We are reeling from the tragedy in Sandy Hook, Connecticut. And as we grapple with the motives of the killer, we are ever so aware of the potential for violence in people with some sort of mental disease. We can't help but look at PANDAS and Lyme which can result in violent threats and behaviors. People are writing that the murderer may have had autism or Asperger's. Others are pointing their fingers at gun control.
Why? Why? Why? we all ask, as we grieve. As we grow angrier and angrier.
Walk into a psychiatric ward and you'll see that this country is not equipped to really help those in need, especially our children. Our psychiatric hospital system is barbaric in so many ways. The people who are the most needy do not have voices. And their families are often too ashamed to demand more. We have been taught to keep problems closeted.
The doctors who figurately work past the 9-5 day, those who follow a different path because they have to make a difference in this world, those who perhaps don't buy into the norm of easy diagnoses, people like Dr. Jones and Dr. Trifiletti, are not honored. Instead, competing doctors, disgruntled patients or an archaic health system instigate investigations into their practices, thus trying to dishonor their characters and prevent them from helping people.
The time for change is now--but what direction will it go in? Gun control is always a hot issue, but it doesn't take a gun to do a mass murder. Psychiatric hospitals tend to dole out medication so that symptoms aren't as prevalent. But who ends up paying for this? And as we PANS parents know, psychiatric meds can actually exacerbate the symptoms we are trying to treat in our children.
We have so far to go in terms of science. And humanity.
Bless our children.