[NYAPRS Enews] Nichols Letter to Times Counters Calls for Forced BH Treatment

[Harvey Rosenthal]

NYAPRS Note: Following is an impassioned letter from Albany's Grace
Nichols in response to a recent NY Times magazine article, "When My
Crazy Father Actually Lost His Mind" that advocated for mandated
outpatient treatment orders
(http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/24/magazine/when-my-crazy-father-actuall
y-lost-his-mind.html?_r=1&ref=magazine).  The Times misprinted the
letter in Saturday's edition, mistakenly adding sentences from another
reader.

 

Letter to the New York Times 

Published July 6, 2012

 

"As a person living with bipolar disorder, I have dramatically different
experiences from those of the author, Jeneen Interlandi. 

Forced treatment in the behavioral- health services of state and private
hospitals has not helped me. 

It drove me away in fear of the level of force, dishonesty, coercion,
incarceration without trial, seclusion and restraint. 

Meanwhile, I earned various college degrees, raised two splendid
children on my own, put both into good colleges and generally defied the
dismal predictions of the professionals who worked on my "case." 

There are many things family members can do to support voluntary
services, and they can act to oppose job and housing discrimination. 

In these things, our relatives can turn out to be our allies rather than
our persecutors."

 

GRACE NICHOLS, Albany, N.Y.

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/08/magazine/the-6-24-issue.html?_r=1

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