That BTW there had me scrambling to Google Florida's history with bipolar lawyers, as I'm planning to enter law school two years from now. Apparently as long as I remain stable and don't do anything breaking the bar rules, I can be a lawyer in FL under the ADA, according to FL Supreme Court precedent. Phew.

Now, about New York--isn't that illegal under the ADA as long as the lawyer isn't trying to "use" his/her mental condition to embezzle funds, etc, as in the Florida case I found? Other state supreme courts, even in more conservative states, have found that it is illegal.

good. actually the bazelon folks ended up suing ny into submission on that but i have heard other untoward tales of newbie lawyers in ny running up against this.

Elyn Saks authored "The Use of Mechanical Restraints in Psychiatric Hospitals," published in Yale Law Journal in 1986. A citable law review article on that subject was a rare thing, and a very valuable contribution.

Re: her perspective on the right to refuse psychiatric treatment, see the article Liberty, Sanity, Equality by David Glenn in The Chronicle of Higher Education -- it's posted at
http://www.alternet.org/rights/15034/

Glenn's article included a couple of great quotes from Saks but also a description of her position on the right to refuse that was troubling, to say the least.

"Ms. Saks's proposed reforms would be, in her words, 'both more paternalistic and less paternalistic' than the legal status quo. More paternalistic because she would increase the state's freedom to give involuntary treatment the first time a person suffers a psychotic break. (Again, she would do this by removing the 'dangerousness' criterion.) Less paternalistic because
she would then give the patient more latitude to refuse treatment on subsequent occasions."

Glenn quotes her as referring to this position as "one free shot."

Perhaps my unprintable reaction to this was influenced by having sustained irreparable harm from a brief encounter with forced neuroleptics (brief only because it was cut short by a court injunction) as an institutionalized teenager. I don't want to form an opinion without having checked out her book. But I think a "free shot" approach requires a perception of psychiatric drugs as fundamentally effective/benign. If someone has personally experienced the drugs as life-sustaining -- or found the state of being that elicited their prescription life-shattering -- they may be much likelier to see a free shot approach as an acceptable compromise rather than an outrage.

Re: the LA Times article:

"She realized that she was schizophrenic, which meant she needed not only her continued talk therapy but also her antipsychotic medications for the rest of her life.

The admission unlocked a door."

Some people find that perspective personally liberating. Some of us would see it as the opposite. But the evidence contradicting the "schizophrenia diagnosis = lifelong psychopharm" doctrine isn't likely to find its way into the LA Times.

rant that may apply here:

Just skimming this I saw the "flowers" thing. When my daughter was thought per MRI to have a brain malformation she received cards, phone calls, and frankly so did I. SINCE her June admit to a psych ward: nothing. My oldest 2 daughters have had trips, visits, cards etc via relatives. My youngest: sits alone. In the psych ward. Nothing. No cards, no flowers. In my opinion, this is when those things need to arrive, even if to be read or looked at later---give me a break. I'm in the middle of it right now, and all I'm told from relatives is to "go read a book" on the eve of her strapped down court appearance. Mental illness is the worst one to be held under a rug. No one wants to talk about it. No one goes to the psych wards to visit. I DO. They want her gone. Out of sight out of mind right? well her sisters are the ones who send her postcards and visit when they can, and they are 20somethings.What is wrong with the Grandparents? and everyone else?

Georgia has put my application to take the bar on hold for 3 years, pending resolution of my wrongful commitment lawsuit. My research indicates they've let one law school graduate labeled as bipolar take bar, with regular tests to prove his taking his meds so I haven't given up yet.