'A female with a record like this ...represents all that is rotten in society nowadays'

Insanity has been recognized all the way back to Jesus casting out demons, so it's hard to blame it on "modern life".

But speaking of creative people who were insane, how about that brilliant musician, Nero? Just couldn't cope with the pace of life, could he.

But she might have sliced her arms to ribbons because she was a raging alcoholic who found herself unable to stop even though she could see how damaging it was, that she was getting in fights, losing friends, losing boyfriends, getting arrested and losing all self respect. She might have sliced her arms when she was in the depths of inebriated self-pity.

We don't know, do we.

I think sakura has a generally good point re modern life is rubbish.

And I think butterpiefy (TBE?) has a great point that it is not right to assume that people behaving in ways which are outside the norm must mean there is something dark that is happening/has happened to set it all off.

Bottom line is I don't think that just because this woman behaved like this it must follow that she has been damaged in some way (or more than anyone else in our society - as Sakura points out).

Of course loads of people have had terrible things happen and it comes out in all sorts of ways. But sometimes, people are just built a certain way.

The great thing is that she has stopped drinking.

I agree with you that drugs help! yes, the symptoms have to be addressed, absolutely. As long as we are living in the world we are, the only way out for some is through medication.

modern life is one cause, in the past there were many other causes. TBH, every single brilliant artist and author bar non were classed as absolutely insane. IN fact, they were the sanest people around in their time, it was the world around them that was mad.
Most of these problems can easily be traced to their environment: off the top of my head: virginia woolf, sylvia plath, van gogh

You don't slice your arms to ribbons because you are having a bad day.

But people had mental illness before modern life. William Blake had "visions"- ie psychosis.

I understand what you are saying re PND etc, but I think there is far too much emphasis on looking for a reason for mental illness.

In fact, I personally think it harms people who suffer from serious mental health issues to have that approach. It creates a stigma for the entire family to bear.

Plus, if someone has no legs, it doesn't matter whether they were born without them or had them chopped off, they still will struggle to walk. Even if a person is drinking because they were abused, the priority is to get them help for the drinking (as part of which they might get help dealing with the abuse) as, even though we would love to, we can't change the fact that they have been abused.

It is the difference between being depressed and having depression - if you are having a bad day, you might get depressed, it doesn't mean you have depression.

sorry, that "I believe you" sounded incredibly patronising, reading it back
I meant that, I do know that some people just "go mad" , as you put it, without any obvious reason, but society is never called into question.
I read a book called "INjustice" and in it the author talks about how widespread medication such as prosac is becoming. There is a trend showing that in the near future populations will be mass medicated !! This means that life is so stressful, because society has been structured in such a faulty way, that your average person is having trouble coping with the demands put upon them

I believe you when you say you can't place your finger on why you're suffering from mental health issues. It doesn't necessarily have to be abuse, or a deep-seated resentment of something.

Living as a woman in a patriarchal society, where women are disenfranchised in all areas of life (political, social, economic- women are poor) and where men make powerful decisions that affect womens' lives is incredibly stressful for women; and this is not addressed properly.

FOr example in the case of PND, it's passed of as being hormonal, or something that naturally happens to women. Nobody questions whether or not the woman suffered birth trauma in hospital, whether she got the support she needed post-partum, whether she has enough help around the house, enough money, a respite etc etc. She's just pumped with drugs. And even if somebody did bother to find out if there was an environmental reason, there aren't the resources to help her in the first place, so again, she'll be offered drugs.

Modern living, in itself, is incredibly stressful. SOme cope, some don't, but I don't think the default line of thinking should be that the person is inherently wired wrong IYSWIM

I have suffered from mental health problems, and it became rather frustrating to be constantly asked if I was sure I had never been abused, was I sure I had never taken drugs, but surely I must have a deep seated resntment of something, I couldn't have just started hearing voices for NO reason!

Sometimes people do just, for want of a better expression, go mad.

I resent being told that everything in my life must boil down to either my hormones or a self esteem issue, probably linked to abuse. I know that's not what you are saying, but it is what I hear a lot of the time.

environmental factors in contributing to mental illness

it's not that ButterPieify, it's that mental health problems in women are often passed off by the system as being something to do with women being inherently faulty as people. The Victorians were ace at this.
So ignoring a person's environment, particularly a woman's (in the case of PND, for example) is a particularly patriarchal way to regard mental health problems

There is an appalling lack of research into the environmental factors of most mental illnesses. The pharmaceutical industries make a mint out of saying that people have just got faulty brains and that's the end of that

I thought it was just a very sad, and intrusive (although not sure if maybe the fact that she is in the other papers, so at least she is getting to put her side out there is an excuse) account of someone with clear mental health issues.

at the idea that she must have suffered sexual abuse. That is part of the stigma of mental health issues- people saying you MUST have been abused to get that illness.

It's akin to seeing someone with lung cancer and saying they MUST be a smoker - logically wrong.

sorry for consecutive posting

LOL at this ISNT "You can spot them by the look in their eye when alcohol is mentioned - they look excited."

That's me! I'm practically teetotal and have been since I had the kids because I am a menace when I'm drunk

I agree with dittany about aborigine's. Asians (DH included) are missing an enzyme that helps process alcohol, so they get drunk very easily (I'm talking a grown man getting pissed on half a shandy)

BUt because the Japanese have never suffered any of the cultural obliteration, deaths, forced sterilization and wrenching babies and children away from their mothers for forced adoption by whites like the aborigines have, there is no epidemic of alcoholism here. None at all.

thumbwitch, I watched an interview with Marion Keyes. she came from a dysfunctional family, there's no doubt about that. She said her mother expects her and her siblings to come to dinner on the same night every week and refuses to accept their adult status.
It sounded incredibly stifling. That would send anyone to drink, let alone someone with a creative streak (or do creative streaks come from pain?- the chicken and the egg)

at the extreme end of this spectrum, in Iran women have virtually no rights and yet are criminally responsible at the age of nine (for boys it's fifteen)

A nine year old girl can hit someone, for example, and being held to the same standards as a fully grown man...and yet boy isn't

Fucking hell

as luck would have it I googled BBC alcohol monkeys and up it came!

My figures were way off - with the monkeys 25% didn't like it, 50% could take it or leave it and 25% couldn't get enough.

Sorry for hijack everyone.

My twopenneth (sorry this might be a bit rambly).

There was a program about alcohol recently that was very interesting. In one part of it they had given monkeys free access to alcohol or water. Can't remember the exact figures but it was something like 10% tried it once and never again, 80% went and had some occasionally, and the remaining 10% kept going back and back and back and wouldn't stop until something external stopped them (the alcohol was removed, they were too pissed to get any more).

I don't think it's a stretch to say that could be pretty similar to humans - when I look at people I know some dont' drink at all, or if they "have to" eg a wedding toast they obviously don't really want to, most people like a drink but don't tend to go overboard. Then you have the people who will just drink and drink and drink until they fall down/the pub shuts/they get arrested/whatever. You can spot them by the look in their eye when alcohol is mentioned - they look excited. Many of these people regain some self control but it's a fine line - if anyone is going to get pissed and end up in a right state it's them.

I really do believe that some people just respond to chemical stimulants in a massive way, that their pleasure centres light up like a christmas tree and they've got no "off switch".

So that's one thing.

The other thing is that drinking excessively and constantly making a complete twat of yourself can lead to feelings of self-loathing - the whole thing can become a vicious circle. Most people don't like themselves very much when they wake up with a steaming hangover and remember all sorts of godawful things they did the night before.

Of course they may be something in the background. But I think it is a mistake to assume that there must be.

So really I agree with LRD that saying that she must have been abused to behave like this may well be a sexist approach in itself. Because nice girls don't do this - she is a nice girl - so there must be something wrong.

I think it may be to do with her personality. I think this is significant

"Hall admits she is difficult to get to know. If even she doesn't understand herself, how can others? Both Davis and Hall's friend Sarah Hales describe her as "closed"."

"She looks anything but mad sat in front of me dressed in a black top with smart brown hair swept to the side, polite, seemingly shy and a little nervy. Occasionally, she shakes and twitches as she talks."

I think the drink is a release for her. Her personality changes and she becomes more open. I think she will grow out of it, as she devlops more confidence with age.

lrd - if she were just being a violent, horrendous drunk, then i think yes, suggesting that there must be some sort of abuse history to provoke such behaviour would just be the soft version of the judge's sexism - but self-harm and suicide attempts do suggest some sort of past trauma, surely?
i know that alcohol is a depressant and that there's a possibility it caused her mental health issues on its own, but surely there's at least an equal likelihood that it's not her physiological reaction to alcohol but psychologically damaging life experiences which caused her behaviour?

judge a dinosaur, though, clearly.

Ah, I see...sorry. Thought we were still on 'being angry with the judge'!