I learned of something upsetting yeterday. The story is here. And then I wrote to the White House because some things just HAVE to be said. Even if a person must save the rest of their energy for their own person and family and cannot receive public comments about it from their blog pals.
This is what I sent. I can only hope that someone reads it and that many others will speak up as well. If you would like to be heard, please go here.
Dear President Obama: Please ask your agency SAMHSA to support their original choice of journalist Robert Whitaker to be keynote speaker at the annual Alternatives 2010 conference. Robert Whitaker has a very important message that is vital to the futures of countless Americans and to our country as a whole. He is an advocate for choice, self-empowerment and the quest for the personal and collective freedom and responsibility that America was built upon. Please do not allow this sneaky kind of censorship without your input. So many Americans are being disabled by a lack of information about real alternatives in mental health. I am living proof. I used to need public assistance, but no more. Not for many years. There are alternatives to automatically reaching for societally acceptable forms of disablement by prescription drug dependence. This is NOT the only way to address matters of mental health and I promise you from what I have lived and witnessed, that this kind of thing is a large and well-concealed part of America's health care burden. I am self-reliant now, but I had to figure it out on my own. My own doctors wouldn't even support me! I had no helpful information and I knew of no one like Robert Whitaker to assist me at that time. It took a long time and much misery on my part to begin to claw my way out of the mess my life had become. I had to reclaim my health all by myself and it was a terrible experience. 25% of Americans will be diagnosed with a mental health issue in their lifetime. THEY NEED ALL THE INFORMATION AND ALTERNATIVES THEY CAN GET THEIR HANDS ON. I have seen too much in my life to ever be considered an 'optimist', but I, like you, still have the audacity to hope. I am hoping right now and I am putting my hope in YOU. Please, please use your office to help bring freedom of choice to your fellow Americans and help us all have an equal opportunity to enjoy the freedom that was won for us with the blood, sweat and tears of those Americans who came before us. Please contact the SAMSHA and endorse Robert Whitaker for keynote speaker at the annual Alternatives 2010 conference. PLEASE. 25% of the American public will be in danger if they do not have more information and choices. I don't know how many of those will end up needing financial support from the government, but I do know that WE CAN'T AFFORD THIS ANYMORE. Not in dollars and not in the deeply personal cost to individual human beings and their families. Please help us.
