{Warning |self-mutilation alert| - graphic} Talking with SonofPtah, he causally said,

[Ptah]

We were watching some crime show on the TV. The criminal in question was obeying
the words God was speaking only to him.

Son says, there was a guy there that bit off his pinky because Mother Mary told him,
"If you consume your pinky, Many poor children will be fed."

The authorities pulled all his teeth.

-----------

Trying to understand my son's perspective.

Just needed to vent.

[EFerrari]

1. Does sonof self-harm? I don't think I'm understanding.

Is he saying that people who self harm are doing it to make something better?

[Ptah]

2. He doesn't self harm.

He was spontaneously relating something that he
witnessed in prison.

[EFerrari]

3. Okay. Was he saying that the authorities pulled someone's teeth

as a way to deal with a psych problem?

[Ptah]

4. That's my understanding.

[EFerrari]

5. I believe him.

Once when my then husband was decompensated, he missed two appointments to go renew his prescriptions for psych meds. The clinic decided to punish that behavior by denying his psych meds the next time he manged to drag himself in there.

Can you BELIEVE that?

I waited until they turned him away, sat in the car and just counted to 100. When he came back, crestfallen and shamed, I had to go back to the clinic and asked them where they were putting him up because I wouldn't take him home with me without his meds.

This was at the Edelman Clinic in Los Angeles -- the biggest provider of mental health services in the whole country besides the Pentagon.

The abject ignorance, no, criminal neglect, of mental illness in this country is a national disgrace, Ptah. I'm sure the Edelman Clinic gets millions in Federal, State and County funds. And they were willing to risk my life and send Doug away without his anti-psychotic meds because he was TOO PSYCHOTIC to make his appointments.