OPINION: Our society has a mental illness problem about mental illness. We're delusional about its reality.

Oct. 22—Mental illness is so pervasive in our communities that it has become invisible.

We know it's there. We look away, kidding ourselves that's it's something else. Or someone else's problem. Or another county's scourge. Our society seems to have a mental illness problem about mental illness. We're delusional about its reality.

"I know just enough to know that something is wrong," said Porter County Commissioner Jim Biggs.

Biggs is at his wit's end with our societal delusion. He shared with me an opinion editorial piece he wrote that resonated with my viewpoints about mental illness and it rising into every crevice of every community. Whispers aren't getting us anywhere to properly understand it and address it.

"No reporter would dare label someone 'mentally ill,'" Biggs wrote.

This is the only point of disagreement I had with his op-ed.

In my column space, I've labeled dozens of people as mentally ill, not to degrade them but to describe them regarding an issue we prefer to ignore. Every one of those people I described not only allowed me to mention their illness, they welcomed the openness to publicly explore it.

"My parents were in denial about it with my brother. They felt ashamed about it," Angella Meeks told me five years ago after her mentally ill brother, Eric Meeks, shot and killed both their parents before taking his life.

"I know what it's like to suffer from a mental illness, which can paralyze you to where you can't even get out of bed," Brian Fesko told me 10 years ago about his struggles with bipolar disorder.

"People don't understand. I don't think they care to," the elderly mother of a woman with schizophrenia told me 15 years ago. "We have our dignity, you know."

One of the sharpest tools to better understand ourselves is the willingness to discuss topics that make us uncomfortable. Mental illness makes us uncomfortable.

"Mental Illness works insidiously to unravel the social fabric strand by strand, breaking and stigmatizing families, leaving good but desperate people feeling helpless and emotionally broken," Biggs wrote. "As we have seen in Porter County, mental illness cuts across all demographics. No neighborhood is untouched by it, no fortunate son or daughter immune to it."

The problem in Porter County, as with most every other county, is that our grasp of its prevalence is largely anecdotal, he said.

"On occasion it makes it into the headlines, or we surmise it does after reading the story," he said. "Much more often it's something we hear about or whisper about, embarrassed or shocked. At this point, we can't know how many people might need mental health services or how accessible and effective those services are to residents who need them."

County officials such as Biggs know that millions of local tax dollars are appropriated toward fighting this far-reaching problem.

"What county officials don't know is why it appears that drug overdoses and suicide rates continue to increase at an alarming rate despite the millions we invest every year to manage it," Biggs said, noting that at least $2.5 million of Porter County county taxpayer money is spent each year on mental health services.

"Tossing more money at this problem isn't going to fix it," he said.

I'll be addressing this specific aspect of the issue in a follow-up column.

Biggs was reminded of this broader issue after hearing from Ronald Stone, a Duneland School Board member, who is passionate about fully addressing it. Not by more empty talking points from well-meaning public officials. Or by putting a magnet on our vehicle or planting a pinwheel in the courthouse square. But by establishing a baseline behavioral health needs assessment from an independent source with an expertise.

"I am calling on my fellow Porter County Commissioners to help me make available the necessary resources and funds to try and get a better handle of this problem with a behavioral health needs assessment," Biggs said. "The cost of this assessment would be minuscule compared to what we're spending to fight this issue every day, every year. I want to know what's going on here. And what we need to do to improve this situation."

Biggs is convinced that if we don't begin treating our mental illness about mental illness that it will become nearly untreatable.

"Until then, people in our communities will continue to slip through the cracks because we don't know where the cracks are or what's causing them in the first place," he said.

Mental illness is linked to unemployment and homelessness, to self-medication and substance abuse, to suicide and domestic violence, and to all manner of crimes, he said.

"It also drains a community's resources. Police officers, paramedics, ER doctors, social workers, counselors, addiction specialists, pastors and educators whose jobs are busy enough, only to be caught up again on the jagged edge of dealing with mental illness."

Our system has gotten so nonchalant about treating mental illness that it's lost its effectiveness, I told him. Legalized pill pushing is bound by state law in many counties and its futility is swallowing us whole. Walking zombies are not success stories.

"We need to deal with this," Biggs told me. "I want to hear from national experts, not local providers. We're failing horribly. We need a smarter, different approach."

More than 15 years ago, Lake Superior Court Judge Salvador Vasquez talked with me about criminals with mental illness who repeatedly return to his court. And to thousands of courts across the country.

"It's the classic definition of insanity," he said. "Doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result."

Like I said, we have a mental illness about addressing mental illness.

jdavich@post-trib.com

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