‘Deaths of despair’ grew slowly in Arizona, but still higher than U.S.
September 18, 2019Aug 27, 2019 By Miranda Faulkner, Cronkite News White Mountain Independent https://www.wmicentral.com/news/apache_county/deaths-of-despair-grew-slowly-in-arizona-but-still-higher/article_97bd685a-361f-586a-9fa4-9b9709c02e70.html
WASHINGTON – “Deaths of despair” have grown more slowly in Arizona than in the nation as a whole since 2005, but death rates in the state still exceed the nation in every category, according to a recent national survey.
Deaths of despair – the catchall name for deaths from drug overdoses, alcohol and suicide – have seen “alarming” increases across the country since 2005, said the Commonwealth Fund’s Scorecard Read More
‘I’m Gonna Die in Here’: 19-Year-Old Mentally Ill Woman Remains in Jail for Spitting
August 22, 2019 7:00AM By Hannah Critchfield Phoenix New Times https://www.phoenixnewtimes.com/news/mentally-ill-arizona-woman-remains-in-jail-for-spitting-11346829
When Vangelina Gloria received a call that her daughter had been arrested in February 2019, she was not surprised. At age 19, her daughter Valentina Gloria was no stranger to the courts — she’d been diagnosed with autism and serious mental illness while she was still a minor, and her past arrests had all stemmed from someone calling the police during previous mental health crises.
Read MoreNAMI Statement On Release Of U.S. Presidential Candidate Positions On Mental Health And Addiction
Arlington, VA— The National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) is a proud member of Mental Health For US, a nonpartisan, educational coalition elevating mental health and addiction in policy conversations around the country. Today, the coalition released candidate responses to their survey which asked 11 questions addressing mental health, drug overdose, criminal justice reform, equal access to care and more.
Read MoreWhat It Feels Like To Be In Psychosis
By Andrea Paquette | Aug. 14, 2019 NAMI https://www.nami.org/Blogs/NAMI-Blog/August-2019/What-it-Feels-Like-to-be-in-Psychosis
I was diagnosed with bipolar I disorder with psychotic features when I was 25 years old. My mental health journey unraveled my life to the point where I nearly died. An entire year, spanning most of 2005, drove me entirely out of reality. It remains extremely difficult to explain how something called “psychosis” has affected my brain.
Most people understand psychosis to be seeing, hearing and believing things that are not real. Simple. However, it is not easy Read More
Surviving Suicide: woman shares story of struggling with mental illness to empower students
TUCSON, Ariz. — With pills in one hand and a bottle of rubbing alcohol in the other, Ernestina Limon attempted suicide for the first time. She was ten years old.
“I got so sick,” Limon said. “We were at church. It was Palm Sunday, and I was lying on the pews, and I got a fever. My parents didn’t know Read More
Mental illness not a factor in mass violence, group says
August 8, 2019 / Modified Aug 8, 2019 12:11 P.M. By Duncan Moon Arizona Public Media https://news.azpm.org/p/news-articles/2019/8/8/156252-mental-illness-not-a-factor-in-mass-violence-group-says/
Following the shootings in Dayton and El Paso, President Trump has made several public statements linking mental illness to gun violence. Mental health advocates have been quick to respond with data that show those struggling with mental illness are no more likely to perpetrate mass violence than those who are not.
Christine Wells, with the Arizona chapter of the National Alliance on Mental Illness Read More