From: LIB_STANKUS@HLYCROSS.BITNET
Newsgroups: bit.listserv.medlib-l
Subject: Re: Pejorative comments
Date: 29 Dec 92 20:02:12 GMT
Comments: Gated by NETNEWS@AUVM.AMERICAN.EDU
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Re: Ms. Barbara Epstein's Critique of My Terminology Describing Mentally
Ill Persons Who Can be Disruptive in Library Settings

1. I readily confess that I am not myself a DSM-carrying mental health
professional, and therefore do not attempt to make exact diagnoses of
people who may be disruptive in libraries. But I do know that these
incidents occur -----admittedly not with every person who has schizophrenia
or has been in a mental hospital or currently lives in a halfway house.
One has only to walk down the street of my home town of Worcester, to
see large numbers of de-institutionalized mentally ill persons who are
not coping well, many of whom are actively delusional and occasionally
menacing to passersby. This is a sad reality and the "blame" may well
be placed in several corners: diminished government funding, overly
optimisitic clinical assessments, lack of public ascceptance or understanding
of people who are mentally ill. My job as a librarian serving a clientele
that seeks to quietly research and study requires me to maintain an
environment conducive to this and free from disruption. If this
means that I must resort to modest security measures and screening
procedures, then I will do so. I cannot effect a "cure" for these persons,
but it is in my power and my professional duty to serve my clientele.

2. This may seem to be the attitude of a highly insensitive person with
no experience or insight into the problem, but that too is a mistaken
notion. I know one highly delusional paranoid schizophrenic quite well,
for over forty years in fact. She is my mother, Anna Stankus, and many
were the times when I would have to retrieve her from stores, post offices,
bus terminals, etc. when she quite frankly was "acting out". (She is one
of those patients who, for a variety of reasons, was judged by mental health
professionals, as ready for "deinstitutionalization", although one really
wonders just what they were thinking.) My references in my e-mail to poorly
managed schizophrenics comes from experience: too many either cannot afford
to pay for their prescriptions, discontinue them on their own, or
self-medicate with street drugs or alcohol. Many do not continue to check
in with their counselors or socialworkers. Many suffer from poor nutrition,
exposure to the elements, or from lack of hygiene. If all things were optimal
in their lives and in society, or were "well-managed", maybe things were
to be better, and we would have fewer sad situations involving the mentally
ill in libraries. Bu they are not. I developed an early awareness in life
that the average person didn't go out of the way to hate or fear my mother,
they just didn't want to be exposed to dusruptive behavior, and that is not
an unreasonable attitude at all on their part. I saw, early on, that my
haranguing the gathered crowd about tolerance was not helpful, they had
already had had enough of a harangue from my mother.

3. My family remains quite active in helping the mentally ill. My brother
went on to take his PH.D. in Clinical Psychology and practices in Omaha.
My wife and I gather groceries for the parish pantry at St. Paul's
Cathedral in downtown Worcester, and we feed many, many of the "obvious"
mentally ill who cannot cope (I know, I know, how can I diagnose them
without professional training....well, let's just say that they have some
really sad thought processes and beliefs that they are willing to tell
you about without one's asking.) At any rate, I feel that I am doing my
part as a sympathetic human being and as a librarian with certain duties
when I admit (rather than deny) that there are sadly disruptive mentally
ill people out there who are delusional, and my advising of colleagues
of what works for my library practice is NOT anti-mental-patient but
pro-library patron. Let me even venture to say that for those patients
whose schizophrenia is "well-managed", that they too, would welcome
a quiet, non-threatening library situation as much as anyone else.
I discriminate against current bad behaviors, not against anyone with
a prior mental health history!

Tony Stankus
Comments: Gated by NETNEWS@AUVM.AMERICAN.EDU