Neglect Based On Religious Belief

I heaved a sigh, realizing I was going to relive a scenario I had lived too many times.  I would take too much time, I would be behind my schedule, but I was going to do this thing.  I was going to figure out why he had gone off his medication.  Frankly, I did not think anyone else could or would take the time, so I would do it.

He was a schizophrenic who had been without medication, maybe a month or so.  He had come in wanting some because his misery was indescribable.  He could barely speak and he had a downcast gaze, fixed at his toes and the floor. He sat stiffly in a chair. I slithered down on the floor, on my back, and tried to insinuate my eyes into his line of gaze.  He screamed.  “You are too strong.  You are going to annihilate me.” I could only answer “sorry” and get back to my seat. He started saying a lot of things about the importance of being Christian and following Christianity.  It did not matter what I knew or thought I knew about Christianity.  It only mattered that I could fit into whatever he thought Christianity was, right or wrong.  I could make little sense of his thoughts.  I have a standard way of dealing with this.

“Look,” I said, “I am not Christian and I am not going to pretend to be Christian.”  I am a Jewish lady psychiatrist, I am fully qualified and licensed in the state of California.  I am also a full blooded descendant of the House of David. If you think that the God you believe in is able to work through me, then I am going to help you the best I can.  If you do not believe that God can work through me, and you want a Christian doctor or some other doctor, we will try to figure out what you need and get you to the right person.”

There were only a few seconds of silence before he said “Yeah, you are Okay.”

From here, the story was familiar.  A Christian preacher of some sort, presumably well-meaning, had told him something about having been created in perfection that meant he did not need medicine for his schizophrenia.  Now the medicines had been working just fine.  He had been living in a board and care for a few years before this “preacher” had found him.  He had been doing some volunteer work, even looking at his first paying job.  He had been asking the questions a lot of chronic mental patients ask.  Questions like “why me?”  He liked the answers he heard from the “preacher.”

I told him that my position was he had not been created to suffer, the way he had suffered during his medication free period.  He had, after all, come back to the clinic to feel better.  I tried, gently, to suggest that maybe the “Preacher” person could be wrong and I could be right. He started to admit he had “wondered” about his preacher person, as the latter indulged in alcohol, marijuana, women, and some other behaviors that sounded questionable at best.

I think I convinced him to restart medication, and the last I have heard, he is doing pretty well.  He was able to get back in the board-and-care, and hopefully will be back doing his volunteer work very soon.

I have nothing against religion in and of itself.  As a matter of fact, I am pretty convinced that mental health is at its best when someone is capable of believing in a benign and friendly universe, and religion is a well-systematised way to do that.  A way that works for a lot of people.

One of the best kept secrets in the world is how easy it is to get power just for the taking.  Lots of people out there not only want to be followers, but want simple solutions. The chronic mentally ill want to be “normal” and sometimes get the feeling that “normal”  means not taking pills. Sometimes I am happy to see the chronic mentally ill involved in a wholesome way with religious institutions.  Sometimes being associated with a church is the best way for them to get an occasional healthy meal.  I actually have taught this reality to the chronically mentally ill in some Midwestern places where I have practiced.

Nevertheless, I do not think that Southern California is the only place in the world where people use what I consider misinterpretations of religious doctrine to control people, usually in a way detrimental to those people’s well being.

I have linked above to someone who has documented this kind of abuse in children. I deal primarily with mentally ill adults.  They are difficult people to teach to be self-reliant.  Family support can go a long way toward being helpful when it is available. The feeling of surrogate family has often caused this population to fall prey to inappropriate religious beliefs.

How to tell the difference between a “real” and “fake” religious doctrine?  Checking whether or not someone is “ordained” is usually not a tremendous amount of help.  Seems like mostly anyone can set up a religion if they feel like it.

So try my “general position” here.  Medicine, science, and even technology are simply not things that can or should be Biblically or Religiously dictated.  The Ten Commandments may be good rules to live by, but they simply do not have anything to say about whether or not to take a particular medicine for a particular reason, or genetic recombination, or a lot of the concepts that are part of American life.  Nor does anything in religion have things to say about what was not known when it was written or developed.  Everything is “interpretation.”

So the only thing to do right away is to work out who can trust in the modern world where you are living. Over time, it is necessary to become stronger and smarter and able to make better decisions. That means learning from everyday lessons. Being a schizophrenic without medicine is too hard a lesson. The “preacher” who recommended it will have to beg his own God for forgiveness.