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Police Training, Re: Mental Illness Though the Nutshell is primarily a consumer/survivor publication, we try to include a variety of voices from within the mental health-advocacy community. Sometimes these voices can be those of family members. Pat Lawrence is a Past President of NAMI of Massachusetts and President Emerita of the New England Personality Disorder Association (NEPDA) her narrative voice is that of a family-member advocate. Her life has been changed by the suffering of her husband and daughter who are both psychiatrically disabled. Since her husband’s profession was that of policeman her mission has been to educate and hopefully enlighten police officers and police-recruits, (otherwise known as “first responders” ) to the realities, rather than the stereotypes, of the disabled people whom they often confront. As she eloquently recounts in this article Pat tries to raise the consciousness of officers and officers in training in the classes she teaches.
Your mind travels when you can’t sleep. You can sense the anxiety building as the clock continues its endless progression. The upcoming, events roll in your mind like the previews of an old movie. Used to to it? Never! It’s the same anticipation that rears its head in the hours before I stand in front of a class of very eager and very intelligent first responders. My aim is to change, in a single morning, whatever they have learned, usually erroneously, about severe, catastrophic mental illness. Do I take my few hours before them too seriously? Do I have the audacity to think that what I say to these young police officers in training, (and even the older ones) will cause a difference in the lives of vulnerable, mentally challenged friends? You bet I do! I can thank the former Executive Director of the Massachusetts Criminal Justice Training Council, for my years on this forefront. He, a civilian, and I had the audacity to think that what I say to these young police officers in training, (and even the older ones) will cause a difference in the lives of vulnerable, mentally challenged friends? You bet I do! I can thank former Executive Director of the Massachusetts Criminal Justice Training Council, for my years on this forefront. He, a civilian, and I had the same thoughts, to teach people at the entry level about the reality of life on the streets, and the whole story of people with special needs whether they be body or mind. In Massachusetts, nothing had been given as tools to the police to help them in their determination as to what could possibly be wrong with the the confused individual before them, usually needing their immediate help. They were perplexed and frustrated. Mental illness had been too long in the closet buried under eons of unenlightement and covered over with the misconceptions of stigma and discrimination. My need was to teach anyone who would learn, the feelings of my mentally ill child and her friends, their innocence, their vulnerability, and their equality. Who better than the people who decide whether to place these people in the mental health system or the criminal justice system—the first responders—the police recruits—my first trainees. And so, ten years ago, I did just that. I wrote a program and brought it before six thousand in- service police, police recruits, EMT’s, firefighters, library security, MBTA police—anyone who would listen. And, they all needed to know the young age of the psychotic innocents, the terrors of their symptoms, the side effects of the drugs that gave back a life of reality and with some took back the use of pancrease, liver, or even a life. They needed to know the hopelessness of the streets for those with a confused mind who could not find food or shelter, let alone hold down a job. They needed to know that the criminal justice system created a new type of hopelessness for the mentally challenged: food and shelter provided, but vulnerability to the enth degree. And, they needed to know a whole new world of hallucinations and delusions with the feelings of despair and suicide that envelope five million Americans each year. Most of all, they needed to know that this illness called severe catastrophic mental illness is non discriminatory, no one’s fault and a proven physical illness the same as diabetes or heart-disease-a biologically based brain disorder. So many things they needed to know, and still do, but a small indentation has been made. When armed with knowledge of all the facts, someone might move beyond an uneducated guess to an educated decision. It is quite fundamental to use brains instead of brawn. Police skills are absolutely essential in some unpredictable situations, but fear of an ill victim should not play a part in taking him into custody and delivery to a cell. The safety of all concerned is paramount in my program. I am aware of the issue of safety from both points of view. My husband was a police officer, and my child is a survivor of schizophrenic symptoms. My name is advocate, and I am proud of its meaning. But I am prouder still of those men and women, young or old, who listen, question, and then want to take on my name—in all its connotations— advocate. My course gives them answers to questions long unanswered. Dusty cobwebs no one bothered to disarrange. The love, the passion, the pride I have for the mentally ill is undeniable. The hope, the support for their recovery is uppermost in my mind. If I can touch the heart of one person in society and read awareness through tears in their eyes, then my wakefulness, my long drives, my standing for sometimes six hours, my talking until I am hoarse, and then the long drive back from five police academies, mentally and physically exhausted sometime to the point of enlisting the bed at a nearby hotel to place my weary brain and body until I get strength to continue home, is well worth any effort I have put into it. It is then I will sleep the sleep of the self-satisfied for I will have done an educational service to all my husband’s brothers and my daughter’s friends.
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