Yeah, I notice that movies, but especially series nowadays are just truly despicable, depraved, abhorrent ... it's hard to find an appropriate word for them. They do affect me, especially if watched for several days in a row. I don't watch TV almost at all now, and not at my place.

Watch Lone Ranger. Always a good show.

I tried to write a piece that summed up my opinions and was solution-oriented (and edited for clarity). Feedback is welcome. Thanks.

People struggling with mental health issues—especially those who feel they're unable to manage and cope on their own—are encouraged to seek professional help. Talking with family and friends about their struggles can be beneficial, but if that proves insufficient then other steps need to be taken. But what if a person (I'll use the term consumer for the remainder of this letter) is unable or unwilling to seek professional help? What options remain after consumers have obtained professional help in the past and it's yielded few, zero, or negative results? Professional help is no guarantee. Doctors are not gods, and doctors do not claim to be gods. When we tell consumers that help and treatment is available, that they simply have to ask, it implies that they are likely to receive effective treatment from professionals. This is sometimes not the case, and their feelings of disillusionment may prevent them from seeking help in the future.

I am a consumer. In the last twenty years, I have seen seven psychiatrists and seven trained therapists (seven, to the best of my recollection). The opinions in this letter and the following suggestions are based on that experience. I will also draw on what I've learned from talking to other consumers, and reading Internet blogs and message forums where they've written about their treatment experiences.

In order to improve the mental health system, encouraging consumers to share their experience is necessary. Furthermore, we should help those who believe they have received ineffective treatment to feel comfortable enough to share their thoughts about it—they are a demographic who are less likely to publicly provide feedback than the many consumers who have had positive outcomes.

What we learn from listening to consumers is always beneficial to improving current "merchandise." Without analyzing differing points of view and by omitting factors from the discussion we are doing a disservice to those we'd like to help, people who have placed their trust in us (non-consumers) and believe we have their best interests at heart. I understand that no one wants to speak of things that may potentially discourage a consumer from getting help—I'm aware that talking about the "S" word often creates controversy; however, little progress can be obtained by silence, and ignoring relevant and crucial information isn't conducive to opening doors or forming solutions.

In the short term, a list of resources should be compiled and made widely accessible and easy to find, e.g., a web site, a blog, and a "flyer" published periodically by a local paper. Consumers should be presented with many options from which to choose. Options provide hope, and hope—in many cases—is the only force that has the ability to sustain someone struggling with mental health issues. Presently, most resource directories and lists are incomplete, and some resources exist of which consumers aren't aware. We need to create a list/directory that includes any and all resources available.

Remember, the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline number is 1-800-273-TALK (8255). (I'm not affiliated with that nor any other mental health organization, and I'm not professionally trained to give mental health advice.)

You know, after I wrote my comment about some therapists being duds, I realized that I was speaking from the relaxed position of having found one who works well with me. I stayed with my oh-so-sweet-yet-completely-dimwitted therapist for far too long. Starting up with a new therapist is so hard. One has to go through so much garbage yet again just to get to the point where you can start working. And, of course, one wonders if one just wasn't trying hard enough with the last one. Repeating that process again and again is disheartening. If I hadn't found a few real gems along the way I probably would have given up.

Your comments about the mental health system as a commodity that consumers have difficulty evaluating can be expanded to health care systems in general. It's very hard to get information about outcomes. There are metrics about how nice the office staff are and how long one waits in the exam room, but it's really hard to get information about outcomes except through informal communication with people.

Yeah, starting from scratch with a new therapist can be difficult. Getting used to a new therapeutic relation, repating the same all over again, etc.

And talking about bad therapists, I went to a Lacanian therapist for some years... I wouldn't recomend this type of "therapy" to anyone. I could sit there, speak about how bad I felt and this guy wouldn't say anything useful; sometimes said some obvious stuff or repeated what I had just said. I know they can't make people feel good magically, but they could do their best to help. Fortunately, I found other therapist who helped me to get in the proper state to solve the problems I was having by that time.

My favorite was the one with her "Tips and Tricks for Living". Seriously, she never said anything that was more profound than what one might find in Woman's Day magazine or Reader's Digest.

Forgot movie where doctor asks patient to jump out of window after spending too much nerves trying to make him not commit suicide, surprisingly it worked and helped not do it at all.

This seems interesting: Holistic Recovery from Schizophrenia
Good point, thanks.

Some research shows that depressed people are more realistic than non-depressed people. The problem is the balance isn't there, which leads to depression caused by negative thoughts and feelings.
i know someone who has an interesting sorta psycosis he was told that awarenes of phycology is unhealthy
this after i told him not to resist making a face at what disturbs him if he really feels that emotion he shoul take the time by himself to consider what he wants when he feels it and try to go get it
and what about that famous argument that phycology isint real "its al brain chemestry and motor nerons fireing" but i can never seem to see what all these putzy agresive scientists see in the gathering that disqualifies the existance of a phy cology
fireing brain activity in conjunction to a sorta "bio batery/resistor" system results in a co dependant balance of logic given purpose/funtion by a set of chemical portions that fuel/drain/impeed/accelorate a raidio signal more or less
then we intro duce a nice tal cold glass of koke cola on the table and a heat raidiater on the other and watch the subject for a minute or two as they discover the sensation of heat and ascociate it with thirst and discomfort and we move away then the cold side of the room where the coke is and we move toward it because it is more comfortable
we move closer to the radiator when the window near the coke lets in a draft and makes the room cold ...
this is called ascociative behaivior and if you are consious of ascociative behavior you can remember things and in the recurring phenominon as more ascociations are established we begin to pre concieve with varrying degrees of acuracy what we may experience
inacurate conception or accurate conception
inacurate conceptions or phycosis are a malody to the health of this niche that is our phycology and anyone with a substantial psycology may feel compelled alter your experiences due to acociative experiences that result in a phyco relationship known as a friend these sensations are verry desireable and being one who likes to feel friendship i afirmly reccomend it to evryone
so with the understandings of primal ascociative behaivior and accurate conception we can begin to gather information a scientific mind may call this gatherings with them we can pre assert situations decide what we want and how we want to recover from something resulting in a gathering from with in the omega to the apha
and so exists psycology
if you can read this you have a niche that depends on phycology
so for a nutrtious meditation and a healthy phycology i recomend we get back to the basics and practice ascociateing our feelings with our experience so we can gather gather and hypothisize with greater accuracy so we can render inert any deleterium cause whenever or wherever and in whomsoever it may occur with exeeding efficiency so we can get back to sipping cokeacola and making friends
i look forward to a reply to this one
note it isint good to be unconcious of your phycology because people like me who have tendancy disacociative behavior
(sociopaths) could hurt you really badly

I had trouble understanding most of what you wrote. There were a lot of misspelled words and poorly constructed sentences. No offense is intended; I realize not everyone has "perfect" grammar. I sure as heck don't

But I'll respond to a couple things.

Your first two sentences were from something I wrote in previous post regarding Depressive Realism.

When you wrote:
That's a very general statement, but I do believe there some validity to it. Who told him that "awareness of psychology is unhealthy"? A friend, doctor, something he read, etc? But it is a general statement and may apply to some people, but not others.


Could you state this another way, to help make it more clear what you meant by this:

It's that time of year again:
World Suicide Prevention Day

In my experience mental health treatment over the last 15 years seems almost experimental. It seems about every 8 weeks or so I find out another guy I served with has committed suicide. (I'm aware that is probably not that frequent but it just feels that way) I would be nice if people stopped perceiving mental illness as a weakness or problem that needs to be hidden and started doing pushing for some actual research on the issue. Maybe things are changing it's been a good long while since I've been to the states and the military community overseas is well insulated so I could be talking about the past but it is my thoughts on the matter.

Military personnel can be (and often are) exposed to situations that can induce mental illness. I know I've spoken to a number of psychologists and they are very concerned about the huge number of cases of PTSD in soldiers coming back from active war zones. War experience is definitely not good for the mind. Certainly you've heard of the high rate of suicide among soldiers coming back from war zones. I'm not sure if there are enough psychologists and psychiatrists to handle the situation ... and the future doesn't look like war is going away, quite the opposite.

Yes..

I've either been in or worked for the Army since 22 June 2000