I’m very happy that people with insurance are now going to be able to get more mental health help. But, honestly, if you are well enough to hold down a job and get insurance, you are already head above water.

The real kicker is that they have laws that keep the middle group, you know, the 21-64 group without physical disabilities, from being able to get state health insurance without a diagnosis.

And, your parents have no rights where you are concerned, so they can’t force you to get help unless you are threatening to kill someone or yourself.

So, if you are mentally ill, your parents can’t get you help without your consent, you cannot get medical insurance and your parents cannot get it for you, and if you have a psychotic break you end up in jail or in a place that will give you anti-psychotics for 3 days and then turn you loose on the streets again.

Yay for people who get more mental health care, yeah, that’s great. Now, can we help families with mentally ill adult children? PLEASE??

I have gone through a lot of grief getting care at first (20 years ago) due to many of the factors people cite. I’ve been on the wrong end of the economic scale for a long time. Things like getting psychotherapy but no meds, choosing to pay to see said person vs. meals, having people tell you ADHD doesn’t really exist, etc. (which is something Rush L. loves)

After 20 years of this, it is outright barbaric that mental health services don’t have parity with “regular” health care in facilities and access to care.

We are paying for this disparity. Oh, are we ever! And will we ever!

Some of us already have (Bey, I’m very sorry for your loss.)

A long time ago I read that only $7 per patient was spent on research on mental illness. While the number has increased, I’m still astounded at how far we have to go-and how little is really being done to push it along.

Why is it named after Wellstone and Domenici, those guys are sane?

Domenici’s a total wingnut, but he had a sister with severe depression or something. I’m for whatever works but it sure would be nice if this country could identify problems which members of our ruling class don’t have personal experience with.

By the way, Wile E, you’re a smart, funny guy, but damned if you don’t manage to bring a tinge of sexism to almost everything you write. Saying things like “cunt” less would only make your comments shine that much brighter.

it would be nice if y’all could stop setting up strawmen. the argument was never that health care had to be perfect, just that it was wrong both politically and institutionally to turn the government over to the private sector. if that’s the kind of solution people like so much, we could simply have Halliburton hire every unemployed person in the US and then worry about it later.

pps: as long as i am being argumentative, the supposition that a failure to pass whatever-you-want-to-call-it will be a deciding factor in November is, well, unfounded. who exactly in the general public will remember (who would otherwise vote D), and what are the Rs going to do: run ads saying who failed to pass health care reform?

ppps: as a person who has a family with some mental illnesses in it, i certainly welcome changes in perception that permit this kind of progress. and, knowing how intractable and soul-crushing such illnesses can be for both the affected person and his or her family, i am deeply sorry for your losses and troubles.

Things happen to the best of us, especially as we get older, and while we don’t need lifetime stuff, things can get rocky at times.

I loved life more when I was on my meds. Things got done quickly and were far more organized. I could keep up with my other medications as well. Even my house was cleaner, as I paid more attention to small details.

Then I realized that maybe this bill can help me too. I have ADHD, and my meds were too expensive to keep when I get laid off. Maybe now I can get them more affordably and keep organized and on a steady regimen now?

Still, I’m really, really glad that this makes things better for many people. One step at a time is better than no progress at all.

That’s what I mean when I say I’m sometimes very, very tired.

Now, if I could have sworn I was addicted to downers or painkillers, I could have gotten inpatient treatment that lasted significant amounts of time, and they would have done lots of stuff to help me break my “addiction”. But because I wasn’t on drugs, the insurance companies were free to say “tough shit; your MD can try a few antidepressants to see if they help.”

Thankfully, I learned about ADHD and learned that feeling like one had narcolepsy or sleep apnea could be a stealth-symptom of ADHD. So, I talked to a shrink, who agreed. But I could only see that shrink every two months or so, and my insurance company could have decided not to let me continue at any time. They were a decent insurance company – but they didn’t have to be. So, ugly situation.

Mental health parity changes this.

I am very sympathetic to the plight of the mentally ill. Unfortunately, most of the people who will tap the benefits are not severely ill people who need intensive care; they’re people who are unhappy. Unhappiness is not a condition for which psychotherapy, or antidepressants, have been shown to be very effective. (Severe clinical depression, yes. But contrary to the belief of people who felt awfully down the time their boyfriend left them, these two conditions are not the same thing.) Since the moderately unhappy and dissatisfied are much more prevalent than those with serious disorders, that’s most of what we’ll be paying for: someone to listen to complaints. That’s what Senators are supposed to be for.

You know, if the Atlantic would fire this ignorant cunt I might renew my subscription.

The law is officially known as the Paul Wellstone and Pete Domenici Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act of 2008.

Why is it named after Wellstone and Domenici, those guys are sane? Shouldn’t they have named it after Jim DeMint and Michelle Bachmann?

put me down as also believing that rootless was being sarcastic, riffing on the general’s comment.

also, put me down as being full of sorry about what happened to you. having a kid myself, and a clinical psychologist for a wife (the stories she tells) makes me so glad for anything we can get that puts better mental health coverage in the hands of parents of mentally ill children.

Not having been following politics all that closely when Wellstone died, I have a question for the people who were: would Wellstone be considered closer to Kucinich today?

Kucinich ran for President so he could meet women.