I Am Not Adam Lanza's Mother

Now that we’ve talked about mental illness, when will it be time to act? 

Photo by Charles Mims, October 2013

Republished from The Blue Review, December 15, 2013 

On the morning of December 14, 2012 I closed the door to my office and started to cry as the news of a tragic school shooting in Connecticut blew up my Facebook and Twitter feed. My then 13-year old son “Michael” had been in Intermountain Hospital for two days, placed there against his will after an inexplicable and violent episode of rage he couldn’t remember. After years of struggles, we still didn’t know what was wrong, or how to help him. I was exhausted, sad and afraid. The isolation of living with a child who had a serious, undiagnosed mental illness made me feel like there was no hope for me or my family. 

That night, I sat down and wrote my truth. I told about the years of missed diagnoses, medications that didn’t work, costly therapies. I wrote about my worst fears for my son’s future. And as a national tragedy beyond comprehension intersected with my personal sorrow, I called for a conversation about mental health. My cry for help, which I published on my formerly anonymous blog, “The Anarchist Soccer Mom,” was picked up by The Blue Review and republished under the title “I Am Adam Lanza’s Mother.” The essay was shared everywhere. Many people wrote me to say, “You told my story! I am Adam Lanza’s mother too!” But a few excoriated me for talking openly about my son’s struggles with mental illness. 

One year after the Newtown tragedy, where has that conversation about mental health led us as a nation? The official report about the school shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School could be summarized in five words: no answers, lots of guns. Lanza’s mental illness was certainly a factor. As the report notes, “the shooter had significant mental health issues that affected his ability to live a normal life and to interact with others, even those to whom he should have been close.” Like his mother. 

As the one year anniversary of the shooting approached, with yet another school shooting in the news, policy makers were paying more attention to mental health. After meeting with the families of the Sandy Hook victims this week, Vice President Joe Biden, whose initial response to the tragedy was to push for tighter gun control, announced a $100 million increase in funding to help people access mental health services. Half of the money will come from the Affordable Care Act; the other half has been pledged for rural mental health care, which should be welcome news in states like Idaho. 

Lots of things have been promised. For example, when the state mental hospitals closed, we were promised community based care. That never happened. The fact is that in December 2013, one year after Newtown, if you or a loved one is in crisis, you still have to call the police. And we continue to use prisons as the new institution to treat our adults and children who have mental illness. 

In the past year, I have slowly found my voice as an advocate for children’s mental health. I haven’t done it alone — my son has joined me in calling for an end to stigma, by bravely speaking out about his condition on Nova and in a StoryCorps interview. We were honored to share an award for family advocacy from the Idaho Federation of Families, which my son placed prominently on our piano. 

Where is my family a year later? I’ve had quite a bit of time to think about what I wrote. And I can’t sugar coat it: the consequences of my decision to put my name on my story were devastating to us personally, as we learned firsthand just how harsh the stigma of mental illness can be. 

Yet there were also rewards. I researched and wrote a book, The Price of Silence. The book will be released by Hudson Street Press in the fall of 2014.which explores stigma and other barriers to mental health care for children and families as they try to navigate the healthcare system, public schools and the criminal justice system. I also had the opportunity to speak at TEDx San Antonio, where I asked the audience why we never see a picture of a child with mental illness in a grocery store checkout line. 

My family has also found some answers. Michael now has a diagnosis — bipolar disorder — and medication that works. I can’t tell you how much this has changed our lives for the better. A year ago, I had almost no hope for my son. Now, we are talking about where he will go to college (he says Harvard or Oxford, but he’s going to have to bring his math grade up just a little bit). 

Above all, I’ve learned this year that I am most emphatically not Adam Lanza’s mother. While I still feel a great deal of empathy for Nancy Lanza, who surely loved her son as I love mine, we are different in two important ways. First, by acknowledging the seriousness of my son’s condition, I am empowered to do everything I can to ensure he gets the treatment he needs. 

Second, I don’t own guns, and I never will. 

Some have speculated that perhaps guns were a way for Nancy Lanza to connect with her son. My son and I share some common interests too: writing, history and Greek mythology. As far as I know, a love of history never killed anyone. 

Still, I believe that in the futile search for answers, too many people continue to blame Adam Lanza’s mother, the first victim of the tragedy in Newtown. Emily Miller of the Washington Times is representative of that view. As she explained in her Op Ed piece that followed the release of the official Sandy Hook report:

"In the end, we can’t blame lax gun-control laws, access to mental health treatment, prescription drugs or video games for Lanza’s terrible killing spree. We can point to a mother who should have been more aware of how sick her son had become and forced treatment.”

If only it were that easy. Instead, numerous barriers still exist for children and families who need access to mental health care. In 1999, NAMI published a report called “Families on the Brink: The Impact of Ignoring Children with Serious Mental Illness.” That report addressed school shootings in the wake of Columbine:

"As we struggle to make the lives of all our children better in the wake of unthinkable school violence, we must not forget our children who have serious mental illnesses and their families who love them.”

On December 14, 2012, more than ten years later, we watched again in horror as we witnessed exactly how devastating that impact of untreated mental illness could be to a community — and very little if anything had changed for children and families who needed help. 

If 2013 was the year to talk about mental illness, let’s hope that 2014 is finally the year to act. 

Watch my interview with Marcia Franklin on Idaho Public Television’s “Dialogue,” December 13, 2013.

Thinking the Unthinkable

Michael holding a butterfly

In the wake of another horrific national tragedy, it’s easy to talk about guns. But it’s time to talk about mental illness.

Three days before 20 year-old Adam Lanza killed his mother, then opened fire on a classroom full of Connecticut kindergartners, my 13-year old son Michael (name changed) missed his bus because he was wearing the wrong color pants.

“I can wear these pants,” he said, his tone increasingly belligerent, the black-hole pupils of his eyes swallowing the blue irises.

“They are navy blue,” I told him. “Your school’s dress code says black or khaki pants only.”

“They told me I could wear these,” he insisted. “You’re a stupid bitch. I can wear whatever pants I want to. This is America. I have rights!”

“You can’t wear whatever pants you want to,” I said, my tone affable, reasonable. “And you definitely cannot call me a stupid bitch. You’re grounded from electronics for the rest of the day. Now get in the car, and I will take you to school.”

I live with a son who is mentally ill. I love my son. But he terrifies me.

A few weeks ago, Michael pulled a knife and threatened to kill me and then himself after I asked him to return his overdue library books. His 7 and 9 year old siblings knew the safety plan—they ran to the car and locked the doors before I even asked them to. I managed to get the knife from Michael, then methodically collected all the sharp objects in the house into a single Tupperware container that now travels with me. Through it all, he continued to scream insults at me and threaten to kill or hurt me.

That conflict ended with three burly police officers and a paramedic wrestling my son onto a gurney for an expensive ambulance ride to the local emergency room. The mental hospital didn’t have any beds that day, and Michael calmed down nicely in the ER, so they sent us home with a prescription for Zyprexa and a follow-up visit with a local pediatric psychiatrist.

We still don’t know what’s wrong with Michael. Autism spectrum, ADHD, Oppositional Defiant or Intermittent Explosive Disorder have all been tossed around at various meetings with probation officers and social workers and counselors and teachers and school administrators. He’s been on a slew of antipsychotic and mood altering pharmaceuticals, a Russian novel of behavioral plans. Nothing seems to work.

At the start of seventh grade, Michael was accepted to an accelerated program for highly gifted math and science students. His IQ is off the charts. When he’s in a good mood, he will gladly bend your ear on subjects ranging from Greek mythology to the differences between Einsteinian and Newtonian physics to Doctor Who. He’s in a good mood most of the time. But when he’s not, watch out. And it’s impossible to predict what will set him off.  

Several weeks into his new junior high school, Michael began exhibiting increasingly odd and threatening behaviors at school. We decided to transfer him to the district’s most restrictive behavioral program, a contained school environment where children who can’t function in normal classrooms can access their right to free public babysitting from 7:30-1:50 Monday through Friday until they turn 18.

The morning of the pants incident, Michael continued to argue with me on the drive. He would occasionally apologize and seem remorseful. Right before we turned into his school parking lot, he said, “Look, Mom, I’m really sorry. Can I have video games back today?”

“No way,” I told him. “You cannot act the way you acted this morning and think you can get your electronic privileges back that quickly.”

His face turned cold, and his eyes were full of calculated rage. “Then I’m going to kill myself,” he said. “I’m going to jump out of this car right now and kill myself.”

That was it. After the knife incident, I told him that if he ever said those words again, I would take him straight to the mental hospital, no ifs, ands, or buts. I did not respond, except to pull the car into the opposite lane, turning left instead of right.

“Where are you taking me?” he said, suddenly worried. “Where are we going?”

“You know where we are going,” I replied.

“No! You can’t do that to me! You’re sending me to hell! You’re sending me straight to hell!”

I pulled up in front of the hospital, frantically waiving for one of the clinicians who happened to be standing outside. “Call the police,” I said. “Hurry.”

Michael was in a full-blown fit by then, screaming and hitting. I hugged him close so he couldn’t escape from the car. He bit me several times and repeatedly jabbed his elbows into my rib cage. I’m still stronger than he is, but I won’t be for much longer.

The police came quickly and carried my son screaming and kicking into the bowels of the hospital. I started to shake, and tears filled my eyes as I filled out the paperwork—“Were there any difficulties with....at what age did your child....were there any problems with...has your child ever experienced...does your child have....”  

At least we have health insurance now. I recently accepted a position with a local college, giving up my freelance career because when you have a kid like this, you need benefits. You’ll do anything for benefits. No individual insurance plan will cover this kind of thing.

For days, my son insisted that I was lying—that I made the whole thing up so that I could get rid of him. The first day, when I called to check up on him, he said, “I hate you. And I’m going to get my revenge as soon as I get out of here.”

By day three, he was my calm, sweet boy again, all apologies and promises to get better. I’ve heard those promises for years. I don’t believe them anymore.

On the intake form, under the question, “What are your expectations for treatment?” I wrote, “I need help.”

And I do. This problem is too big for me to handle on my own. Sometimes there are no good options. So you just pray for grace and trust that in hindsight, it will all make sense.

I am sharing this story because I am Adam Lanza’s mother. I am Dylan Klebold’s and Eric Harris’s mother. I am James Holmes’s mother. I am Jared Loughner’s mother. I am Seung-Hui Cho’s mother. And these boys—and their mothers—need help. In the wake of another horrific national tragedy, it’s easy to talk about guns. But it’s time to talk about mental illness.

According to Mother Jones, since 1982, 61 mass murders involving firearms have occurred throughout the country. (http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2012/07/mass-shootings-map). Of these, 43 of the killers were white males, and only one was a woman. Mother Jones focused on whether the killers obtained their guns legally (most did). But this highly visible sign of mental illness should lead us to consider how many people in the U.S. live in fear, like I do.

When I asked my son’s social worker about my options, he said that the only thing I could do was to get Michael charged with a crime. “If he’s back in the system, they’ll create a paper trail,” he said. “That’s the only way you’re ever going to get anything done. No one will pay attention to you unless you’ve got charges.”

I don’t believe my son belongs in jail. The chaotic environment exacerbates Michael’s sensitivity to sensory stimuli and doesn’t deal with the underlying pathology. But it seems like the United States is using prison as the solution of choice for mentally ill people. According to Human Rights Watch, the number of mentally ill inmates in U.S. prisons quadrupled from 2000 to 2006, and it continues to rise—in fact, the rate of inmate mental illness is five times greater (56 percent) than in the non-incarcerated population. (http://www.hrw.org/news/2006/09/05/us-number-mentally-ill-prisons-quadrupled)

With state-run treatment centers and hospitals shuttered, prison is now the last resort for the mentally ill—Rikers Island, the LA County Jail, and Cook County Jail in Illinois housed the nation’s largest treatment centers in 2011 (http://www.npr.org/2011/09/04/140167676/nations-jails-struggle-with-mentally-ill-prisoners)

 No one wants to send a 13-year old genius who loves Harry Potter and his snuggle animal collection to jail. But our society, with its stigma on mental illness and its broken healthcare system, does not provide us with other options. Then another tortured soul shoots up a fast food restaurant. A mall. A kindergarten classroom. And we wring our hands and say, “Something must be done.”

I agree that something must be done. It’s time for a meaningful, nation-wide conversation about mental health. That’s the only way our nation can ever truly heal.

God help me. God help Michael. God help us all. 

This story was first published online by the Blue Review. Read more on current events at www.thebluereview.org

Everything I Know about Success I Learned from Failure

Five Life Lessons that Were Worth the Bruises

If you fall out of a standing bow pose, get right back in it!
You've got time.

I got rejected by Huffington Post today. It stung a little; I thought my essay was interesting and insightful, but their editors didn’t agree. Still, even as my lips curled into a slight frownie, I realized I was grateful for the pinch, the little reminder that I’m not going to win at everything, and even more importantly, that I don’t have to.

The rejection email served as a reminder of far bigger failures, not stings but major body blows. I’ve weathered some more gracefully than others. But without a doubt, each significant failure in my life led to important self-knowledge that has shaped me into the person I am today. As a quick aside, I’m well aware that every one of these failures could be hashtagged as #firstworldproblems. I’ve been truly blessed in my life with extraordinary opportunities.

Failure: When I was 17, I got a C in high school calculus.

What that meant in the short term: My poor performance in calculus destroyed any hope I had of accomplishing a major (at that point) life goal to graduate among the top ten students in my high school class.

What that meant in the long term: Absolutely nothing. I still got accepted to my first choice college with a full scholarship. And as an added bonus, I aced the AP Calculus test, so I didn’t have to take a single college math class.

Life lesson: When you give 100% and only earn a 78%, you should still be proud of your efforts. But also, you don’t have to be a rocket scientist if that’s not your calling.

Failure: When I was 25, I dropped out of a Ph.D. program in Classics after giving birth to my first son.

What that meant in the short term: I was so disappointed in myself for being unable to accomplish another (at that point) life goal, in part because of my own shortcomings as a scholar: in all honesty, I do not think I could have passed my Ph.D. language exams without significantly more effort than I was willing to expend. Also, I learned pretty quickly that I was not one of those moms who could “do it all,” juggling the demands of a rigorous academic program with the far more baffling demands of a colicky newborn baby and the attendant sleep deprivation.

What that meant in the long term: When I finally decided to return to graduate school at the age of 37, I was ready to study something that really held my interest and fit my skills: Organizational Leadership. My comprehensive exams a few weeks ago were by no means easy—I’m still biting my nails as I wait for the results. But I felt fluent in the language of change management and motivational theory in a way I never was with Latin or Greek. Also, my Classics training was not a waste of time: I learned rhetoric from Aristotle and Plato, and they proved to be pretty good teachers.

Life lesson: Sometimes it’s okay to quit. And you’re never too old to go back to school.

Failure: When I was 35, my 13-year marriage to the man I thought was the love of my life imploded.

What that meant in the short term: To say that I was devastated is an understatement. I’ve always been one of those people who believed that you marry one person, and you make it work. Worse, we had four children, ages 2, 3, 7, and 8. Feeling like I had failed my (then) husband was awful; feeling like I had failed my children was nearly unbearable.

What that meant in the long term: It took me several years of intense personal therapy and hard work to understand that while I certainly played a role in my marriage’s demise, it was not all my fault. I learned to value myself, to communicate more authentically, and ultimately, to love again.

Life lesson: Take a chance on second chances—but take the time to know—and love—yourself first!

Failure: Just a few weeks shy of my 40th birthday, I was fired from my dream job, and I learned I had stage 0 cervical cancer.

What that meant in the short term: On my 40th birthday, I was an unemployed single mother of four children with no health insurance and a cancer diagnosis! This had always been my greatest fear. And to my surprise, it turned out to be one of the greatest gifts I’d ever received from the Universe. I never would have gone to the doctor for a long overdue pap smear if I hadn’t been about to lose my benefits, so in a way, getting fired may have actually saved my life.

What that meant in the long term: For the first time since I became a mother, I had time for me. While the kids were at school, I did 60 days of hot yoga. I started blogging again. I took long walks and thought about gratitude. I had a minor successful surgical procedure. I volunteered in my kids’ classrooms, took my teenagers skiing, and treated the family to lots of home-cooked love. In fact, we still look back on those few months of unemployment with a bit of nostalgia. Now I’m in my dream job again—at a much more ethical organization.

Life lesson(s): Your job, even your dream job, does not define you. Also, if you’re a woman, get regular Pap tests.

Failure: On December 14, 2012, after 8 years of calls to the police, visits with numerous doctors and specialists, jail time, and hospitalizations, my son was in an acute care psychiatric hospital again. I had no idea how to help him.

What it meant in the short term: I was truly and completely helpless. And I did what I have often done, what I am doing now, in fact, when confronted with failure: I wrote it out. I told my truth. No mother wants to admit she can’t help her child. I admitted my helplessness to the world.

What it meant in the long term: We found help and hope. My son was diagnosed with bipolar disorder, and the treatments are working. I also learned that I was far from alone in my perception of myself as a failure, but that in fact, the mental healthcare system was failing me and so many other families. While writing my book, The Price of Silence: A Mom’s Perspective on Mental Illness, I was able to find even more solutions to the heartbreak. I continue to advocate for children like my son and for moms like me.

Life lesson: Never give up on the people you love, even when you’re exhausted. They are worth your best, hardest fight. But it’s okay to admit you are tired and to ask for help when you’ve done everything you can do.

These five are just the big failures. In my life, as in most people’s lives, most blog posts don’t go viral. Most calls for change fall on deaf or ignorant ears. But these five big failures have taught me resilience. I’ve learned to take charge of my own life, to be honest with myself and others, and to ask for help when I need it.

A few hours after the HuffPost rejection, I got a call from a friend. He had just received copies of a new college textbook, The Elements of Argument, which includes essays by Michael Pollan, Hillary Clinton, Henry David Thoreau, and me. Another essay I wrote once upon a time, the one about my failure to help my son, was picked up for my Huffington Post debut under the title “I Am Adam Lanza’s Mother.” Now it will be used to teach Aristotelian argument to students in college courses.

I’ve come full circle.

Write Your Truth

How to make your blog go viral in three easy steps

A few weeks ago, I had an opportunity to do something I had secretly wanted to do for a long time. No, I’m not talking about skinny dipping at a secret Idaho hot spring (though it’s possible I did that too). I was invited to speak to an audience of talented writers at Elaine Ambrose’s annual “Write by the River” retreat in Garden Valley, an event which has previously hosted literary luminaries Alan Heathcock, Tony Doerr, Jennifer Basye Sanders (one of my short stories appears in her Miracle under the Christmas Tree collection), A.K. Turner, Gretchen Anderson, Stacy Dymalski,  Doug Copsey,and of course, the inimitable author of Midlife Cabernet, Ms. Ambrose herself.

I’m sure I’m missing someone here, and please forgive me. Boise has a lot of world-class writers on first-name bases. We’re kind of like Iowa, only our writers’ workshops are supportive and polite in the “constructive feedback” process. Also, we have lots of brew pubs.

The lineup for this season’s blogging-themed retreat was intimidating. Stephanie Worrell, PR maven and founder of Red Sky, kicked off the show with a 42 page comprehensive guide to writing, producing, and starring in Your Blog. Stephanie was followed by writer Ken Rodgers, who independently produced (with his talented wife Betty) a moving documentary about the siege of Khe Sanh called Bravo: Common Men, Uncommon Valor. Then there was The Anarchist Soccer Mom. I described how to get yourself a publicist and hide under a rock when your blog about a controversial topic—your son who has mental illness, for example—goes viral.

I can’t really tell you how to make your blog go viral, by the way. As for handling the media, well, let’s just say that I didn’t even know who Anderson Cooper was until my friends told me. I haven’t had commercially broadcast television since 2002. But I learned this: stick to your message. You don’t have to defend yourself for saying something that needed to be said!

I can tell you this: we live in an age, as former Vice President Al Gore has said, when a single blogger can influence the course of a national conversation.

What does that mean for you? It means that you had better write your truth as well as you can, each and every time you Tweet, post on Facebook, or compose something for your blog. Because you just never know when something you say will change the world.

Blogger Arlee Bird has been exploring the topic of blogs as an essential part of every writer’s platform in a recent series of posts on  Tossing It Out. He had this to say about “making” a blog go viral: “In answer to the question "Did your blog post go viral?", the answer is no.  Nor did I expect my Monday post to go viral.  The content for virality wasn't there [emphasis added].”

I don’t personally think any one of us has the power to “make” a blog go viral. But Arlee has hit on the writer’s main job: provide meaningful content. As I learned with my viral essay about my son with mental illness, which was picked up by The Blue Review and Huffington Post under the title “I Am Adam Lanza’s Mother,” one of the most meaningful consequences of sharing our truths, even when our stories are painful, is that we can actually change the world. I mean, I spoke at a TEDx event in San Antonio last week with some of the coolest people I will ever meet in my life! I never could have imagined that kind of platform for my mental health advocacy. But it happened (and yet just days later, so did another tragic school shooting). 

So with this post, I’m officially adding my name to my blog. Yes, I’m THAT mom, the one who shared a story that made some of you wince and many of you cry. I started blogging in 2008. I’m a lazy blogger, posting whenever I feel like it—no content schedules for me. And I write about whatever I want to, from yoga to kids to grammar lessons to thrift store wedding dresses (Little White Dress, a collection of essays and poems I edited, was conceived from that 2011 blog post). 

Arlee interviewed me recently about my viral blog post and its effect on me as a writer. You can read my answers to Arlee’s interview questions about viral blogs here.  The advice I gave both to Arlee and to the would-be viral bloggers at Elaine’s retreat was simple: “Write your truth. Write it well. And accept the consequences.”

It’s that simple. And it's that hard.

Little Blue Dress

When Cupid strikes a second time, you can wear any color you want

“Know, first, who you are, and then adorn yourself accordingly.”—Epictetus

Author’s note: This week is National Suicide Prevention Week, a time to focus our efforts on preventing the tragic deaths of more than 800,000 people around the world who die each year by suicide. Many of them have mental illness and lack effective treatments. This week, I am in New York City with my second husband (we married in June) to promote my book on children’s mental health, The Price of Silence: A Mom’s Perspective onMental Illness, from Hudson Street Press.

Once upon a time, I wrote a blog about thrift store wedding dresses and second chances. It became a book called Little White Dress: Women Explore the Myth and Meaning ofWedding Dresses. This book earned me, my 25 co-authors, and Mill Park Publishing a 2012 Bronze Ippy Award in Women’s Issues from the Independent Publishers Association of America. This post is a follow-up to that original post. It is also an expression of immense gratitude for the life I have today, and for the man who chose to share it with me and my children.

A few years ago, anticipating what would have been my sixteenth wedding anniversary were it not for my divorce, I wrote a nostalgic post about thrift store wedding dresses and second chances. My essay sparked a steady stream of wedding dress stories—some bitter, some sweet, some funny, some achingly sad, all revealing various aspects of a woman’s life and experiences with love. I was so touched by these stories that I thought, “Wouldn’t it be great if we could collect them in a book?”

So I called Elaine Ambrose, Midlife Cabernet blogger, owner of Mill Park Publishing, and a woman whom I think deserves the title of “Erma Bombeck Part II: The Sassier Sequel.”

“What if we do a book about wedding dresses?” I said.

“Sounds great!” she replied.

“And what if we put the book together in one day?” I was pressing my luck here—I knew it. But I had this vision, born of too many writing workshops where I left feeling unfulfilled and empty-handed, of creating a physical book in one sitting as tangible proof of my friends’ formidable writing talents

Any other publisher would have said, “Hell, no! There’s no way you can put a book together in one day.” 

But not Elaine. She didn’t even blink. “Sure,” she replied. “Let’s do it. I’ll supply the wine.”

And so Little White Dress: Women Explore the Myth and Meaning of Wedding Dresses, was compiled on August 8, 2011, three years after my divorce. It took a few more weeks to edit, lay the book out, and print physical copies. But start to finish, we completed the entire project in just a few weeks. Elaine hosted a swanky country club “book reception,” with proceeds benefiting Dress for Success, and I wore my original white wedding dress, a bit snug after four kids, but I could still zip it up if I only took shallow breaths.

I still remember when Elaine called to tell me the book had won a bronze 2012 Ippy Award in Women’s Issues. I was in the grocery store, looking for ketchup. “Do I still have to bag my own groceries?” I asked, so giddy with excitement that I announced the news to everyone on my aisle. I did still have to bag my own groceries. And I still do. But the medal looks really cool hanging on my office wall.

Now, of course, Elaine has surpassed our project with her own silver medal for Midlife Cabernet (the book version of her delightful blog), and I’m sure a gold is in her future.

And last June, I decided to put on a wedding dress again, this time, a blue one.

In August 2011, this is what I wrote about what that day, if it ever came, would mean to future me:

Will I ever wear another off-white dress on a day of goofy rituals? I can’t say right now that I see the attraction to that particular fairy tale. These days, I prefer the one where Cinderella breaks through the glass ceiling. But if I do decide again to don the costuming of love, I’m pretty certain of two things: first, I will love someone enough to wear a silly dress for him (this is no small amount of love), and second, I will buy the dress at a thrift store. Because every wedding dress deserves a second chance. 

At that time, I had officially resigned from the dating scene. Unpredictable, shallow men felt like a waste of time compared with my kids or my job. And besides, I was spending about half my time at IEP meetings, and the other half at the Ada County Juvenile Detention Facility or Intermountain Hospital, trying desperately to get help for a sweet little boy who sometimes flew unto uncontrollable violent rages.

Little did I know that the whole time I was crying in my cubicle, wondering how I would take care of my son and my other children, I was actually working right next to the person who would be my future partner in crime, Ed Pack, a red-headed Woodpecker who would promise to aid and abet me in a new set of life adventures (yes, that’s a Tom Robbins reference right there, folks).

I guess in hindsight, I should have known I had a thing for Ed when I offered to drive him to his colonoscopy in October 2011. I thought I was just being a nice boss—I was Jack Donaghy picking up Liz Lemon when she had her root canal on Valentine’s Day. The nurse called me “Mrs. Pack” that afternoon, and I didn’t correct her—maybe her comments got us both thinking.

Since we worked together, a romantic relationship wasn’t possible. But we built a solid friendship, sharing hiking stories and swapping books. Several plot twists later, I was working someplace else, and Mr. Pack called me up asked me out for a beer. It was the first of several—okay, four—dates before I couldn’t keep my hands off of him any longer. Yes, he really is that cute! 

And yes, it is no small amount of love that led me to a beach in Surf City, New Jersey, to wear a stunning light blue silk charmeuse hand beaded dress (new with tags) that I bought at, you guessed it, the Idaho Youth Ranch Thrift Store for $15. It’s my second-best thrift store find ever. The first was a 1925 Model M Steinway piano, in case you are wondering.

I wrote a bluegrass song for Ed and played it on the iPad. He wrote a poem for me, describing all the adventures we had shared, from backpacking the Washington Coast (“embrace the mud!”) to turning off our cell phones the night my “I Am Adam Lanza’s Mother” post went viral. My kids fought to read us our vows (we had “officially” tied the knot a few days before at City Hall). We took silly beach selfies and watched my younger two play in the waves. I wasn’t too worried about my dress getting wet, because as I mentioned, it was $15. My new sister-in-law provided an elegant touch with peach-colored rose bouquets for my daughter and me, and boutonniers for the boys.

It cannot have been an easy decision for Ed to give up a comfortable solitary existence for the hustle-bustle of my busy life. Similarly, it was very hard for me to develop enough trust in a man to tie the knot again. We both had to be sure we were in this for the long-haul. Everyone has baggage at our stage in life; you just want to be with someone who carries his or her own.

This week, I’m profoundly grateful for that god of second chances, and for a partner who inspires me, supports me, challenges me, and excites me about the possibilities of life. His overarching credo is a sense of wonder, and we share profound gratitude for “all things bright and beautiful, all creatures great and small.” I’m sure we’ll face challenges—all couples do. But I feel confident in our combined ability to weather storms and marvel at sunrises and sunsets—together.

Thoughts from a 40-Something Mom to All the 30-Something Moms who are Freaking Out about Internet Oversharing

Thou shalt not write about thy children online.
Photo courtesy of iceviking, www.freeimages.com

In 1994, when I was a senior in college, I searched the World Wide Web for the very first time. I still remember that Mosaic query: surfing conditions in Australia, a half a world away from Provo, Utah. The answer? A full report, including weather forecast, tides, and wave conditions. In that moment, I felt like I had won the Golden Ticket to Willy Wonka’s Knowledge Factory. This will change everything, I thought. I never once thought about trolls.

In 1994, you were ten years old. No one was thinking about what the Internet would mean for ten year olds.

In 1996, when I was a graduate student at UCLA, teaching assistants faced a daunting new requirement: virtual office hours.  The concept was so mysterious and misunderstood that some of my fellow students actually organized labor protests. But as a woman expecting her first child, I saw instead the potential to work from anywhere, which at the time seemed like an overwhelming positive. Maybe, with the help of a computer and a dial up modem, a mother could work from home, I thought.

In 1996, you were 12 years old. You were probably one of the 75 percent of public school students who were using the Internet for middle school research projects that year. In 20 years, working from home—or anywhere else, for that matter—would be your normal.

In 2001, I was a young work-at-home mother playing around with coding basic html websites, and a fleeting thought passed my mind: what if I could create a website to share pictures and updates of my two beautiful boys with our family and friends? A book editing project distracted me, though the idea never quite left my mind.

In 2001, you were 18 and headed to a very different college experience than the one I had a decade earlier.  In fact, the American Psychiatric Association reported that in 2001, one in ten college students was addicted to the Internet. A researcher explained the findings as follows:  "The sense of security afforded by the anonymity of the Internet provides some students with less risky opportunities for developing virtual relationships." (Ah, that sense of anonymity!)

In 2007, I joined Facebook so I could play Scrabble online with my siblings. I quickly realized that it was the perfect platform for that shelved idea of sharing pictures and updates of my now four beautiful children. I never once thought about privacy. Why would anyone other than people I knew and trusted want to look at my Facebook page? I also created my blog, The Anarchist Soccer Mom. I loved the idea of an anonymous forum where I could be candid about the challenges (and joys) of parenting—and those challenges were becoming increasingly hard as my second son failed to respond to treatments for his erratic behaviors, which we would learn (much later) were caused by his bipolar disorder. Did I worry that people would know it was me? Of course not. No one—then or now—reads your blog.

In 2007, you were 24, transitioning to an adulthood that was shaped by unlimited access to all kinds of information. Maybe you had just bought your first iPhone, a device that transformed not only the way we access and share information, but refashioned our entire culture. Your adult life was shaped by a knowledge of this “revolutionary and magical” tool—the all-knowing computer in your purse. Before you had children, you had time to experience both the wonder and the terror of this new constant connection to all of humanity’s combined wisdom and ignorance.

40-something moms like me did not have that same luxury. Our children were young—or just being born—when all this wonderful and terrifying new technology was unleashed on us. In the 1980s, parents proudly carried wallet-sized print photos of their children. In the late 2000s, we started posting pictures, by the thousands, of our children online. We sincerely thought that the audience for those Facebook albums was the same as the audience for our parents’ wallet photos.

In 2012, when you had young children of your own, you knew better. You spent your early adult years watching people do stupid things and go viral. You experienced, either personally or vicariously, the extreme public shaming that only the Internet can facilitate. And you didn’t want your children to experience that level of public shame, with good reason. Internet bullying is awful, pervasive, and sometimes even fatal. 

So you created a new word to describe your criticism of the 40-something moms who were constantly posting about their kids: oversharenting. And you created a new commandment of mommy righteousness: “Thou shalt not write about thy children online.”

In 2012, in a gut wrenching intersection of a personal tragedy with a very public one, I shared a painful story about my own family on my anonymous blog. Then, after a lengthy conversation with a close personal friend, I decided to allow him to republish it, with my name attached. My revelation that my son had mental illness and we didn’t know how to help him has become Exhibit A in more than one essay about parental oversharing. For example, in 2013, Phoebe Maltz Bovy described my essay, “I Am Adam Lanza’s Mother,” as “the most outlandish version of a popular genre: parental overshare.”

In the aftermath of my viral blog post, I thought long and hard about my children’s privacy, and I made some pretty significant changes to the way I post things about my children on social media. I don’t ever use their names now. I think carefully about the content of any message concerning them, and I use privacy settings to limit access to people who can see what I post. Although I love Instagram, I try to make sure my kids’ faces are not visible in the pictures I share there.

But I absolutely refuse to stop talking about my family’s struggles with mental illness. In the case of mental illness, or any illness, advocacy trumps privacy.

Every parent writer struggles with how to talk about his or her children. Emily Bazelon presciently took on this topic in 2008. Wondering whether her own revelations about her children’s lives were violating their privacy, she asked, “Should we all close our laptops once our kids learn to talk?”

In response to her question, one honest blogger told her that he “mostly saw my hand-wringing over the ethics of writing about my kids as the result of ‘the same narcissistic impulse that causes us to write about our families in the first place. Because most people don't care what we write.’” 

This is a fact. If you write about your kids, or post their adorable pictures on social media, most people won’t read what you write. And your intended audience—real-life friends and family—are likely to appreciate your posts and feel more connected to you. I don’t see how that’s any more harmful to your children and their privacy than an annual holiday letter, and those have been around for a while.

But I also understand the privacy advocates who worry about what happens if people do in fact read what you write. Quite a few people read what I wrote about my son on December 14, 2012. More than four million, in fact.

My chief complaint with people who use me as an example of oversharing is quite simple: they all contend that what I wrote about my son was damaging to him or his future.

And that’s not even close to true.

I wish that Abby Phillip of the Washington Post had actually reached out to me to discuss the consequences of what she calls “oversharenting” when she quoted my blog. In our case, sharing our story had more positive than negative outcomes. Because I spoke up, my son got effective treatment and is now back in a mainstream school with friends who are totally fine with his bipolar disorder. In fact, they—and I—admire his self-advocacy and think he is brave for speaking out and sharing his story. We were also able to connect to an amazing community of mental health advocates. No one has ever approached us in the grocery store and said, “I know who you are. You’re that mom and kid who talked about mental illness after Newtown. You are horrible people.” It doesn’t work that way.

Google “oversharing child cancer” and see if you can find criticism of mothers who post about their children who have cancer on social media. (I couldn’t). Why was my alleged oversharing potentially damaging to my son’s future? Because we should be ashamed of his illness? Or because the writers who criticize me are ignorant about mental illness?

Would you like to know what is actually damaging to my son and his future?

1. The appalling lack of access to mental health care for children and families.
   
2. Our society’s decision to send children and adults with mental illness to prison.
   
3. The stigma we perpetuate when we respond sympathetically to a mom who writes about her child’s struggle with cancer but cry “oversharing!” when a mom talks about her child’s struggle with bipolar disorder.

These struggles—cancer and mental illness—are only different because the second mom will have tremendous difficulty both in getting people to care and in getting access to care.

Even Hanna Rosin, one of my most vocal critics after my blog post went viral, finally got this last point after she researched and wrote a moving piece on Kelli Stapleton, who will spend ten years in prison after a failed attempt to kill herself and her then 12-year old daughter, who has autism. 

When I suggested on Twitter that Rosin’s thinking had evolved on the subject of parents who advocate for their children with mental illness, she responded, “For sure. I really didn’t get it until I read your book and talked to Kelli.”

Now, in 2015, I share the most important and relevant portions of my family’s story, with my children’s permission, in every place I can.

And this is my heartfelt request to you, 30-something moms: keep sharing, especially if your child has an illness that can benefit from awareness and advocacy. Parents of special needs children actually rely on Facebook for much-needed support. You never know when sharing your experiences might change someone's heart and help to heal a mind.

The Anarchist Soccer Mom Goes to Washington

I hope Congress can give themselves a facelift and pass mental
health reform legislation that will help children and families!

Lessons in Speaking Up—and Listening

I’m a mom. What that means for me, as it means for so many moms, is that I rarely think of myself first. When I have to choose between hearing the President of the United States speak in my hometown or picking up my kids from school, I pick up my kids. When I’m cooking dinner, I fix their favorite canned tuna and white rice instead of the lamb curry vindaloo and brown rice I would prefer to eat. Rather than spending money on spa treatments for me, I buy soccer camps or ice skating lessons for them.

But this week, I did something all for me. I bought a last minute plane ticket from Boise, Idaho to Washington, D.C. and flew into the outer edges of Winter Storm Juno to attend the presentation of the well-deserved Treatment Advocacy Center E.F. Torrey Award to Representative Tim Murphy (R-PA), a man I and many other families of children with mental illness view as a hero.

Two years ago, in a gut-wrenching response to the Newtown tragedy, I told our family’s painful story on my formerly anonymous blog. My essay was picked up by Boise State University’s The Blue Review and retitled as “I Am Adam Lanza’s Mother” (thanks, @paleomedia). Overnight, I became an accidental advocate for mental illness, speaking up for families and children everywhere who could not find anyone to listen to their stories. Then I wrote a book, The Price of Silence, telling some of those families’ stories, describing the numerous barriers to care that we face, and identifying solutions that already exist in some communities.

Now, it seems that lots of people are talking about mental illness, and that’s a good thing. But I wonder if people are listening.

Every day, there’s another tragedy in my Twitter feed: a father (or mother) tosses a child from a bridge, a mother attempts to kill herchildren, an estranged boyfriend kills a woman and her daughter, a police officer shoots a 17-year old girl. Every day, hundreds of thousands of people with mental illness suffer on the streets while millions more languish in prison. Meanwhile, states slash mental health budgets, and families continue to live onthe brink, as they did 15 years ago.

Today in his acceptance speech, I heard Representative Murphy offer, once again, a vision of hope. He talked about the need for better options, from early intervention to peer support to assisted outpatient treatment that can keep people with serious mental illness in the community and out of prison. As National Institute of Mental Health Director Thomas Insel and American Psychiatric Association President Paul Summergrad looked on, Representative Murphy encouraged research into new treatments that can help people with serious mental illness live productive, happy lives. He talked about ending discriminatory regulations that prevent people with mental illness from seeing a physical doctor and a mental health specialist on the same day and about expanded inpatient treatment options (instead of jail) for those who desperately need them.

I have to admit that one thing made me especially glad: in discussing his proposed new legislation, it seems like Representative Murphy is listening. And that’s important. But has one advocate noted, the voices of people who have serious mental illness are important too.

How do we hear the voices that serious mental illness has silenced? How do we ensure that we do not merely “bring back the asylums,” as one recent provocative JAMA article proposed, but that we create comprehensive services for individuals, families, and communities?

The word “advocate” means to speak up for something you believe in. But sometimes, advocacy also means respectfully listening to people who disagree with you. That’s a lesson our current Congress needs to learn. I hope that the Capitol’s denizens can repair their rifts (as the building itself gets a facelift) during this next session. It has become very easy in this world of fast information to tune out voices that disagree. But as a scholar and as an advocate, I prefer to surround myself with the voices of people who think about these complex problems in different ways. I do not feel threatened by other advocates who see these problems—and their solutions—differently than I do.

But one thing I think we all agree on is this: the current mental health care system is broken. We see the proof in our suicide and incarceration rates. Barriers to mental health care—however you define it—are massive and omnipresent. As one of my opposition-minded friends noted, whatever you think of Representative Murphy’s proposed legislation, at least he got us all talking about the problem. No bill, however well-intentioned, is ever perfect. But I applaud Representative Murphy for rising once again to the challenge of bringing our different voices together in a clarion call for change and hope. Let 2015 be the year we can listen to each other—and by listening, learn to help each other and those among us who suffer most.

P.S. Thanks to a supportive and amazing spouse who got the kids to school, fixed their dinner, and supported me in this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. Love you, Babe!

Three Years after Newtown: Hope

Parents for Care dinner in Baltimore, with
the SuperMoms (and Dads) who advocate for their
children who have serious mental illness

Three years ago, when a mother, 20 first graders, 6 educators, and a young man with untreated mental illness died by gun violence in Newtown, Connecticut, I was on the phone with a social worker in Boise, Idaho. He wanted me to press charges for assault against my then 13-year-old son, who had threatened to kill himself a few days earlier. My back and ribs still ached, and my arms were covered with bruises and bite marks sustained when I tried to keep my son from bolting into oncoming traffic.

When I heard about Newtown Friday morning at work, I put my head on my desk and sobbed. My younger two children were still in elementary school, and I couldn’t even imagine how horrible it would be to lose them like that.

Except I could.

With Representative Tim Murphy

My third son was in an acute care psychiatric hospital--again. After years of trying to find help for him, we still didn't have answers.

But I knew two things for certain that morning. First, my son was not a bad kid. He was not a monster, or a psycho. He was a kind, sweet, sensitive boy who suffered immense pain and deserved help.

Second, I was not a bad mother.

That terrible morning in 2012, without knowing any details other than the age of the shooter and the fact that his mother--and 26 innocent people--were dead, I felt like I knew everything.

So I wrote, "I Am Adam Lanza's Mofher." And I thought I was the only mother in the entire world who could sympathize with Nancy Lanza.

It turns out I was far from alone. Mental illness touches us all in some fashion. According to the National Institute of Mental Health, one in five children will suffer a debilitating mental disorder before age 18.  Almost one in five adults will experience mental illness in any given year (excluding substance abuse disorders). l  And serious mental illness—schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, and major depression—affects 10 million adults, or 4% of our population.  These men and women are too often shunted into a nightmarish “revolving door” of prison and homelessness because we do not have the community or medical supports in place to provide them with life-saving treatment. 

A reading from my award-
winning book at StoryFort

Three years after Newtown, I was able to travel around the country and see what's working in mental health--and why we still have so far to go. If you want to learn more about ways you can help children and families like minhe, click on the links below to learn more about these organizations, and think about donating if you are able to do so.

In January, I made my first trip to Washington D.C. as a guest of the Treatment Advocacy Center to celebrate an advocacy award given to Representative Tim Murphy for his tireless efforts to reform the mental healthcare system at the national level. 

In February, I spoke at the Jewish Family and Children’s Services of Arizona annual luncheon in Phoenix, where I was able to learn about crisis wraparound services provided to children and families. 

In March, I won a 2015 “Books for a Better Life” award for “The Price of Silence” and I participated with my son in a StoryFort reading hosted by the Cabin in Boise. 

2015 APA
annual meeting in Toronto.

In April, I spoke at the North Dakota Juvenile Justice conference and also visited with several parents whose children were struggling with mental illness. I also spoke at the Showers of Hope luncheon to support the Lindner Center of Hope in Cincinnati, Ohio. The Lindner family has a legacy of philanthropy in their community; they are now contributing their resources to help fund a truly revolutionary center of excellence for mental healthcare treatment and research. I also was the keynote speaker for the Idaho Children’s Home Society, an organization that provides counseling to low income children and families in our Boise community. 

With Dr. Jeffrey Lieberman, author
of "Shrinks" (must-read!)

May was a busy month. I spoke at the Siouxland Mental Health Center annual conference and learned more about partnerships with mental health courts that reduced recidivism rates for people suffering from mental illness by more than 75%. That’s a huge savings, both in taxpayer dollars and in lives. I also co-presented a workshop at the American Psychiatric Association annual meeting in Toronto. The workshop was the brainchild of Mental Health America’s thoughtful Patrick Hendry. Every advocate should read his paper on meaningful dialogue. Finally, I gave the keynote speech for Thresholds in Chicago, where I was brought to tears by the life-changing work their staff has done as they intervene with at-risk youth and give them a chance at a bright future.

September took me to Miami, Florida, to present at the 8th annual Chair Summit, where I met psychiatric care providers from all over the Americas, including Dr. Jeffrey Lieberman and Dr. Paul Summergrad, and learned about cutting-edge new research and treatments—and enjoyed an authentic Cubano and the best ceviche I’ve ever had. When I returned, I attended my first NAMI-Boise chapter board meeting. The National Alliance on Mental Illness is one of the nation’s most prominent advocacy groups and provides free education classes for the community.

The Oklahoma City Memorial

In October, I spoke at my first non “mental health” conference. Leadership Oklahoma decided to focus their annual meeting on mental illness and its impact on the Oklahoma community. Sadly, less than a week later, a young woman with mental illness crashed into a crowd of people, killing four people. Cathy Costello, whose untreated son stabbed her husband Mark, Oklahoma’s well-respected labor commissioner, was in the audience.   

In November, I was able to meet several of my mom advocate heroes in person at the Johns Hopkins annual Schizophrenia summit. The presenters, top researchers in their field, took time to meet with us as parents and answer our questions at an event organized by the inimitable Laura Pogliano, founder of Parents for Care.  Laura’s son Zac, who suffered with schizophrenia, died tragically at the age of 23 earlier this year. 

And now, on December 14, I’m in San Diego, preparing to attend the International Bipolar Foundation board meeting. Our board members include Randi Silverman, whose poignant film, No Letting Go, tells the hopeful story of a teenager struggling with mental illness and his family, and Kevin Hines, who survived a suicide attempt from the Golden Gate Bridge and is now sharing his powerful story to help others. 

Messages in Dutch Bros coffee lids.

Last year, on the second anniversary of Newtown, I wrote on the Huffington Post that we were “Two Years to Nowhere.”  Today, I have more hope. But real change depends on each of us. As a society, we have an obligation to provide treatment to those who suffer. As individuals, we have an ethical duty to treat one another with respect and compassion.

We still have a long way to go, but it feels like we’re finally moving in the right direction.