July 27: Friend's Son, Bipolar, Classic Saint Marty, New Cartoon

This morning at church, I spoke with a friend whose son has been struggling for a long time.  As I sat and listened to her describe her son's depressions, flights of energy, inability to hold a steady job, sleepless nights, and disappearing acts, I started feeling a very familiar sense of panic.  I knew all of the things my friend was describing.  I'd been through them all, to a greater and lesser extent.  But I hadn't experienced that panic for a very long time.  It was a state I lived in for quite a few years.

My wife has been doing really well.  She takes her medications, goes to her doctor's appointments, and recognizes when something isn't quite right.  Her road has been long and difficult.  My friend's son has a long and difficult road ahead of him, if he is indeed bipolar.  I told my friend that.  I told her it wasn't going to be easy to get him the help he needs.  It's one thing getting treatment for a person who wants to get well.  It's a whole other crappy ball of earwax to get treatment for a person who doesn't think he's actually sick.

I spoke to my friend's son, a young guy.  Twenty-one years old.  Highly talented.  Incredibly bright.  I told him he needed to get help.  I told him I was worried about him.  Eventually, he promised to go to a doctor tomorrow with his mother.  I told him that I was going to call his mother to see if he followed through on his promise.  And I told him that I was going to crawl all over his ass if he didn't.

I don't know if I did any good today.  All I did was listen and offer compassion.  That's it.  Sometimes, that's all you can do, I guess.

Today's Classic Saint Marty originally aired four years ago.  It's about mental illness and compassion, as well.

Saint Marty wishes the world wasn't such a broken place sometimes.

July 27, 2010:  Saint Pantaleon

Today's feast saint, Pantaleon, is the patron of physicians.  He is honored in the Greek Orthodox Church, which identifies him as "one of the Holy Moneyless Ones who treated the sick without payment."  The Greek version of his name is Panteleimon, which translates as "the All-compassionate One."  All the other details of Pantaleon's life are suspect, and that means that legend and fact have stewed over the centuries into a mash of truth and fairy tale.  The one thing that's obvious, from his name and titles, is that he was a man of great caring, a person who looked after the poor and broken.  I kind of picture him as a cross between Mother Teresa and Anthony Edwards on ER.  One of the hardest things to do as a human being is to comfort another human being who's suffering physically or mentally, especially if that suffering is acute and frightening.

Last night, I sat in a room-full of people who face that kind of suffering every day of their lives.  It was the monthly meeting for the local chapter of the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI).  It's a support group for those suffering from mental illness and their families and friends.  Basically, it's for people on the front lines, who deal with the effects of bipolar, schizophrenia, depression, mania, OCD, borderline personality disorder, you-name-it, every day of their lives.  Over the years, I've had therapists and friends tell me I should attend a NAMI meeting.  Last night, I decided to follow their advice.

As I listened to people speak last night, I heard story after story of heartbreak and frustration.  One 26-year-old attendee knew she had acute depression when she was 12 or 13; she didn't start receiving legitimate treatment until four or so years ago.  Another person suffered from mental illness since she was a child, but she didn't get help until she was in her thirties; she's in her forties now  and, in a one-year-span, tried to kill herself five times.  There was a young man whose brother is schizophrenic and violent.  The brother refuses to take his medication, and the man can't get him committed to a hospital until the brother hurts himself or another person.  Another man has a girlfriend with untreated bipolar disorder; the girlfriend screams at him and beats him up when they're together.  "She's my best friend.  She's helped me through a lot," the man said, paused, and then finished, "and she's pregnant now."

The details were different for everyone, but they were also the same.  Family members wanted their loved ones to be well.  Those with mental illness wanted to feel normal, think clearly, be happy, at peace.

Through all the anger and frustration at a health care system that, for the most part, fails patients with mental illnesses; through all the turbulence of mania and depression and psychosis and paranoia; through all the meetings with doctors and therapists and police officers and lawyers and judges; through all of this shit, there was one overriding emotion:  hope.

Hope that the pregnant girlfriend will stop screaming.  Hope that the brother will take his shot.  Hope that the next medication, the next treatment, will be the ONE.  Hope.

I didn't expect to find that at NAMI.  I expected the crying, heartbreak, pain, anger.  I didn't expect hope.

But there it was, shining through the understanding nods and concerned questions.  There it was in the face of the woman who said, "I'm going back to college this fall."  There it was in the girl who had found a friend she could talk to, who understood what it felt like to want to cut yourself.  There it was in the man who said he wanted to hold his unborn child.

NAMI is full of Panteleimons.  All-compassionate ones.

Confessions of Saint Marty