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May 25, 2022·edited May 25, 2022Liked by Guttermouth

I was a police officer for a handful of years in Texas, in a suburb of a major metro area. In that time, I quickly learned that an extremely high percentage of the individuals I dealt with on a nightly basis were in some form of mental health distress. By this, I don't mean that everyone was mentally ill (although a very high percentage of these people had some form of mental illness or another), just that they were in some form of mental distress. When many of these people are placed under this stress, they would often times act out in totally irrational ways. Sometimes, this would take the form of substance abuse, sometimes in violence (very often times both).

In this regard, coping skills definitely don't seem to be the forte of a large number of people, which lends itself to a lack of impulse control (hence the binging on behavior-altering substances and then violence). Sometimes, this would bring certain people to the edge of a precipice toward suicidal ideations. With these individuals, and for all the rest who were experiencing full-blown psychotic episodes (almost every homeless person in my jurisdiction fell in this category), we had the option to place them in a psychiatric facility to hold them for 72 hours. During that time, they would receive care, treatment, and meds, then booted out the door promptly after 72 hours, to start the process all over again. There would be no follow-up care, and quite often, there would be no beds available in the limited number of facilities we could transport them to.

All of this is to say that our mental health care infrastructure is woefully inadequate to deal with the massive amount of mental health care needs in our country. Based on my own personal experience, if we could tackle even a chunk of this problem, I am convinced that not only would gun violence decline, but crime overall (especially violent crime) would decline. Case in point - my department implemented one person to serve as a "Mental Health Liaison". This person was a fully licensed and certified psychologist, who would follow up on any case we informed her about. As she became familiar with these cases, she would essentially be their follow-up care; linking them and their families to resources they may not have been aware of, and ensuring that they had some sort of plan for further care. We began to see a decline in the number of calls for service for the truly mentally ill individuals with whom we would come into contact with regularly. Since then, the department expanded this area, and they have been reaping the rewards. If coupled with an expanded number of available in-patient facilities, I think it would work wonders.

However, attacking the root cause of all of this mental illness in the first place would be the best strategy, but I truly don't have an answer for that.

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founding
May 25, 2022Liked by Guttermouth

At the risk of being derided, I am going to put in a good word for the medical community. In 1900 when medical care was all nostrums and vitamins and whatever, the lifespan in the US was 35. Much of that was child death, and much was infectious disease, but that is how it was.

The body is a complex instrument, and every patient is their own science experiment (a speech I have made thousands of times over the years). Things work for one patient, but not for another. It is a journey doctor and patient take together to reach the best possible solution.

As with any other profession/trade/calling there are better and less-good practitioners. I have separately written about the deprecation of US medical training by steering admissions toward demographics and social justice warrior scores instead of intelligence, passion, willingness to work, and concern for making patients better, so I will not repeat that here. There are still good practitioners, but now it is harder to identify them. (Yes, all medical schools and boards are now pass/fail because the entry requirements have been so watered down that if you posted scores you would realize how awful many of those passing are.)

But many doctors (and most over 40) are still generally wedded to doing the right thing for their patients to the best of their ability. In many ways sadly, as Prasad has pointed out, most doctors, especially today, have a primary qualification of "obedience" as one of their admission requirements. Part of this is necessary to survive the rigors of absorbing as much as one must, but there is little/no time spent in getting the bulk of the students to be inquisitive, statistics-savvy, etc. Doctors are taught that anecdotes have little value (correct, except vis-à-vis an individual patient) and that RCTs are the best way to divine truth. This has long been mostly true until they started lying in the RCTs (much evidence of this with COVID -- really makes some of us sad). So now it is very difficult to discern what is actually true while keeping up with all of the actual advances across a specialty that may impact the care of the next patient.

My greatest sadness about the whole COVID thing is not particularly that public health has taken a black eye from which it will not recover in my lifetime, it deserves it in spades. My real sadness is that good people like GM are now afraid of doctors.

Many/most of us are not out there to make your life worse; we have generally spent our lives (and endless 100 hour weeks) trying to do the best we can for you because your success is our success. You need to recognize the true villain here: the COVID stuff was so contaminated by the GOVERNMENT skewing reimbursement (if the government had not started paying hospitals so much to treat a certain way and to diagnose a certain way, almost nothing that you see would have ever happened) that it has dragged the entire health care system, including many of those of us that actually care, down with it. This is something that causes me great sadness every day. And it was so unnecessary. It is what you get when you let the government/corporations get between doctors and their patients. If we learn nothing else, we should start there.

Sadly, organized medicine was also captured by this, especially the AAP which should have a Nuremburg trial of its own, but all of those organizations now seem to be run by a handful of covidiot wokesters. That will not persist because most of us disagree, but it is an issue now and just making things worse.

Back to the point: There are a large number of areas where a trusted physician who cares about you and understands from where you are coming can do things you can never do poking around on the Internet. Plenty of smart people can learn lots by studying/reading -- I do not dismiss anyone because they are not credentialed. But there is a lot that comes from four years of science undergrad, four years of medical school, four years of residency and a couple years of fellowship, and then 25 years of practice, that you just cannot get from any number of (slanted) Google searches no matter how smart you are. Human intelligence is best at pattern recognition, often in ways the human does not understand, and that is something you gain after seeing thousands of patients over many years of school, training and practice. If you do not think that is pivotal to health, you are sorely mistaken. We physicians generally pick the person most likely to be able to use that input to reach conclusions that might elude us as our own physicians...there is a reason for that. And we mostly all try to do that ourselves for the sake of our own patients.

One of the other commenters pointed out how they cured their T2D. Most of those T2D cases would cure if the patient would lose 100 pounds. We all know that, but the number of people that will do that can generally be counted on the fingers of no hands. So you try to make things as good as possible with the person you have at hand. I always tell them that we could likely just do away with their BP/diabetes issues if they would lose substantial weight, but I cannot tell you how few patients will do that. And now that is called "fat shaming". It is so stupid as a health concept I cannot even opine or I will start spitting nails out of the screen. So I will spare you all the risk to your eyes from those spitting nails.

I am all for balanced nutrition and adequate levels of many substances, but have yet to see some vitamin/concoction/whatever be preventative/curative for everything despite the strong convictions of some of their users/purveyors. If the substance is water soluble, no harm in taking as much as you want, but I guarantee you will still die of something. So that may be part of any continuing solution, but it cannot be the beginning and end of all conversations. Those become just as constrained as the "only remdesivir/vent for COVID because I will pay you an extra $10,000 per case if you do that" conversations.

I would just suggest that throwing the baby out with the bathwater is bad health care for you and your family. There are plenty of doctors who will see things you do not, that have access to tools you do not, and who will do their damndest to make sure you get better. There are long lists of things that DO work and that have saved countless lives. I would certainly interview them carefully to try to separate the "I do what they tell me" from the "I think all organic will save you" from the "I will be honest with you and help you to the best of my ability, irrespective of what others are saying" practitioners.

I have yet to wear a mask (other than in the OR where it is mostly to stop us from getting splashed with body fluids) or to make my patients wear one. If there were science backing it up, I would be happy to do so -- it is not a religious matter to me. It is just wrong and many of us hate wrong. I give different spikeshot advice to 85 year olds and mothers of small children. Every person is an individual and that is what you hope you do as a physician: combine what you know/have learned about all of medicine and health with what you know/have learned about that individual for the benefit of that individual. That is why most of us went into medicine and you would be surprised by how many of us are still doing that.

Just one doctor's thoughts. Call me DoctorMouth...lol.

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May 25, 2022Liked by Guttermouth

So happy your dad essentially has a new lease on life - a better life in some ways. Sickness keenly clarifies what is important. A better relationship with his family is quite a gift.

That cold you got will give you a nice defense the next time you choose to go clown around with the midgets.

Hope Hubs is making some headway in the trucker arena. Still keeping you in my prayers.

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May 25, 2022Liked by Guttermouth

i studied health when doctors diagnosed me with t2 diabetes, he told me i'd have it for life and it will probably kill me. i went home and jumped on the internet, it took me a whole 2 hours to figure out he was wrong. it took me 9 months of research and the last 4 months of that time to learn enough to reverse not only my diabetes but to cure my asthma, psoriasis and undiagnosed but early stages of arthritis, i went from 6 meds to 0. haven't been near a doctor since.

anyway one subject i have been reading for 20 years is biohazards so when i read about health i took particular interest in vitamin C and its interaction with viruses. there are many types of vitamin C and one stands out as actually really useful the rest are limited by the bodys inability to absorb it.

virus protocol: liquid Liposomal Vit C. take 2.5ml every 2-3h until you feel better then taper off over the next few days every 4 h then 5 etc you will probably feel fine in less than 24h but dont stop suddenly or you may get a rebound.

this works for all respiratory viruses, i was half dosing when i got covid cos i had nearly run out and all i got was a low temperature, no other symptoms and was completely better in 36h

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May 25, 2022Liked by Guttermouth

The thing you are afraid of really exists, so being afraid of it, is rational. The things you do next are not a binary, all-or-nothing. Hospital care went from a well-maintained Volvo to that rattle-trap motorcycle your cousin bought from Some Dude. And you're stuck riding it, unless you can find someway to rideshare someone's used car.

Which stinks. Great insight on the teens and young adults btw. The first round of destroy-them-by-the-numbers was when we created massive parent-shaped holes in their lives. One of the many, many reasons I believe evil is real, beyond just the entropy of human nature.

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May 26, 2022Liked by Guttermouth

I have a chronic illness (well multiple chronic illnesses) so even in remission I see my docs regularly for blood tests, medication, check-ups, etc. As a result, I have long history/long relationships with my various docs. I stay up to date with them about their children, spouse, parents, etc. I deeply respect them and I've trusted them for decades.

But since Covid, I've had to mentally prepare for every visit. My hubs helps by prepping me on how to address the vax question if it comes up. I steel myself for each visit. While I still chat with them about their family, vacations, etc. I find it hard to let my guard down with any of them (receptionist, PA, docs).

It is rare anymore that they inquire about the vax - can't tell if it's in my chart that I've gone crazy or they've just moved on from Covid. It may be my imagination but I've noticed an uptick on pushing shingles vaccines or new pharmaceuticals.

It's a damn shame but I just don't trust them as I did pre-Covid. On the plus side, because of this I've assumed much more responsibility for my health and the elements of my lifestyle that effect it.

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May 26, 2022Liked by Guttermouth

Glad to hear the situation with your father is improved.

Skipping to the end, about your as you say umpopular reaction, it is in fact the normal human reaction. What we have on top of that is a conditioned response where we, having taught each-other for 4 generations or more that all lives are equal in value, worth and dignity, simulate having just as deep and real an emotional response to "250 people dead in India when ferry sinks" as to when your animal companion of more than a decade dies.

Our monkey-brain is simply not capable of real empathy beyond certain limits but it can be trained to simulate the response if that is proper social protocol.

I let go of that inhibition as I think of it 30 years ago, instead opting to state openly about such things as when police take down an armed attacker with a record long as the Great Wall, or even better criminals exterminating each-other: "One less, gods bless". Also, an old swedish saying goes: "Är man dum i huvudet får kroppen ont" meaning idiots deserve to get hurt. Pain is after all the great teacher.

As for the mental illness issue: all social mammals such as us have an over-riding directive to belong to group, any group under almost any condition. Nothing special about that for our ancestros, as individualists in hunter-gatherer times was just a way to self-eliminate from the gene pool. Modern day individualism, libertarianism, and anarchism all require the structured ordered top-down hierarchical society of today to exist at all, as personal choice alternatives under the protection and on the suffering of Leviathan.

So what happens when you a) don't or can't belong, your core feeling being ennui, alienation and anomie? You go insane. This is then of course exacerbated by the bleak realisation that none of us matters in the slightest in the great scheme of things. We are not Luke Skywalker. We aren't even Jek Porkins or Ponda Baba. No, we are Anonymous Rebel Soldier #3 or Stormtrooper #2, at best. Fully replaceable, fully interchangeable (Now with moving joints!).

Add to that substance abuse/medication, traumatising events, bullying further strenghtening the general ostracisation from society and reality and finally only ever finding either equally disturbed peers (and forming groups centered on being disturbed, yet again stenghtening the negativity) or amoralic social scavengers egging you on to your final psychotic break.

Given that, acknowledging not only to yourself but openly to others like you do, that your empathy and sympathy is limited and conditional, is nothing but a sign of personal integrity and solid mental health - it might be ugly and brutal and impopular but it's honest and that kind of honesty is key to maintaining sanity, or at least balance.

Life must have meaning, most of us need that, but very few of us (those of us humans who cannot help but think consciously about such matters at least) can manage to create meaning that feels real rather than make-believe or arbitrary. That's the price of (mental/spiritual) freedom, I'm afraid: being unable to blame neither the One nor the Other.

Bleak as Elle's grip, it is, but in that bleakness lies the beauty: what is more brave - to struggle against a threat where you have a decent chance of winning, or to struggle against certain Doom and still do your level best? Ragnarök comes, yet the All-Father does not yield.

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The loss of faith in the medical system is likely a widespread phenomenon, one the PTB must have accounted for. The only conclusion might be that we're headed toward an authoritarian technocracy in which they're counting on public opinion becoming totally irrelevant to holding power.

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May 25, 2022·edited May 25, 2022

I don't think your fear is irrational, I have the same fear about the forced shot if I ever went to a doctor/hospital. Recently told a friend that I would rather go to a hospital in Mexico than USA, which is sad.

Also curious if you happened to take any horsepaste during your sickness? Ever since learning about it I've taken it at the first sign of anything amiss and so far can't complain about the results.

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After what we've witnessed over the past two-three years we're all fully entitled to be supremely skeptical of medical "professionals". You especially.

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I have been blessed so far to have had few medical emergencies. Insurance is not affordable. A few years back I was descending into a ravine with tools in both hands. I was confident I could imitate my technique from boyhood and rely on the spring strength in my legs to keep my balance and worst case I could sit down and skid on my butt. When I was about ten feet above the rocky stream bed the ground beneath my feet gave way suddenly and completely such that I couldn’t just sit down as I had planned. Instead the weight of what I was carrying caused me to rotate in the air and head for the rocks belly upwards-back first. Fortunately I did not hit my backbone. I cut my head and took a good shot to the ribs. I climbed out and my landlady, an RN, insisted I should go to the ER. For her sake, I agreed. Big mistake. They wanted $4000 for their ministrations. I talked them down to $2000. Such a deal. I got an X-ray and a coulple of staples in my scalp, which were pulled out a week or two later for an additional cool $800!

Once in awhile I go an see a local old Chinese Acupunturist / Herbal guy. He has big following for years, it costs $60 for acupunture. You tell him what’s wrong and he laughs, does a treatment while you listen to Chinese music on his buzzy speaker, and he sells you some pills. So I told him the story about what had happened to me at ER. He laughs and says, you should have come here! I fix you up for $150!!!

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I never see viking used as a verb! Except in places like Poul Anderson's fiction. Pretty awesome. It needs a comeback.

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I don’t know who to trust medically either. Luckily I have been relatively healthy and haven’t needed a western Dr in 25 years. But I know I need to find someone I can trust, who isn’t captured by corporate medicine or fear of losing a license. It is just a matter of finding him/her. Wishing you the very best of luck in your search.

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