Update
Two quick updates, and I'm putting these at the top because they are important.
I wrote a line below that inadvertently denigrates those with learning disabilities. I apologize. Rather than edit the line, I'm issuing a mea culpa. It was poorly stated and offensive. I mistakenly attempted to draw a contrast between those who are mentally capable of making decisions for themselves and a class of people who cannot. I do not have enough experience or information to make that distinction in relation to those with learning disabilities. I apologize.
Secondly, I am aware that what I have written about below, while attempting to implement an ideal, is not either implemented in an ideal way or even all that common. Too many community-based systems come nowhere near this due to many factors. I still believe that empowerment and comprehensive treatment and rehabilitation is far superior to institutionalization. There are better ways, and patient-directed and oriented ways, that I try to present below as generally successful where they are implemented.
Thank you for reading.
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Mental illness effects 1 in 4 of every adult across every demographic divide. Race, gender, age, economic status, none of that matters. Like many other indiscriminate diseases, mental illness doesn't care if you are rich, poor, white, black, male or female. The illnesses in question range from anxiety and depression to bipolar and schizophrenia, with a smattering of more complicated disorders.
There has been some recent interest in how to treat the mentally ill in this country. Some of that has focused on hospitalization, and how the paradigm for treatment of mental illness has moved away from warehousing people in institutions. For some reason, a lot of people feel that this is a bad thing. It is not.
Mentally ill persons are human beings. They are not mentally retarded. Like all other factors mental illness ignores, it can strike anyone of any level of intelligence. Mentally ill persons have every right and ability to decide for themselves how to live a normal, productive life, but like any given physical disability, severe mental illness limits those choices and often needs outside support.
Please journey with be below to learn more about the mentally ill community, what it is, what it does, and what it needs. Here's a foreshadowing of what is to come: they don't need any of you to tell them what is best for them.
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