BUY NOW
Weeks ago I told you about the FACING US Music Contest. It’s time to listen to the finalists and vote for your favorite.
Help create a defining moment in the career of a young musician.
Later today…that personal story, as promised. Please check back.
In its annual report, the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration cited that the use of illicit drugs — cocaine, methamphetamines, heroin — among young adults and teens dropped last year.
Unfortunately, unauthorized use — abuse — of prescriptions drugs increased dramatically.
After a year of record-high deaths reportedly caused by heroin overdose, many of our kids are scared enough not to use it. But they’re uninformed enough to think that using prescription drugs (including, codeine, darvon, fentanyl, hydrocodone, oxycodone, oxycontin, percocet, percodan and vicodin) is safe.
My prediction: This year overdose deaths from prescription drugs will increase.
Why?
The high from opiates is wonderfully pleasurable. But even more significant, withdrawal from opiates is terribly painful. The user often cannot tolerate the discomfort; and he uses again to alleviate the symptoms. Or the user remembers the pain from a previous detox experience and fears repeating the ordeal. This fear is real and valid. Detox and withdrawal from opiates is among the most difficult to endure.
Common symptoms of opiate withdrawal include:
Symptoms begin within hours of the last use, and gain steadily in severity until peaking within a day or so of cessation of use. Symptoms endure with intensity for a period of three or four days before gradually subsiding, although lingering symptoms of detox may persist for months. Addicts who use for prolonged periods of time, or who detox repeatedly, seem to experience an even longer period of intense symptoms.
It is dire, this epidemic of opiate use. Many will suffer. Many will die.
If you or someone you love is using, abusing or addicted to opiates, SEEK HELP! One excellent online resource: Choose Help. Here you’ll find information and resources including a free downloadable Guide to Affordable Drug and Alcohol Rehab Programs.
TOMORROW: A personal account.
According to recent reports, US soldier suicide rates are up for the fifth consecutive year. Many of us in the mental health arena have long belabored this horrifying trend and all the “reasons why.” I will not do this today. Suffice it to say, we have endangered the mental health and long term well-being of a group of people willing to sacrifice all for our great nation. They deserve greatness from us, from their country, from their government. We must do better.
Gabrielle Giffords, my local congresswoman, is one of the most responsive and accessible politicians in Washington today. She listens to constituents and is accountable to them. Because I’ve communicated with her office on numerous synopsis (below) of legislation the congresswoman either sponsored or supported. I’m grateful that some of our leaders are listening and responding to this crisis.
Joshua Omvig Veterans Suicide Prevention Act (H.R. 327): Requires the Veterans Administration (VA) to develop and implement a comprehensive veterans’ suicide prevention program, requires the VA to provide 24-hour mental health care services to veterans, and requires that a suicide prevention counselor be available at every VA facility.
Wounded Warrior Assistance Act (H.R. 1538): Legislation that would improve the management of medical care, personnel actions and quality of life issues for members of the Armed Forces who are receiving medical care. Offered an amendment to this bill that would increase the reporting requirement on mental health services for returning combat veterans.
Traumatic Brain Injury Health Enhancement and Long Term Care Act (H.R. 2199): Ensures that our veterans are properly screened for Traumatic Brain Injury (the signature injury of troops returning from Iraq and Afghanistan) and receive prompt treatment.
The New GI Bill (H.R. 2642): Updated the Montgomery G.I. Bill by guaranteeing a full scholarship to any in-state public university along with a housing stipend.
Veterans Health Care Improvement Act (H.R. 2874): Allows low-income veterans access to successful readjustment programs in their communities such as transportation and housing assistance.
Medicare Improvements for Patients and Providers Act (H.R. 6331): Ensures active-duty military personnel and military retirees access to the doctors they know and trust in TRICARE.
Additional legislation for which Gabrielle Giffords is a cosponsor:
Combat-Related Special Compensation Act (H.R. 89): Provides concurrent receipt of retired pay and disability compensation to medically retired veterans (less than 20 years service).
Military Retirees Health Care Protection Act (H.R. 579): Prohibits a fee or co-pay for retirees and service members receiving TRICARE health services.
Retired Pay for Reservists (H.R. 690): Reduces the minimum age for retired Guardsmen and Reservists to begin receiving retired pay from 60 to 55.
Military Retirees Pre-Tax Health Insurance Premiums (H.R. 1110): Permits Federal civilian and military retirees to pay health insurance premiums on a pre-tax basis.
Wounded Warrior Information Sharing Act (H.R. 3191): Ensures service members’ addresses and contact information is transmitted with their consent to the department or agency for veterans affairs of the state to which the member intends to reside.
Veterans Guaranteed Bonus Act (H.R. 3793): Ensures that wounded veterans will not lose their enlistment bonuses if they are discharged from the military for medical reasons prior to fulfilling their service obligation.
Parents never want to “put away” their children; but sometimes their situation is so precarious and their health and wellness so compromised, safety can no longer be guaranteed. In the last decade, Mark and I have had to hospitalize two of our children many times. It was never easy, always heart-breaking, gut-wrenching. But it had to be done. We literally feared for their lives.
When this is the case, inpatient treatment may be the only plausible course of action. Unfortunately, many of us are called upon to make these life-and-death decisions; and until now, very few resources were available to assist in the decision-making process. That has changed. For those facing this difficult task, NAMI recently released A Resource for Families Considering Residential Treatment Programs for Their Children. Here are some excerpts from that valuable document:
Steps To Take When Considering Inpatient Treatment
Additional Questions To Ask
Children born to fathers older than 30 are more likely to develop bipolar disorder, according to researchers at the Karolinska Institute in Sweden. The findings, published in the Archives of General Psychiatry, verify that children of older fathers are at higher risk of developing mental illnesses, including bipolar disorder, autism and schizophrenia. And the risk factor continues to increase as fathers age, rising to 37 percent when a man is 55 years old. One explanation is that sperm quality degrades as a man ages, increasing the possibility of genetic mutations that lead to bipolar disorder.
Despite years of speculation that a man’s age may be linked to mental illness in his offspring, this is the first time a scientific study has been conducted to verify the assumption. The findings are another step toward understanding the causes and creating treatments for an illness that affects as many as 3 percent of adults worldwide. On another front, last month an international research team linked two genetic variants to an increased risk for the disease, adding to the pool of knowledge about the condition that often runs in families.
During the past two weeks I’ve had no fewer than five amazing encounters. They defy logic, but they are very, very real. Makes me wonder…
What is real?… What is not?… Crazy!
- A woman named M read MOMMY I’M STILL IN HERE, contacted me and wanted to meet for coffee. I agreed. M, diagnosed with bipolar disorder like my children Chloe and Michael, shared details of her illness and inner life that she’d never before shared with another. During those experiences, her outward appearance was uncannily like Chloe’s during similar episodes. M was able to articulate and illustrate her experiences so that I could better understand. I’ve yearned for this understanding. I got it. Just like that. A gift and a blessing from a stranger who is now my friend.
- In yoga class on Tuesday, just after Urdhva Dhanurasana and before Savasana, my friend Carole told me “You’re supposed to be writing fiction. Your neck and shoulder pain are symptoms of not using your voice the way you’re intended.” I wrote one page of a new book a month ago and haven’t gone back to it. Didn’t think the work was ready for me yet. Ha!
- My doctor told me he’d only seen xrays like mine after serious physical trauma… a car accident…a beating…you get the idea. Me? No physical trauma. No car accident. No beating. Another woman in the treatment area says “Emotions and worries, grasping and clinging can do more damage than physical trauma.” Aha moment! I know what I’m grasping for and clinging to. Clearly I need to let go.
- At coffee this morning, a good friend tells me, “I think you should work on a book of poetry.” … Just last month I started Musings, my online “book of poetry.” I’ve told no one in my “real life.”
- Someone I love is in deep trouble. I know it before he calls. And he calls. I can do many things. I am supposed to do one thing. Love unconditionally. The movie “Feast of Love”, incorrectly sent to me by Netflix (there are no mistakes) serves as an example for this lesson.
Life is crazy. Life is grand. Life will continue to give what we require in order to learn what we must.
Tell me…what’s your crazy story?
Along with prompt diagnosis and appropriate medical care, people with anxiety, bipolar disorder and / or depression benefit from learning how to:
1) Recognize their patterns of thought and behavior.
2) Learn skills to adjust those patterns toward wellness.
A recent study, led by David Miklowitz, PhD, of the University of Colorado, and published in the Archives of General Psychiatry, verifies these statements.
In the study, adolescents with bipolar disorder who received a nine-month course of family-focused therapy (FFT) recovered more rapidly from episodes of depression and stayed depression-free for longer lengths of time than a control group.
What is FFT?
Family-focused treatment, or FFT, is a series of intense psychosocial treatment sessions during which the patient and his family learn to identify the symptoms and patterns of bipolar disorder as well as how to recognize impending episodes or relapses.
In addition to medication monitoring, the participants learn communication skills, problem-solving techniques, and illness management strategies that include charts and tools for tracking symptoms and side-effects.
This course of treatment offers an encouraging glimpse into a future where patients with mental illness will develop skills and acquire the tools that allow them to stay well a greater percentage of the time.
In addition, by imbuing the mentally ill with not only appropriate medical treatment, but also support systems, knowledge of their illness, and skills to better manage it, we empower them to believe in the possibility of wellness and encourage the will to work toward and achieve that possibility.
The size of a small part of the brain, the hippocampus (a structure at the base of the brain involved in memory, learning, emotions) is influenced by variations in a blood-vessel gene; and it seems to be key in memory and mood disorders, according to Yale researchers.
It is hoped that this new information, which builds on years of previous research, will lead to new ways to treat depression, bipolar disorder and other mental illnesses. Previously, researchers discovered that the hippocampus is smaller in depressed people, and that antidepressants actually enlarge the brain structure, through a growth factor called brain derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF).
The discovery by Dr. Ronald Duman, a professor of psychiatry and pharmacology at Yale, coincides with previous findings that BDNF is involved with neural regeneration.
The latest research, based on brain scans and genetic analysis of 47 volunteers, suggests that another growth factor, vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF), is also linked to the volume of the hippocampus. When scientists figure out exactly how a variation in the VEGF gene affects the hippocampus, new treatments for depression and bipolar disorder, among other ailments, could develop through the VEGF pathway.
VEGF controls the growth of blood vessels and has been of keen interest to oncologists looking to starve malignant tumors and researchers in the area of macular degeneration. Several of these growth factors may affect the parts of the brain responsible for the symptoms in mood and other psychiatric disorders. Likewise, multiple genes may be responsible for mental illnesses.
The bottom line…new research means new knowledge leading to better diagnosis and treatment for more complete recovery.
