A Gap In The System

I know enough House fans that I really thought I should pass this one on!

HOUSE calls for NAMI

The hit television drama HOUSE is helping NAMI.

At a packed press conference on the Los Angeles stage where the show is produced, cast crew and producers launched a promotion this week to benefit the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) and its work in education, support, and advocacy for individuals and families affected by mental illness. View photos from the press conference.

Right now—for a limited time only—T-shirts from the show are being sold on-line for $19.95 at www.housecharitytees.com. They are emblazoned with the phrase “Everybody Lies,” one of the best-known “House-isms” often uttered by the brilliant, but cynical diagnostician Dr. Gregory House, played by Hugh Laurie, the star of the show.
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A good conversation with an acquaintance who was involved in the children’s mental health system for a long time has gotten me really pumped to write more and work as an advocate for mental health, in general, and children specifically.

I feel as if our story needs to be shared. People need to know what’s going on, what it is really, viscerally like to be in this place. Other parents need to be aware that there are options out there. All of the bureaucracy needs to quit being bureaucrazy, but that will likely never happen, so someone who has learned things the hard way needs to share those lessons with others.

T, the acquaintance, suggested that I look into peer counseling. I will be doing so. It feels odd to consider myself as someone to help other people like that, but I know what I would have given to have someone who had been there already helping me.

Another suggestion was legislative advocacy, something else that I will look into doing. While I can’t imagine trying to speak in front of a large group of people, I think that I’m willing to try it.

I will be writing more in this journal and sharing our history, as I pull it all together in my head, as well as sharing some of my other experiences, resources, and beliefs. I hope to post something every week day.

I know that I have very few readers currently, but if you would like to know anything, feel free to ask in comments.

Esperanza is Spanish for hope and it’s what I finally have a bit of now. I’m almost afraid to even whisper that, as if speaking may ruin it all.

J is in a state-contracted long-term facility now. It’s a residential treatment center, where he is receiving training and experiences to get him ready to face the real world again.

We went to visit him today, as a family. He’s only been there for three days, but it seems like I can already see a bit of a difference. He’s not being warehoused and he’s being forced to THINK. He seems to be coming out of the unthinking fog in which the hospital had placed him.

I have hope and, oddly enough, that makes me even more scared. Hope is such a fragile thing, as ephemeral as a soap bubble, as light and soft as a butterfly wing.