I was just listening to a NPR piece about the mentally ill in the prison system and how completely unequipped the system is to be taking care of them. Best estimates put the number of mentally ill people in prison at 330k. The story I heard chronicled a mother’s loss of her 21 year bi-polar son while waiting for a rehab bed in a county jail.
It was heart wrenching, I kept having nightmarish visions of what the future holds for my son. I have no reason to believe there will ever (knock on wood) be anything wrong with him, but the “What Ifs.. ” were having a heyday in my head.
I grew up in Elgin, IL — home of the Elgin Mental Health Center, once a spawling metropolis of mental health care, the potential location of the University of Illinois or for a mental facility. Great choice guys. Anyway, I digress.
I have an uncle who used to be on their fire department, yes they had an actual fire department just for the facility. He watched it slowly be cut down in size, go into disrepair and generally decline faster than anyone could shake a fist at.
Growing up I never cared, it was an eyesore. An uncomfortable place that our high school football team practiced (you have not lived until you are doing a football run and have a naked black man running along side of you, lol — true story!). And I don’t really think that the city cared either, by then it was an eyesore, an testament to one gigantic bad choice.
But after hearing that story I have to wonder how much more of a disservice was done to not only those people in the facility, but to those who were put into the system instead of a place that could help with their mental health?
Again, I keep thinking of those “What If” situations and those poor mothers, fathers and children stuck living in a personal hell that our country has made a reality. I guess this is just a topic too disturbing to face head on, we as a society are much more interested in hearing about the plight of poor Paris Hilton.
What happened to us as a nation? We used to be great, I fear that we have lost the edge that our grandparents and great grandparents had that made us great. I love America, so that is hard to say. Its time we get our act together. Rant mode : /off
Tags: County Jail, Disrepair, Disservice, elgin, Elgin Mental Health Center, Fathers And Children, Heyday, High School Football, High School Football Team, illness, mental, Mental Health Care, Mental Health Center, Naked Black Man, nightmare, Nightmarish Visions, NPR, Paris Hilton, Peoiple, Personal Hell, Poor Mothers, prison, Prison System, School Football Team, Testiment, Uncomfortable PlaceYou must be logged in to post a comment.
