Thinking the unthinkable
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Thinking the unthinkable
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Re: Thinking the unthinkable
#2I think this woman's blog post is interesting, for all the obvious reasons as well as the consideration that Aspergers and other forms of autism are associated with Silicon Valley children.
Re: Thinking the unthinkable
#3This is incredibly important.
Every time I talk to people from outside of the country about the US, the first thing that comes up is the difficulty of obtaining proper healthcare.
Re: Thinking the unthinkable
#4Reading this nearly brought a tear to my eye. I can't imagine what it's like for a mother to fear her own barely-teenage son and worry about the implications of his condition for the remainder of her life. I agree it's important to discuss mental illness and how it should be handled, but what is she suggesting should be implemented to address situations like this?
Re: Thinking the unthinkable
#5Does anyone know a) how often this sort of pattern presented itself historically, and b) what people did back in the good old days? For example, what would a small rural town have done to support someone like Michael? Would they have treated him somehow? Would they have assumed he was possessed by a demon and tried an exorcism? Or would they have found a way to get rid of him in a hunting accident, and had a dirty little town-wide secret? Or what? It's a really hard problem, obviously, and history might at least give us some ideas (possibly some very bad ones, granted).
Of course, since his outbursts are so episodic, it would be interesting to consider installing some sort of drug system in the kid, remote-controlled that either knocks him out or just sedates him when he gets belligerent, similar to how diabetics have insulin dispensers. It would be interesting to see if his "sweet, sunny" self would accept this leash on his evil twin, or even the particularly interesting possibility that he can be taught to observe the episode and trigger the device himself. It would also, of course, be interesting to get an fMRI of his brain before and after an episode - he could advance our knowledge of the biological basis of rage and hatred. Heck, if he's really that smart he'd probably do well to consider a neuroscience track so he can study himself, eventually.
Re: Thinking the unthinkable
#6Does anyone know a) how often this sort of pattern presented itself historically, and b) what people did back in the good old days? For example, what would a small rural town have done to support someone like Michael? Would they have treated him somehow? Would they have assumed he was possessed by a demon and tried an exorcism? Or would they have found a way to get rid of him in a hunting accident, and had a dirty li…
> Of course, since his outbursts are so episodic,
My suspicion is that they very specifically aren't episodic - lots of kids with this style of behavior problem are excellent manipulators. You can't discount the possibility that he's behaving well and poorly in order to extract what he wants out of other people.
Re: Thinking the unthinkable
#7Post like this terrify me. What if there isn't anything that can be done? It seems like there are some people that are just born broken or at some point they break.
Men who experience schizophrenia it often stars in their late teens or early 20s, and late 20s/early 30s for women [1]. I had a friend in high school who was completely normal in every way. During his first year in college he literally just went crazy. It wasn't a singular event but over 6 months he lost it and he's never been the same. He has access to mental health care and after several years his parents even had him committed for a few months. Nothing helps and even his parents have finally accepted that he will never be the same or even normal.
I don't know what we as a society are supposed to do in these cases and that's what terrifies me above all else.
[1] http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/healthlibrary/conditions/ment...
Re: Thinking the unthinkable
#8Mental health care isn't that easy to obtain north of the border either, here in Canada.
I had to wait nearly 1.5 years to get the help I needed. I've dealt with issues for over 25 years, and only recently have I identified them. I still struggle with them. During the last 1.5 years, I nearly failed out of my Master's program.
Here's hoping I can finish it.
Re: Thinking the unthinkable
#9Thank god a post like this was brought up. This incident in CT has undoubtedly brought up a national debate about gun control, but I hope to God it sparks a debate about mental illness, the real cause behind all of these mass shootings.
Re: Thinking the unthinkable
#10Does anyone know a) how often this sort of pattern presented itself historically, and b) what people did back in the good old days? For example, what would a small rural town have done to support someone like Michael? Would they have treated him somehow? Would they have assumed he was possessed by a demon and tried an exorcism? Or would they have found a way to get rid of him in a hunting accident, and had a dirty li…
I hope that clockwork-orange style behavior modification or remote "kill switches" in people are never socially acceptable answers to this problem :(