American Restraints

During the 1700’s the jails were not only used to confine criminals, but they confined people with mental illness as well. People with mental illness were subjected to inhumane treatment, even when the individual was admitted

I believe that the first meeting at the diner between the two former workers at Kings Park and Lucy Winer delineates many of the issues with mental healthcare. The two men were supposed to be providing care to over a thousand patients, yet it did not seem as if they knew much about mental health. When Lucy was describing her suicide attempts, the one main replied with, “Oh you must have had really low self esteem or something”. This naive statement by the former worker is concerning, for this may mean that he didn’t truly

In the book Girl, Interrupted by Susanna Kaysen, Susanna Kaysen was only 18 years old when she agreed to enter a medium security psychiatric facility in Boston, McLean hospital in April 1967, after a failed suicide attempt. She insisted that her over dose on aspirin was not a suicide attempt, but after a 20 minute interview the doctor decided she needed to be admitted to a hospital. During her prolonged two-year stay at the hospital Kaysen describes the issues that most of the patients in her ward have to deal with and how they all differently deal with the amount of time they must stay in the hospital for. While in the hospital Kaysen experienced a case of depersonalization where she tried to pull the skin of her hands to see if there were bones underneath, after a failed escape attempt. Soon, after going to therapy and analysis she was labeled as having recovered from borderline personality disorder. After her release she realizes that McLean Hospital provided patients with more freedom than the outside world, by being free responsibility of parental pressure, free from school and job responsibilities, and being free from the “social norms” that society comes up with. Ultimately, being in captivity gave the patients more freedom then in society and created a safe environment in which patients wanted to stay in.

Most of the treatment towards patients were ethical, like Cheryl was treated very well and she felt like she didn’t deserve such treatment. Having to tie down some of the patients that weren’t a threat was kind of overkill, some would have walked or sat nicely on the bed when they were taken into Bellevue. Tying the patients to the bed is what made them very mad and pushed them over the edge. Some of the patients that could leave Bellevue should have slowly gone into the outside world instead of just letting them go on their own, without any help. Bruce should have taken the medication instead of going to court to have Bellevue not give him medication. Without the medication he wouldn’t get any better. The hospital could have met him in the middle and given him a smaller dose of the medication that would still help him without the side effects that would make him depressed or have difficulties with speech and movement. Without the medication Bruce couldn’t be helped in anyway. The employees at Bellevue take their job very seriously and they do everything in their power to calm down patients when they have a break down or dangerous outburst. The employees manage to laugh at some things, like having their finger be bitten off by a man. They are very professional do, they try to be as honest as they can to the patients, even if they are only partial truths. One of the patients asked an employee if god was punishing her for something and that was why she was the way

After this episode a professor convinced her to go to the hospital and reluctantly she complied. This hospital did not take kindly to her psychosis and restrained her numerous times with straps. She had never been treated this way before and was confused and frightened. She later said for a hospital for the mentally ill it had been a brutal experience (157). She then was moved to a different hospital, memorial Unit 10 (MU10) where she was first diagnosed with “Schizophrenia with acute exacerbation” (167). Though she had finally gotten a diagnosis for her broken brain it seemed more like a death sentence than a diagnosis. She continued on with life in depression, psychosis, and denial.

The shutdown of state mental hospitals and lack of available financial and institutional resources force mentally ill people to the United States Judicial System for mental health. Every year thousands of people are arrested for various crimes and they are sent to jail. Sixteen percent of these people have some type of mental health problem (Public Broadcasting System , 2001). When we consider that the United States has the largest incarcerated population in the world at 2.2 million, this number is staggering (Anasseril E. Daniel, 2007). This is about 1% of the entire population of the United States. There are many reasons as to why the situation has taken such a bad turn and when the history of the treatment of mental illness is examined one can see how the situation developed into the inhumane disaster it is today.

The short documentary Crooked Beauty, directed by Ken Paul Rosenthal, narrates Jacks Ashley McNamara’s experience in a psychiatric ward and how her time in the facility shapes her new appreciation for her mental illness. One controversial issue has been trying to identify the true cause of mental illness. On the one hand, most people may think mental illness is simply a biological disorder that can be cured with a combination of medication and doctors demanding appropriate behavior until it sticks in the patient’s mind. On the other, McNamara contends that mental illness is a misconception with a patient’s oversensitivity, where it is harder for the patient to ignore certain events than “normal” people, and their doctor’s textbook knowledge. In McNamara’s mental institution, the psychiatrists simply trap her in a padded room and prescribe many different pills to suppress her mental illness instead of embracing her differences or showing her how to use those differences to her advantage. In attempt to prevent those who are mentally ill from feeling the same anger and frustration she felt, she demands a change in the line psychiatric treatment when she says:

Known as an American philanthropist and reformer, Dorothea Dix transformed living conditions in prisons and established institutions for the mentally insane in 20 states, as well as Canada (“DIX”). Through her crusade for fair treatment of the mentally insane, Dorothea Dix exemplifies the ideals of her time – to protect the rights of all human beings, no matter their age, race, or mental capacity.

During the 1800s, treating individuals with psychological issues was a problematic and disturbing issue. Society didn’t understand mental illness very well, so the mentally ill individuals were sent to asylums primarily to get them off the streets. Patients in asylums were usually subjected to conditions that today we would consider horrific and inhumane due to the lack of knowledge on mental illnesses.

In the book, Crazy, by Pete Earley, provides a detailed overview of the mental health system in the United States, as it presents a first hand narrative of Earley’s family journey through the system. The author’s major premise and arguments, in the book, is to highlight the history of mental health, navigation through the judicial system with mental illness, the bureaucracy and policies of hospitals, society views on human rights and client safety, and the impact on the individual, family, and community. The content suggests that human service workers and public health workers should extend their professional lens to advocate for change in the mental health system in the United States.

Wright, D. (1997). Getting out of the asylum: understanding the confinement of the insane in the nineteenth century. Social History of Medicine, 10, 13

In America, one in five adults has a mental health condition, a staggering statistic. Appreciatively, recovery is the goal in the mental health centers of 2017. Nevertheless, in the 1950s, patients were provided with inhumane treatments such as lobotomies. Ken Kesey’s novel, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, provides an accurate portrayal of a psychiatric ward in the 1950s. The antagonist, Nurse Ratched, hopes her patients will not recover and manipulates them to gain authority. In contrast with the past, Nurses of the present day treat individuals with respect. Conduct towards mentally ill patients has changed since the 1950s in ways such as public attitude, medication, and

“Both the book and the movie are insightful views into societal problems such as stereotypes about the people who have mental disorders. But the film is largely out of date in terms of depicting hospital staff as manipulative or evil. From what I saw when I worked in a similar institution, mental hospitals are a calm, healing environments—as they should be” (Wind Goodfriend, 2012).

The work of David Rosenhan has inspired many people after him to look into how psychological clinics and hospitals work in admitting and their behavior towards those who seek their assistance, whether they be sane or insane. Two of such people are Lauren Slater and Mike Smith.

Mental illness in the Victorian era was in no way looked at with the same perspective that it is today. Unlike the Victorian Era, today’s society generally treats its mentally ill members with compassion and sympathy, not disgust and ill-treatment. However, many years ago the opposite of today’s treatment was very much acceptable. Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre, set in Victorian England, demonstrates such difference, as it is acceptable for a woman to be hidden and put under lock in key solely for reasons of insanity. Yet, with many differences in Brontë’s story and the current world, one concept may remain the same: woman driven mad by man.