I've known a number of people with serious bipolar issues and will never look down upon you for ramifications of your illness. Everyone's got their cross to bear, after all.

(Who struggles almost daily with ever-increasing visual impairment.)

Mental illness can't be our "dirty little secret". The result can be catastrophic to individuals, families, and communities. Bil, I admire your resolve to be open about your struggle.

Bil,
If you are all of those things, then so are at least three of my closest friends. I do NOT consider them ANY of those things!!! I do not think any less of them for having such issues; they are my friends, period.

My own life experiences with depression and suicidal thoughts have been troubling to me as well. Between medication and transition (subsequently having GCS/SRS late last year), my outlook on life and living has improved considerably. So, does all this mean I am a "nut" or a "screwball" too?

Mental illness is an illness. It may not be physical in nature like heart disease or arthritis, but it still affects a very vital organ: your mind. John Aravosis is wrong and his column offensive. To demean someone who is ill like that, regardless of the cause, is showing ignorance - and hatred.

Hello fellow nut! I wish more people understood HOW the human brain develops - Jane Healy has some great books on that...start with "Endangered Minds" if you are a parent (I used to be an early childhood music specialist; read this book and kill your TV).

Here's the BIG SECRET. Our brains develop DIRECTLY THROUGH experiences, so naturally when a child experiences traumatic events (like physical/sexual abuse and neglect), that child's BRAIN develops differently. And many developments are permanent. Dendrites either connect differently, or not at all, when there is abuse. Is it any wonder how many "mentally ill" folks have histories of abuse?

Other science stuff - Our personalities are mostly developed by age 3. A child's musical aptitude is SET by age 9. This suggests that the time from birth to age 9 is HYPER-CRITICAL when it comes to developing a "healthy" mind or a less "healthy" one. That's what meds do - fix the brain chemistry that failed to develop during childhood.

Yet we are often chastised for "not trying harder", "pulling up boot straps", and ridiculed for how our physical body (including our brains) developed. Yeah, us gays are as petty and cruel as everyone else, despite our minority status.

Bil, I have been moved when you share here, and also thrilled to see someone else who feels NO SHAME in just BEING REAL. I mean, what the F*CK else CAN you be but real? :-)

Great observations, Bil...

For me, it's intriguing to look at the connections as well as the disconnects between lgbtq communities and mental health awareness.

If you ask me, queer communities have a long history with mental illness. From the earliest days, living with an orientation and/or gender identity outside the perceived norms has been equated with being deformed, deficient, or fixable. Those who survive and thrive have done so by marshalling huge internal resources. So many of us have grown up in personal war zones of one flavor or another; in that context, it's no wonder that so many of us have lived through seasons, if not much of our lives, recovering from traumatic stress disorders.

There is good evidence of gay and gay-affirming folks pulling together to support and care for each other, raising awareness and promoting prevention in the face of HIV in the 80s and 90s. It's not that we're quick or perfect about learning and innovating... as a whole, the learning process has seemed slower and more haphazard in truly understanding and integrating transgender people and related issues.

But, it strikes me that lgbtq communities have a remarkable opportunity to grab hold of mental health issues and promote broader, better understanding. The public stereotypes are more likely to promote the image of gay folks as naturally fierce and fearless, not needing or using professional care and support. That's not an accurate reflection of the big picture, though -- many of us have owe much to being competent consumers of good mental health care.

My ownership of the issue is multi-layered. I've got my own stuff to deal with in the form of anxiety and other crap that too often leaves me less than functional or productive. I've also got the experience of surviving my partner's suicide in 2000.

Because of the lessons learned in the aftermath of Dale's death, I get really frustrated with many of the responses I see to suicide.

John's response to Marie Moore was to lapse into name-calling and feel some sort of despair about what she means for the country; the commenters who followed seem to insist that she remained lucid enough to rise fiercely above her mental illness to make rational decisions.

Of course, she needed intensive mental health care, not just our vague wishes that she would have mustered more internal fortitude.

When the topic of suicide comes up in our communities, I'm concerned about us getting distracted from the need to focus on mental health awareness and getting good care. The first time I saw the word bullycide used, a chill ran through me. The headline by Pam Spaulding was Eliminate Bullycide Now. Yes, absolutely, we need to end bullying. But, eradicating bullying will not erase suicide.

Death by suicide may have any number of contributing factors, but it is the end result of a collapse in mental health. (I'm leaving aside exceptions, like suicide bombers, here.)

We run a grave risk if we talk about suicide and imply that it is a rational, almost expected, response to bullying and hate crimes. The risk is that our most vulnerable loved ones, younger and older, struggling through despair with no apparent end in sight, will hear that their fate is out of their hands.

I believe we in the lgbtq community have an opportunity -- a unique platform -- to promote mental health awareness and advocate access to effective mental health care. It has always been key to being functional and productive as queer folk. It is the primary path to suicide prevention (while work continues, in parallel, on bullying, hate crimes, and discrimination).

With your open, poignant telling of your story here, Bil, you're on the leading edge of that. Thanks -- it's no easy or simple thing to say what needs to be said, but it's deeply needed and appreciated.

Maybe the solace of knowing Americablog seems to be losing readers by the day will make you feel better.

As someone with a 7-year diagnosis of major depressive disorder, I hate it when people tell me to just "be happy".

It would make me very happy if I could smack them upside the head- is that an acceptable treatment plan?

OK, let me just say from the start that Bil Browning isn't "normal" 95% of the time. He's extraordinary.

But yeah, the lesson in this story isn't something about gun control. I can kinda see the point that Aravosis was trying to make - that we have to accept that no policy can be perfect in a country of 300M, that not accepting that fact leads to retributive, right-wing policy that tries to punish instead of understand - but seriously he didn't have to state it that way.

The woman doesn't deserve pity - she deserved compassion and help. Because no matter how much the rest of us non-mentally ill folks think that we're all-so cool because we don't hear voices, etc., that shit can happen to us and even if it isn't exactly bipolar disorder we should be making an effort to understand people who work differently because there's no guarantee that you're not going to get something like Alzheimers or depression later on in life and you won't want the Aravosises of the world making stupid comments.

Don't worry, Bil, I got your back. Let me know if you want me to start leaving gratuitously mean comments on AmericanBlog.

Every time I write about being bipolar, I feel readers' and peers' respect shift downward dramatically.

Guess I'm swimming against the tide then, Bil. My respect for you went up.

Just like my respect for the Australian Human Rights Commissioner went up when I met him, and found out he was blind.

It takes something special to achieve what you've done. That you've done it while suffering bipolar is pretty darned impressive.

As for the woman who shot her son, and herself - it was a moral act. She was trying to do the right thing. People like her deserve all the help we can give.

sad as this woman's problems are you are only one thing:

Gifted

Gifted by the opportunity to experience an alternate reality that "enhances" this reality. It is a burden to be different. You turn it into something else that allows you to be "Bil" and that is damn fine.

Hi Bil. I've been living with a bipolar diagnosis for 20 years. I'm on disability, because my symptoms get so severe that I don't leave the house most times. Because I was suicidal, my ex-spouse had a restraining order set against me and took emergency custody of my children because I was a "danger" to them. I had NEVER lifted a violent finger towards anyone, let alone my children.

The woman in the article, however, doesn't sound bipolar. Her delusions were so severe, she sounds more Schizophrenic than anything (my older sister is Paranoid Schizophrenic). While I do suffer some paranoid delusion, I've never experienced anything as extreme as the woman in the article.

I have been on a roulette wheel of medications in my time, and I'm currently unmedicated due to no insurance. I've found mental illness to be extremely isolating. Friends don't want to deal with you, partners get exasperated and fed up, and you're left feeling alone, helpless and guilty for something you have no control over. There isn't a week that goes by that I don't wish for a "normal" life.

As a bipolar, bisexual, black man. I feel ya man. and yeah. the sounds get to me too. B.P. for life.