Virtus. Femina. Tristitia

It is time. The mask, which we erroneously believed concealed our Gift and our Curse, only proved our being fools. The time has come to offer an explanation in the hope that it fosters forgiveness. It is between the plateau of invincible grandiosity and the abyss of true self-loathing that our greatest sins were committed. My usual subject matter deals with the aphorisms of the politics of the two societies to which I belong: that being the American and the Muslim. While these two paradigms of life are portrayed as being diametrically opposed, they aren't. Moreover, explaining their similarities and differences are not at issue here. My purpose here is to explain the reasons of the sins I committed as they relate to virtue, women, and melancholia. These are not arduous lines to produce. Politics, whether American or Islamically-based are my passions and require no extraordinary effort, for the end is always Social Justice. How does a man explain his sins with another form of justice being his most desired outcome? How does a man with Bipolar I Disorder explain the pain he has caused to some very special women, who were most unfortunate in that they loved him? How does he move on, when the very illness he has compels analysis, followed by argument, debate, more analysis, and conclusions that never seem concrete? Let there be no doubt: I am haunted.

I am haunted by the things I have done that are sexual in nature. The complete lack of loyalty and fidelity I showed almost every woman to whom I claimed I was committed. I am haunted that I did these things in my twenties and thirties, which means that I was a man only because age and size dictated I should be identified as such. Indeed, I was simply a man-child, for there was a blatant disregard for the simple humanity of women. The most important relationships I have are with individuals who are women: my adopted Mother; my Godmother; my Aunts Barbara, Laurie, Gina; my beloved sister Desiree. I am a father of three little girls. My Grandmother was truly my mother, because when a fifteen year old gives birth, it is her mother who truly raises the child. My biological mother, whom Desiree and I both refer to by her nickname 'Penny' is a violent, manipulative, toxic person. Of her four children: my two half-sisters, Desiree, and myself; none of us want anything to do with her. Some would look to the abuse I suffered for the better part of ten years at Penny's hands and make a correlation to my own sexual behavior. I can only respond that there comes a time when an individual must take responsibility for his or her actions. My Godmother and my adopted Mother have given me so much love for the last 20 years that I cannot use my physical, mental, and emotional abuse as excuses for my behavior. I do not abuse my children, nor speak to them in an abusive manner, because I was abused. I know what it feels like, and I swore long ago that the cycle of violence would end with me. I have succeeded in this respect. I draft these words in order to rectify in a most public way my eternal sorrow and regret to some select women and relationships from my past. In order to provide some semblance of anonymity, I will refer to them in ways which are accurate, but not too obvious to those men in their lives who have no knowledge of me. While it is true that my having Bipolar I Disorder contributed to my failing in a great many respects, when dealing with other people's lives and feelings it is too flimsy an excuse.

My first great love was Sarah. She and I met in college, and in every manner that a woman could be perfect she truly was. Everything from her voluptuousness, to her intellect, work ethic, and commitment to Social Justice: Sarah was truly a treasure. Yes, I will admit to my checking on her on Facebook from time to time: call it cyber-stalking or my Disorder; the fact remains I see a woman who is married, happy, a mother, and a teacher. Throughout our entire two year relationship my life revolved around self-medicating with weed, paranoid delusions, erratic decisions and behavior, as I cycled from mania to deep depression. Sarah deserves to granted a sainthood in her Episcopalian faith. Something else that drew me to her, which is irrelevant to many, but slightly important to me was her bloodline. Sarah and her family were white, Anglo-Saxon Protestants. I even liked about her. I regret so many things about our relationship. I never cheated on Sarah. I loved her too much, but I know there are times that I drove her nuts. I didn't know what it meant to be in a healthy relationship. I did not know what it meant to trust someone. I would not go to class or to work because I wanted to make sure she wasn't being unfaithful. The lines of mental abuse were crossed, and that is what haunts me. Being Bipolar and an insomniac provides a man a great deal of time to think and ponder. I have laid awake for nights thinking of these horrendous mistakes made. She deserved better than me, and thank God she received better than me.

Sarah and I broke up. She joined the Peace Corps and I returned to Rutgers to finish my degree. I had given up on prescription at this point, and self-medicated with the finest bourbon, Guinness, Weed, and the occasional pill of Ecstasy. I met a woman, who was the friend of my girlfriend at the time. This woman's name is so distinct that I can only refer to her as the Colombian, although she was also half Puerto Rican. The Colombian was a virgin before we met. And yet, it would take me months and several other liaisons before I acknowledge my commitment to her. I loved her. I loved her more than I did Sarah, if such a thing was at all possible. I was unfaithful. I was with her when I wanted to be with her and single when I wanted to taste and touch another woman. I loved her, but I treated her as if she didn't have feelings. There was a real problem, which is both laughable and a true complication. Even though I was smoking trees, having pre-marital sex, and sipping Basil Hayden while discussing Islamic Jurisprudence at a bar, I told the Colombian that I could not marry her because she was an atheist. I didn't need her to convert. I didn't need her to do anything she did not wish to do. I simply needed her to stop denying the existence of God. I knew at some point I would need to grow up and take my religion most seriously: Bipolar I Disorder be damned. Still, I was awful to her and I pray that she is happy and fulfilled.

Sabrina: I loved her, though she was not nearly as beautiful as Sarah or the Colombian. She was a nice girl. Simple, intelligent, a little insecure, and I really wanted to be in a relationship with her half of the time. I think when she and I met I was at the height of one of my epic manic episodes; and I mean EPIC!Mania brings irritability and anger with it. Sabrina suffered and I am haunted by that as well. Sabrina was the last woman I hurt in this fashion. My other break-ups were hard, but not anywhere near as close to the damage I caused these three women. Some of the women afterwards were just as toxic to me as I was to them. I can only hope that somehow or some way the women I have hurt will know how sorry I truly am.

Now I am 38 years old. Now I am a divorced father of three little girls. And it is now that I am truly on a quest to find a balance of  Virtus, Tristitia, Femina. I can no longer hold an appetite for meaningless sexual liaisons devoid of love.Ok, perhaps the appetite is still there, but what matters to me more than anything else in relation to women is a virtuous love, a pure friendship and partner who is willing to cook, clean, fuck, fart, shit, and ultimately build together.

 The kind of relationship of which I speak is more important than any sexual experience anyone could possibly have. I cannot, nor will I, apologize for being attracted to women from all over the planet. Women of all hues, voluptuous in shape and size, who can hold an intelligent conversation-indeed, the more brilliant the woman the sexier she becomes. I want a woman who will not tolerate mediocrity from me. I want a woman who will love my daughters, and be a second teacher on the manner in which they should behave as women. In the final analysis, I want virtue over vice. I want love. I want marriage. Some men, even the most successful ones, never learn from the lessons of failed relationships with women. Bill Clinton, JFK, MLK: marriages are arduous endeavors. All I can ask of God is to Send me someone just as nuts as I am, who is committed to working together to achieve lives with dignity, honor, grace, and having sex like porn stars.

Again, simply stated: I want virtue over vice.

بداية

Penny Grande

Mental Health Administrator

County of Middlesex

Middlesex County Administration Building

John F. Kennedy Square, 5th Floor

New Brunswick, NJ  08901

Dear Ms. Grande:

As a consumer of services in Middlesex County, I would like to thank you for all your efforts in taking the time to understand the need for a proper assessment for the vitality of our local mental health system. I am sure you are aware of the National Alliance of Mental Illness (hereafter referred to as NAMI) has rated the entire state of New Jersey with a C; a rating below both the National Average and that of many of our sister States within the Northeast Corridor. Your continued efforts in response to this 2009 rating should be seen as they truly are: a sign of hope for all mental health consumers within Middlesex County. Simply-stated: we recognize that you care. The Great Recession, or what Nobel Laureate Paul Krugman refers to as the Lesser Depression, continues to our present day. In spite of the econometrics and reputable polls that may state otherwise, budgetary and economic matters are of an all-time concern for the average American citizen. Poverty is at an all-time high on the National level, and the economy of the State of New Jersey has been devastated by financial contraction and then Hurricane Sandy. All citizens of New Jersey know that these are indeed, desperate times. That which is equally true is that those of us who are in need of mental health services have borne a disproportionate level of suffering here in Middlesex County, New Jersey. I must state, that personally the stories I have heard within the rooms I share with other consumers are true psalms of heartbreaking injustice, stigma-based discrimination, bureaucracies that crush hope, and all end in privation. 

Legal Services of New Jersey's Poverty Research Institute published a report in September of this year, which identified that 26% of Middlesex County residents lived at least 50 percent below the Federal Poverty Line-some 205,000 individuals. Of that 205,000 resident living 50 percent under the Federal Poverty Line, 170,000 live 200 percent below the Federal Poverty Line. To put this in common terms: 200 percent below the Federal Poverty Line translates into $22,350 dollars per annum for a family of four. Imagine that a family of four has to house, clothe, feed, transport, provide healthcare on $1,862.50 dollars per month: this is a reality for a greater number of our citizens than at any time in the last fifty years. 

For those of us who are mental health consumers these statistics are the difference between a chance at a normal life or an existence plagued by abject poverty. One understands that with resources already strained, funding for adequate care is not a priority for the current administration in Trenton and thus I can provide assurance that the great majority of mental health consumers comprise a disproportionate number of individuals that attempt to live at 200 percent below the Federal Poverty Line within Middlesex County, New Jersey. In short, we are suffering.

We, the Mental Health Consumers of Middlesex County, each and individually, request that you consider our lives in creating policy. Again, we understand constraints in budgets, but we also understand the impact of media within the 21st century. Although, the great majority of us are not a threat to the general public, there are however members of our Mental Health community who have committed acts of violence that are so heinous as to emotionally charge and touch a President of the United States of America. Stigma is not merely an act of discrimination, but also one highly economic in nature. One feels uncomfortable working alongside the individual with mental illness. Though so many, like myself have college degrees, we are often relegated to performing jobs far below our intellectual capacity due to our illness and the stigma with which it coincides.  This is about the pain we, the consumers within UBHC, are feeling. I have learned quite clearly that though there are the low functioning, there are some very, very brilliant people with those rooms. I have one vanity. I have one conceit. I believe my intelligence higher than that of others, in particularly in the field of Politics. I recognize intelligence. A great majority of the people with whom I am a brother, a true brother in the fraternity and sorority of being an American citizen with mental illness, are individuals with the highest intelligence. Some of these individuals maybe barely lettered, as we have heard with one brother in particular during a reading in one of the two groups I have with you. My Professor Ginetta Candelario, a brilliant woman in the field of Women's Studies, Sociology, and Latino studies told me when she was my instructor at Rutgers was that as citizens, we had to as citizens put our lives in a historical, political, and socio-economic context. I took this to mean that in order to understand, and then properly analyze and critique one's society, he and she are compelled to identify their individual place within said society.

I am a 38 year old man, father, ex-husband, broken vessel. I am a man living with Bipolar I Disorder, attempting to manage it in a society that fears the illness itself, has fired me from one of the last good positions available prior to the fall of Lehman Brothers. I am a man who with a degree in Political Science, with an emphasis on American Political Philosophy, and a severe lack of proclivity for mathematics worked successfully as an auditor for in some highly reputable institutions from 2003-2009. I firmly believe that had I been permitted and not terminated for having a mental illness, I would still be an auditor at Port Authority and a superior one having completed their mandated Acute Outpatient Program at Princeton House. I wanted to continue to work and I was symptomatic to the point that they demanded I get the treatment I needed. I was engaged in my divorce proceedings and the crisis level anxiety of my children having a life like their father. At Princeton House I learned that I had control over my interaction in my daughters' lives, that I had to cut people out of my life that were making it worse, and that I had to remain focused on my goals. On the day I had completed the Program, I danced in the kitchen of my mother's home at 5:45 am because I was so excited to return to work. I felt better than I had in years, and I was ready to seize my rightful place in this world. Yes, I believe as FDR believed, that human beings and certainly American citizens, have The right to a useful and remunerative job in the industries or shops or farms or mines of the nation. 

I believe as FDR did when he said: This Republic had its beginning, and grew to its present strength, under the protection of certain inalienable political rights—among them the right of free speech, free press, free worship, trial by jury, freedom from unreasonable searches and seizures. They were our rights to life and liberty. As our nation has grown in size and stature, however—as our industrial economy expanded—these political rights proved inadequate to assure us equality in the pursuit of happiness. We have come to a clear realization of the fact that true individual freedom cannot exist without economic security and independence. “Necessitous men are not free men.” People who are hungry and out of a job are the stuff of which dictatorships are made.

So being fired the first day I returned to work with this sense of empowerment at become mentally healthy is due to, Port Authority of New York/New Jersey belief that any lawsuit that would naturally follow based on their violating my Rights under the Law was superior to their working next to an American Muslim convert with Bipolar I Disorder in a post 9/11 world. So that we, as citizens can assess the ways in which our Nation has become an oligarchy, due to the fact that so many are in dire need and therefore exist as citizens who cannot enjoy Liberty in our modern Republic: having lost my job, after just ending my divorce, most attorneys wanted nothing to do with my case. Why? It is strange that with this narrative just relayed that surely one would be in line for a small fortune. Two things I learned: the American with Disabilities Act is violated a great deal more than people think and that lawyers did not want to take on Port Authority of New York/New Jersey with great level of success, for they are notorious for doing anything they can to just wait both counsel and plaintiff out. If an attorney does not work for contingent fees, a long case can rapidly become extremely expensive. Either the plaintiff will run out of money and the lawyer will run out of patience. This was a lesson I learned from my Constitutional Law Professor at Brooklyn College, CUNY, Mr. Dominick Tuminaro. So we are clear: Dominick Tuminaro is a graduate of the Cornell Law School and the City University of New York. He served as an Assistant Attorney General and the Bureau Chief of the Civil Rights Division of the State Attorney General's office from 1969-1979. Actively engaged in Worker's Compensation both as a policy advocate and practitioner, he was Counsel to the Chair of the New York State Assembly Committee on Labor and later served on the New York State Temporary Commission on Worker's Compensation. Published in New Solutions and the Journal of Public Health Policy, he has lectured for many unions, the Harvard School of Public Health, the City University of New York, and Cornell University. From 1990-1996 he chaired the Workers' Compensation Committee of the New York Committee for Occupational Health, and served on its Board of Directors, as well as on the Board of Directors of the Labor Research Association, and the Editorial Board of New Solutions. I spoke to him about my situation, and you have read his response.

The EEOC took two years to later decide that while they believe something illegal had occurred, they could find no evidence and provided me with a right to sue letter. So without money, I could obtain justice. If the average man cannot obtain justice, then he lives in a nation devoid of the democratic ethics identified by John Dewey. For three years I looked for work with insistent and determined energy to obtain justice, employment, and have The Creator return to me what I was mine by right. For three years I found no work. I went to jail for non-payment of child support, but indirectly I was incarcerated in Hudson County Jail for being jobless without more Unemployment Insurance Benefits. I had never been to jail prior. I had never been arrested for any reason prior to this event in which I truly understood what it meant to be a slave. I was chained to another man with much serious charges because I was jobless. I was made a criminal for being jobless. The irony is tragic and laughable at the same time: my previous employer fired me, thereby violating the Law, which led to my being arrested for the incapacity to follow it. At this moment I am in my fourth Acute Partial Program in four years. My most recent employment was as a chauffeur for a luxury car service, and that is a position I was terminated from for having my children in the car during my parenting time. This is my America. This is the America for all of the Mental Health Consumers within Middlesex County.

My only personal detriment, as stated by the New Jersey Division of Vocational Rehabilitation of the Department of Labor states: I have a disability that creates a significant impediment to employment. The bureaucracies of Middlesex County Social Services and Social Security Disability, one given funds by the State of New Jersey and one by the Federal Government, are truly at odds with one another. Both agencies are designed to make getting desperately needed services that will sustain not only my life, but the lives of my three daughters. I am a divorced father of three of the most vibrant, intelligent, innocent little girls. My twins are 7, and there is a 5 year old. While Governmental Agencies whose respective mission statements state ideals and principles of aiding and assisting the poor, they are organized to do quite the opposite. Moreover, I remind you that none of my involvement with these agencies would be necessary had I been afforded my rights under the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990. A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual death.

Yet, I must admit that mental illness has provided me with a power unknown to the rest of the nation without Bipolar I Disorder and a training in American Political Philosophy, for I love the man that can smile in trouble, that can gather strength from distress, and grow brave by reflection. ‘Tis the business of little minds to shrink;but we whose heart is firm, and whose conscience approves his conduct, will pursue his principles unto death.  My principle, is truly an American one: that I have a right to utilize my talents to improve my station and that of my family. The lack of care for those brothers and sisters of mine in Mental Illness proves that my dear nation is losing its democratic ethics. I have the right to attempt and succeed, but my Government has deemed me unworthy of assistance, while allowing employer-based discrimination to continue. Perhaps it is because the General Public has deemed our claims to be frivolous before they are even reviewed, as a May 31, 2012 Washington Times article. There were a total of 183 cases of discrimination under the ADA nationally in April of 2012, and the Washington Times has deemed them all frivolous. The most telling lines of the article were that disabled people were usually so happy to have a job, that they never wanted to ‘make waves’. Stigma exists, and it is an economic weapon that the larger segment of society inflicts on those of us you are falsely deemed dangers to both ourselves and society.  While an Washington Post article has stated that: all told, the US Government spent about $718 billion on defense and international security assistance...more than it spent on Medicare, and Medicare Part G is the primary source of medical insurance we as Consumers in Middlesex County receive. In short, we are determined to dangerous to work alongside our fellow citizens and seemingly unfit for adequate services to sustain our lives and that of our families.

With such blatant, biased, stigma coming from a major newspaper, it is certain that prevalent, systemic discrimination of those citizens who happen to be mental health consumers exist. This discrimination has a direct impact on our capacity to become productive, tax-paying individuals that can contribute to the mosaic of our contemporary, American society. With my education, my professional experience, my intellectual capacity, love of history, politics, and our national theory of the political philosophy by which we esteem to govern ourselves: I can and will contribute to our society in a meaningful, positive manner which will ultimately lead to my enjoining liberty, independence, and most vitally, my sense of self-respect. Work and faith will spring forth in the hearts of those countless millions of us who simply would like to work for that which we desire. This lack of opportunity to work in a manner that can fend for ourselves like every other decent citizen in the County of Middlesex, in the State of New Jersey; it is crushing to the spirit and the psyche. It robs men and women of God of their Faith in Providence and of their fellow brothers and sisters in humanity. It is a dangerous thing indeed, when men and women within our community no longer believe in themselves and their place within God’s Earth. It is this feeling of being Cursed is what leads to addiction, suicidal ideation, suicide, and yes, homicide in record numbers. We, who are mentally ill, are extremely susceptible to these social ills due to the nature of our illness and the lack of opportunities and investment our Government has secured for us, as the greatest cure for most of the stressors that lead to men killing children in schools, themselves on the streets, and too often addicted the powerful narcotics that inflicted chemical dependence.

It is the moral coward that merely identifies a problem, without offering practical solutions as to what shall be done?

1: There must be more funds set aside specifically for individuals with mental illness and dual diagnosis to receive treatment, and I see no reason why Middlesex County Social Services cannot make this an immediate possibility? As of 2012, Middlesex County had an annual budget of some $427 million dollars, of which $16.1 was spent on Public Welfare, and $6.6 million on Mental Health. Of the $427 million dollar budget of Middlesex County a mere $22.7 million provide for those of us afflicted with mental illness. A mere doubling of this would do wonders, with perhaps an additional commitment of a minimum of $20 million dedicated my brothers and sisters in clinical depression, bipolar disorder, schizoaffective disorder, schizophrenia, and those with a diagnosis of addiction based on mental illness. We, deserve this. Moreover, it would behoove the State to consult with the National Alliance of Mental Illness as how to best allocate said funds to aid in the mentally ill citizens from engaging in a cycle of dependence on the County, State, and Federal budgets collectively;

(2) DVR should provide the means to education, and in cases such as mine, re-education in order that new careers can built, which would optimize working conditions that led to a lack of social cohesion needed in the workplace in order that it can be efficient. For example, I do not believe that I can survive as an auditor with Bipolar I Disorder. The very nature of the illness, for me personally, probably increases symptoms. I am forced to isolate myself amongst stacks of financial records and contracts, engaging in a work that does not fulfill other emotional and mental health needs. I can see why Port Authority terminated me, though their action was illegal. I had an episode and became ill, and audits require contractual obligations to met. Perhaps they believed what I would later learn, that this kind of work, though good at it, was not suitable for a person like myself. This is confidence speaking. I think the reality that they were simply afraid of working next to an American Muslim with mental illness. Maybe I would one day behave like the idiotic members of my faith, and attempt to engage in mayhem and destruction; perhaps this was the thinking of my former employer. Whether or not I was wronged, the simple fact remains that me and hundreds of thousands of people like me within our contemporary Middlesex County needs funds to engage in the process of being re-tooled in order to enter the workforce; The mission statement of the Department of Labor’s, Vocational Rehabilitation Services is to enable individuals with disabilities to achieve employment outcomes consistent with their strengths, priorities, needs, abilities and capabilities. I must assure you, Ms. Grande, this is not the case for we, the Mental Health Consumers of Middlesex County. It is obvious that with a budget of only 6%, our lives and our potential contribution to our society is only worth 0.01% of the County’s priorities in investment. This is evidence that FDR was correct, for indeed there are now in our Republic certain inalienable, self-evident economic rights due to the insufficiency of the strength of our political rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. As FDR said, the nation has fundamentally changed-revolutionized in a manner completely unimaginable to our Founders. In short, as FDR, or even in a manner Thomas Hobbes: nation’s can be seen as one individual body. Individual bodies, like institutions, notions, beliefs are not static. Ideas changed men and men change eras. We, the Mental Health Consumers of Middlesex County, live in an age in which poverty and the violence it has spawned has made our fellow citizens feared. My coping strategies while at Port Authority made me very quiet at times, but I did have friends. I knew how close I was to true poverty, divorcing a woman whose cultural ideas made her miscalculate what the United States of America truly was economically. She has refused to work. While I draft these pages, I have just in the past week come from Social Services for documentation lost by their office twice. I am now on Public Assistance. I have Bipolar I Disorder. In truth, there is nothing more powerful than the awareness of self-hatred. I have graduated from Rutgers University with a degree in Political Science. I know that self-hatred when it is because of a societal marker. People with mental health issues are already prone to ideas of low self-esteem based on their illnesses, but having family, children, co-workers, employers, and even mental health staff members deem you as an American version of the untouchable caste based on your having a mental illness is the foundation for our self-hatred. In response, we simply ask that you invest in us, so we can pursue the avenues that will lead to our being productive, taxpayer citizens who can be examples for others to follow. Again, the current resources provided to the Division of Vocational Rehabilitation do not allow us to reclaim our lives through education and employment. We need a larger commitment from the County in this investment more than any other. I have Bipolar I Disorder. My symptoms make life very beautiful at times. Analysis of  real predicaments are why Political Philosophers should exist, for in those predicaments are potential for human wisdom to grow and foster. Aristotle said in asked in his Problema if all the preeminent minds in politics and philosophy were melancholics, was the ideal state one of health or melancholia. Herodotus confirms the true condition that I, and my fellow brothers and sisters in mental illness when he stated, the worst pain a man can suffer: to have insight into much and power over nothing. The Labor Department of the State of New Jersey needs to strenuously reevaluate its capacity to aid people with mental illness in learning to aid themselves. Careers must be changed when we suffer discrimination because of our disability. Very often we are not personalities that can be confined in the corporate culture, and it is only education that will give us access to power. The great majority of us can reenter society, but a great investment will need to be made in acquiring new skills. There are those of us who possess the educational prerequisites and the intellect to retrain ourselves into citizens that can produce for our families, our society, and ourselves. What we need more than anything are partners within local government that will be willing to invest in us.

(3) That adequate treatment centers are provided with all they need in Case Management skills and resources in order that men and women can stabilize by themselves and their lives. These would be positive and immediate opportunities that can be enacted in order to free us from a culture of dependence. In truth, there are a great many of my fellow Consumers who are completely content living in privation, making themselves dependent upon the County, the State, the Nation, and Society in-general. They lack ambition to improve their lives, and have committed themselves to opiates, alcohol, meaningless copulation, and too often creating another a generation of the American underclass. Another significant number of us are simply too ill, too symptomatic to become productive members of our society, and truly require the assistance from the County, State, and Nation. The lazy should be made to educate and acquire the skills necessary to improve their lives. However, the sick are need of better Case Management and services. It is the sick amongst us who can be dangerous. The stigma of being a mentally ill individual with psychotic breaks, hallucinations, and other behaviors that are real to the sick, but completely unrealistic to the rest of the world-this stigma is at an all-time high. Better facilities, and by facilities it should be taken to mean long-term care facilities, are desperately needed.

Dear Ms. Grande, what I want for myself and my fellow brothers and sisters in mental illness is a fair and adequate opportunity to rebuild my life, for it is tied to my faith in my nation. I did not ask for Bipolar I Disorder. It was passed to me through simple genetics. I want to rise above it, but I cannot without a fair and adequate opportunity to create new avenues by which I can climb from the abyss that is my existence. I am the man that can smile in trouble, that can gather strength from distress, and grow brave by reflection. My mind is not one of those that shrink, my heart is firm, and I will pursue the principle of Social Justice unto my death. It is Social Justice, and Social Justice alone, that will save the Nation.