The Forced Psychosis of Being Homeless
I enjoy being around positive and community-minded people.
I spent this morning and the better part of the afternoon
with many of them in a helpful seminar listening to Mr. Donald Dahlheimer from
Elmhurst, a licensed specialist in the identification and treatment of mental
health issues. We were all there because
we are volunteers and site mangers for the homeless in the northern tier of
South Suburban PADS – an organization devoted to helping those in need of emergency
shelter during the colder months.
As you might have experienced, the colder months have broken
down the front door quickly. And we’re busy.
Our shelter reached well over its occupancy in the first two hours of
opening this last Thursday. It’s a blessing
that we have another “sister” church to send our guests to after dinner.
In our current state budget morass, the homeless are just
one group of the many marginalized and impoverished who stand as serviceable
pawns for the drawn-out battle between an intractable Governor Rauner and his
nemesis Michael Madigan. When will their
suffering call forth enough pressure by the comfortable in our state to make
one of the two uncomfortable enough to budge?
No one has blinked yet.
And, if Thursday night’s numbers are indicative of what’s
about to come, this winter will be harsh indeed.
The Illinois Department of Family Services estimates that
about 48,000 people are served by state funded shelters each year.
Public schools in Illinois saw a 7.7% increase in the number
of homeless students in the last measurement – the 2013-14 school year. That number was over 59,000 students in our
state who were homeless. 20,000 of these
students are in Chicago.
While we shoot, let's put the poor in-between. |
Mr. Dahlheimer (sorry about the digression) was there to
help us work with the many of our guests who arrive in a mentally agitated
state or with severe mental health issues.
How do you interact to provide safety for someone who is in a heated
conversation with a non-entity?
The presentation was clinically informative, but wasn’t nor
would any program ever be able to provide the outline of reacting to a specific
situation. On the other hand, I found
his PowerPoint’s description on “Common Symptoms When Psychosis Is Developing”
disquieting.
Mr. Dalheimer’s list of “Changes in thinking and
perceptions” for those entering a psychotic period was exactly what we should
expect from any person becoming or enduring homelessness.
·
Sense of alteration of self, others, or the
outside world (e.g., feeling that the self or others have changed or are acting
different in some way)
·
Social isolation or withdrawal
·
Sleep disturbances
·
Reduced ability to carry out work or social
roles
·
Odd ideas
·
Difficulties with concentration or attention
·
Unusual perceptual experiences (e.g., reductions
in or greater intensity of smell, sound, or color)
I watch the homeless walk among us during the day, and I
witness the looks and comments they receive.
This is not a sense of alteration; it is an accurate comprehension of
alienation.
I see the results of a month or more on the street – the
need to become loud, to drop social convention for protection, the acquisition
of distrust, the necessary loss of personal interactions.
I perceive the wariness of loss of possessions or meds, the
indignity of sleeping next to an unknown stranger only a foot away, the unnerving
soft padding of people moving about all night for a variety of reasons.
I observe the difficulty of a battered parent with five
children trying to organize their studies and ready them for bed in a strange
and unusual environment filled with strangers.
I fathom their schemes for quick and sudden relief from the
present, sometimes fantasy or, worse, sometimes the lotto – or maybe substance
misuse.
I often excuse their failure to comprehend the byzantine
procedures of the system that has granted them kindness momentarily but demands
reintegration as well as paperwork in return.
In my experience, being homeless in Illinois is not
dissimilar from experiencing a “Developing Psychosis.”
Give me what I want or they get it. |
According to Social Justice News Chicago, many programs to
assist the homeless, especially the children, will start shutting down if the
budget impasse continues. Worse, “Once
the shut down, even if funding is restored some of them might not be able to
just reopen, which means that the infrastructure for hoping the homeless will
be lost,” according to Julie Dworkin, the policy director at the Chicago
Coalition for the Homeless.
Tell him to present a
budget. Call the Governor’s Office
please: 217-782-0244
The power game being played out between Rauner (R) and Madigan (D) with human suffering listed as mere collateral damage is savagery. The averted eyes indifference on the part of the majority of people in Illinois is the reaction of wage slaves and some mere cowards. The feudal lords and clerical aristocrats of the Dark Ages would be astonished at the sheer numbers involved. The Dark Ages of yore and the Dark Age we live in today are ages of savagery.
ReplyDeleteWhen a few people finally snap at the savage treatment of their children and other loved ones, the targets will no longer be strangers in a shopping mall or students on a campus. The handwriting is on the wall, but Rauner, Madigan and their ilk feel that the wealth walls surrounding them will keep them safe. That, of course, has never been true, but Rauner, etc. choose to believe so.
Yes, all of this could be averted, but the servants and suck-ups of wealth will not tell these plutocrats the truth.
Perhaps our car bumper ribbons should be labeled "God Help America."
By the way, here in Florida the latest government approved list of homeless school children is 685,000. Each has a name, face and life, but Florida billionaire sociopath Gov. Rick Scott (R) is yet another savage Rauner clone.