Do you feel uncomfortable when there is a news announcement of a violent crime committed by some one who is mentally unstable or mentally ill? How can we address this stigma such that those of us who live with a mental health diagnosis largely lawfully are not readily lumped together with those people who are committing heinous acts due to their instability?
What might the typical mental health or substance use patient have to give up if there were to develop a Paranoia Hotline, a Paranormal Institute or a Cohort Model is some level of privacy? (Please see prior posts for a discussion of these concepts.) It is a “no brainer” to me that weapons do not belong in the hands of the mentally ill even when they are in recovery.
I also believe we as a society should allow therapists and doctors to report clients who may be showing signs of being a danger to others. This is very tricky territory, but it seems to me that the person providing mental health care should be able to report findings to some larger group whose mission is to follow-up and investigate and intervene if the concerns raised by the therapist show that a patient is a threat to others. At a minimum in my opinion, such notice from a therapist should ensure the patient goes on a weapon do-not-sell list.
In the past ten plus years the number of school or mass shootings in the US has sky-rocketed with the age of impacted schoolchildren often getting younger and younger. I feel it is the responsibility of people with mental health diagnoses who know how dangerous paranoia can be and how quickly it can develop into an unsafe situation to speak up in favor of controlling and denying access to guns and other weapons for the mentally ill. I also think the dialogue about what a therapist can reveal about his or her patient warrants more attention. If a patient is clearly a danger to others, this fact should be communicated to a third party in charge of reconciling the account. As people who strive day in and day out to be safe when there is often unsafety lingering around in the shadows, people with mental health diagnoses need to speak out as a group to ensure that lawmakers make weapons inaccessible to the mentally ill and provide societal intervention and/or follow-up for people who seem to be a danger to others.
It is only when we start to differentiate people who are a threat to others from people experiencing mental health symptoms but are no danger to others are we able to begin to address the stigma associated with mental illness. The public needs to know that it is a small percentage of people with mental illness who are actually a danger to others so that we who are living with the impacts of mental illness are not lumped into that category of “danger to others” and receive all the stigma that goes with that. These people who are a danger to others need early intervention from healthcare providers and first responders so that they do not act on these impulses to extend dangers to others.
Mental Health is Health 