of work I do and the population I deal with.

I wish that the Joint Select Committee on Deficit Reduction (the“Supercommittee”) and Congress would sincerely realize that behind the numbers,  figures and politics, are real people with real needs,  just trying to survive.

Popular Psychology

Mindy McCready: Addiction, Mental Illness And Suicide

by Torey C. Richards, LMHC5 Comments on Mindy McCready: Addiction, Mental Illness And Suicide

1358256839_mindy-mccready-articleSuicide is such a tragic occurrence in life, something that always surprises me a little, even when it’s expected, such as in the case of Chris Domer.

Even more shocking are the instances when it’s not expected, even if the person has had a troubling past, such as Mindy McCready.

Mindy McCready was a 37 year old country music star who apparently committed suicide this past Sunday afternoon by shooting herself in the head on her front porch. Besides being a country music star, more importantly, McCready was the mother of two boys, including a ten month old infant.

It’s hard to imagine the stress/circumstances that would cause a mother of two to want to take her own life, so I thought it would be a good idea to examine some of the stressors McCready was under.

Recently, her fiance and the father of her ten month old infant, record producer David Wilson died of an apparent suicide. This tragedy in itself could have been enough to push McCready into a suicidal state. Here is the father of her infant child, now dead, someone she had planned to spend the rest of her life with, and now he’s abandoned her.

On top of that, whenever someone close to someone commits suicide (and often they don’t even have to be that close personally), it makes it easier for that person to think about and even commit suicide themselves if they are already in a fragile state. That’s why having a family member who has committed suicide makes a person more at risk for committing suicide and why communities and schools often experience clusters of suicide after someone in that community or school has killed themselves. Perhaps the death of her infant’s baby’s father made it easier for McCready to end her own life.

On top of that traumatic experience, McCready also suffered from addiction and mental illness, both of which increases a persons likelihood of attempting suicide.

McCready had two previous suicide attempts in 2005, including attempting to overdose on drugs and alcohol. She was found unconscious in her hotel room and hospitalized. Then later that September while pregnant with her first son, she attempted suicide again by overdosing on anti-depressants. In 2008 McCready was also treated for an apparent suicide attempt after slashing her wrists. She was hospitalized at least once more after an overdose, or what may have been a bad reaction to some Darvocet apparently given to her by her mother.

Her battle with addiction and mental illness was often public. She appeared on Celebrity Rehab with Dr. Drew Pinsky and on The View. She spoke with Dr. Drew about the stigma she felt from the media and her fans about being in rehab, a topic he discussed on CNN after her suicide:

“Her biggest fear was the stigma of doing so and what people would think if she, God forbid, took care of herself. And this to me is the most distressing part of this story. She is a lovely woman, we have lost her, and it didn’t have to go down like this.”

McCready was also dealing with an ongoing custody battle that was often nasty and very public. Her ex-husband who is her first son’s father, Billy McKnight, wanted primary custody of their son and filed motions in court to have McCready submit to drug and alcohol testing and also undergo a psychological evaluation.

Despite her struggles with addiction, mental illness and an often rocky personal life, McCready still tried to remain positive. On her fan page in January 2012 she wrote:

“I haven’t had a hit in almost a decade. I’ve spent my fortune, tarnished my public view and made myself the brunt of punch line after punch line. I’ve been beaten, sued, robbed, arrested, jailed, and evicted. But I’m still here. With a handful of people that I know and trust, a revived determination, and both middle fingers up in the air, I’m ready. I’ve been here before. I’m a fighter. I’m down, but I’ll never be out.”

Perhaps the death of her infant’s father, a man she called (after his dead), her soulmate and life partner, was the final straw that broke the fighter in her. They both apparently killed themselves by shooting themselves in the head.

It could have been her addiction. After all, she had left treatment for substance abuse early and was reluctant to re-enter treatment due to the stigma she had faced in the media and with fans.

Chances are, it was a combination of everything: addiction, mental illness, dealing with the recent death of her fiance, a custody battle and having an overall bleak outlook on her future.

Suicide is a permanent solution to a usually temporary problem.

It hurts when we lose anyone to suicide and addiction and it’s sad that we have lost yet another bright star. Like Dr. Drew said, it didn’t have to go down like this.

Popular Psychology

Clearing The Air: Mental Illness In Relation to Smoking

by Torey C. Richards, LMHC1 Comment on Clearing The Air: Mental Illness In Relation to Smoking

The other day I was at a sports bar people watching, something I commonly do, when an attractive waitress caught my attention. I watched as she went outside on her break and then did the most disgusting and disfiguring thing, she put a cigarette between her lips and lit it.

I was shocked as I watched her inhale and then exhale a white puff of smoke. She had to be aware of the astounding amount of health issues related to smoking from cancer to cardiovascular disease, and she was smoking by herself so there weren’t any apparent social benefits, so how could someone so young and beautiful be putting that carcinogenic smoke into her body?

I immediately started thinking that she had to be self-medicating for one reason or another and that got me to thinking, is that why so many people are still smoking, can they all be self-medicating with nicotine and if so, from what?

The first obvious answer to me was stress. A lot of people smoke because they are stressed out and use nicotine to help calm their nerves. A study I read said that approximately 30% of people who smoke do so because they are depressed. For these people, nicotine actually helps them feel better, if only temporarily. These people instead of learning how to deal with their depression through counseling and appropriate anti-depressants if needed, have learned to depend on nicotine. Evidence of this came from U.S. clinical trials for Wellbutrin, an anti-depressant. During the trial to see how effective Wellbutrin was on depression, a fair number of participants who smoked suddenly stopped smoking. With drug companies being as clever as they are, Wellbuturin was soon not only sold as an anti-depressant, but was repackaged and renamed as Zyban and sold as a treatment to help people quit smoking.

Also, in an article called “Smoking in relation to anxiety and depression: Evidence from a large population survey: The HUNT study” published in European Psychiatry, it was shown that anxiety and depression were the two most common complaints in people who smoke, with anxiety being the highest complaint, followed by anxiety and depression combined and then depression by itself.

People with mental health issues, even if they are underlying, are twice as likely to smoke as the rest of the population. So it is possible that the people around you who smoke, your spouse, your friend, your family member, (or even you if you smoke) may actually be self-medicating for an untreated and undiagnosed issue that needs to be attended to. With proper treatment, they may lose the desire to smoke altogether. Encourage them to talk to their doctor, health care provider or other mental health provider about how their mood factors in with their urges to smoke.