Thursday, July 9, 2009

Slight tangent

So, a good friend of mine, who I met back in college was reading this blog and she thought I should share with everyone where the title came from. It happens that this friend also has some experience with the mental health care system. We've even had a few misadventures in therapy together (see the upcoming post: Give me Liberty and give me death). Anyway, to the poorly concealed astonishment of her therapists, she makes a decent living as a playwright and after a particularly rough patch in her life, she turned to a therapist called Mary Spilde (spelling?) in Binghamton, NY. Her experience with this person led her to write what I consider to be her best work on a bus between Binghamton and Newburgh. It was a ten minute play that demonstrated exactly how absurd and frustrating therapy can be and it ends with the therapist screaming at and physically shaking the patient followed by an abrupt request for money. She didn't know what to call it, and I suggested "Your Moneys Worth". When I started this blog, my intent was sort of to pick up where the play left off, albeit in a much less inventive way, showing people what really happens to many of us who put ourselves into the system and giving those who share my frustration the message that they are not alone. So I took the title of the play and made the title of my blog. If you'd like to read this piece, it's available at www.notmyshoes.net, as are some other really good plays including Like Dreaming Backwards which deals with the tragedy of suicide. A real beach read. Anyway, enjoy, and if you want, let me know what you think.

3 comments:

  1. Thanks for the plug, my dear, but I was hoping that you would talk a bit about *why* you thought "Your Money's Worth" was a good title for the play (and subsequently the blog).

    ReplyDelete
  2. I feel that that's kind of obvious. People are PAYING for this kind of treatment. Not everyone has been as blessed by the medicaid gods as I. There are people paying 325 dollars a month (almost as much as my rent used to be)or more to be patronized, insulted, drugged, and frequently incarcerated. And those people often don't have the voice to talk about it. Sometimes because they lack support and sometimes because they simply can't get taken seriously. Every negative sentiment (including or perhaps especially disappointment and anger with the system itself) is treated as a symptom, an indication for more aggressive treatment. Well, I still like to think I have some street credit partially because of my stint working for the system and partially because I've never really fully acted on my feelings, so maybe, just maybe I'm not "crazy" enough to be ignored. Maybe someone not "crazy" at all will read this, realize what's happening, and do something. Then maybe we will get our moneys worth. Is that more helpful?

    ReplyDelete
  3. Thank you, yes, that's exactly what I was looking for. Because I think what's interesting is the difference in care, and in choices, the haves face versus the have-nots.

    The people who are paying 325 dollars a month can take their 325 a month to a different clinic if they hate their therapist. They might never find a better one, but they can take their money and keep looking. Medicaid recipients have fewer options - we get stuck at whatever clinic will accept our benefits.

    If I had had money to spend on my mental health when I lived in Liberty, I might have been able to see a private practitioner, but instead I was stuck going to the Sullivan County clinic, a place that actually did more harm than good.

    I think that how much you can afford to spend on your mental health, and where you live and how far you can afford to travel are important factors in the care you receive. But maybe I'm wrong. Maybe the people who pay their private shrinks out of pocket are just as dissatisfied and miserable.

    ReplyDelete