Animal House

Almost everyone knows of the movie Animal House. A group of madcap boys trying to be worthy of "THE" fraternity, wreak havoc trying to fit in. Short of burning the house down (although if memory serves me correctly, they almost did) they did just about everything, to prove they were worthy of being part of this elite club.

Here in Eugene, the 'Animal House' house, went on to become the first home for the clients of ShelterCare, the biggest difference being, the men and women who choose to be part of this program will discover they don't have to do anything to prove themselves worthy. They are accepted just the way they are. There is no judgment, no criticism, just shelter, care and hope for those who suffer from mental illness and for families in crisis.

Many of the ShelterCare clients have known a life of rejection. With the Carter Administration's Mental Health Systems Act of 1980, the shift from inpatient services to outpatient was meant to help coordinate many services provided by community mental health systems such as halfway houses, and family and group homes. For a while it did. This act allowed those with mental illnesses to remain in their home communities with minimal hospitalization.

The system failed with the lack of support from the Regan Administration which left the funding in the hands of the individual states, and for decades caused concern with good reason. The hospitals of yesterday have become today's shelters, train stations, rest stops and more. What Regan neglected to take realistically into consideration was where would the funding come from? Not the financially struggling states. Where would they go once released back into society?

More than 300,000 mentally ill are being housed and treated in jail instead of hospitals. I find that ironic since back in 1842, Dorothea Dix founded the first mental health institution because she was sickened by the dehumanizing treatment of the mentally ill in prisons. So we have come full circle and are right back to the beginning. Many of the mentally ill are either homeless (the third largest cause of homelessness is mental illness) or in jail.

As I pass through Washington and Oregon and am about to enter California, one of the things I hear the most when I ask a shelter or service provider such as ShelterCare, "What can I do for you? What message would you like me to get out there?" I hear the same answer time after time.

"Look at them. Smile at them. Listen to them. They want to know that they are not worthless. They want to know that they have value because in their minds they have none."

ShelterCare may not be the end to homelessness for the mentally ill in Eugene, but they certainly are a huge part of the solution.

www.change-for-life.org

Humpty Dumpty

My name is Charles Alexander Wentworth.* That's a lot of name for a piece of shit like me. I am 72 years old and been living out here for close to 20 years now. I used to be a doctor if you can believe that. A damned good one at that. At first, being a doctor was kind of glamorous.

I fixed the broken arms of future Joe DiMaggio's. I kissed little girl's scraped knees and made them feel better. I was well respected in the community and had the admiration of just about anyone I met as long as I wore a white coat and stethoscope. Then I went to Nam.

I had seen death before. You can't be a doctor and not see death, but I had never seen death to this magnitude. I had never willingly killed anyone before either. In the role of medic, I unwillingly became God. Making decisions in the blink of an eye that cut me to the quick. The hurt my very being. In battlefield situations, sometimes the wounds are so grave, that to attempt treatment is to deny care to those who might yet live. The man is lost - a casualty before he even stops breathing. Then it becomes an act of mercy.

I knew what everyone was thinking. I was a sonfoabitch. If I masked misery as mercy and ended a life, I was being cruel. If I let them endure pain and terror of seeing their entrails lying on the ground beside them, wasn't I being even more cruel? I couldn't live with the decisions because no matter what I did, I was wrong. No matter what I did, I was being cruel.

I tried being a doctor in the real world again. The world without human carnage, Napalm, and the stench of burning flesh. But I couldn't do it. Each time an ambulance came through those doors, all I saw was the pieces of the men I couldn't put back together again. Physician heal thyself was not a concept I could wrap my head around. How could I kiss anybody else owie and make them better again if I couldn't do it for myself?

So I took the chicken shit way out. At least that's the way my family saw it. I didn't want my wife to have to put up with night terrors for the rest of her life. I didn't want my children to see their father fall apart right before their eyes. I walked away from it all. I walked away from my practice, my friends, my family. I even walked away from God. Oh I still believe he's there. I just think now he's the sonofabitch.

They label it PTSD. Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. I think it should stand for 'Put This Sonofabitch Down'. You see I'm dying. I began dying on that field in Nam and He cannot be merciful enough to end my life. I don't have the guts to put a gun to my head and pull the trigger, so I am killing myself slowly but surely with booze, drugs, cigarettes. One of them has got to do the trick sooner or later.

"It is now the moment to recall what our country has done for each of us, and to ask ourselves what we can do for our counry in return." ~ Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

*Out of respect to Mr. Wentowrth we have changed his name for the purpose of this story.