Post #26

Chapter 15, was actually full of information on the disorders, but it was hard to pick something specific enough to write about and relate to my own life. 

In the beginning of the chapter, the authors give a brief history on how mental patients once were forced into psych wards and chained down in beds with little social contact. After a long period of time, Dorothea Dix changed the way the United States viewed these patients. She set up an approach called moral treatment, which advocated that mental illness patients be treated with dignity. In 1950 a new drug came about, chloropromazine, that revolutionized mental health. Many patients were sent on remission because it worked so well, providing more reason to shut down mental institutions. With these people back on the street, it was a toss up whether or not they would become integrated into American life, or would fall back off the medication at a loss of follow-up programs. 

Media still portrays these mental institutions as prevalent. In the television show Revenge, the main actress' mother is seen in flashbacks as being strapped to a hospital bed and in some cases wearing a straight jacket. This is a poor display of reality because these methods are an exaggeration and would only be used in serious cases. 

Also, I was recently going through my family's genealogy and found a birth certificate I never knew of. It was for a great uncle who showed to be the youngest in the family of my grandmother's family. When I asked my dad about him, he told me that when he was born he had certain mental disabilities and grandma never knew him. It is an unspoken secret on that side of the family. But he was sent to a hospital, and my father does not know whether he is still around or not. He may have been one of those people locked up in a room in a straight jacket, or he could have been saved by the miracle drug.