One of the latest American obsessions is not just with the Kennedy family of Camelot fame but diagnosing their multiple psychiatric disorders. From Newsweek to TMZ (neither of which are exactly scholarly publications in the field of Clinical Psychology) there is much speculation about Mary Kennedy’s depression, drinking problem, DUIs, suicide and now her presumed borderline personality disorder or BPD. In my business, having several co-existing psychiatric disorders is called comorbidity, something that often but not always portends a poorer prognosis. Lurid details follow in these high profile print articles and online stories detailing her multiple incidents of Jekyl and Hyde like behavior, domestic violence and even physical abuse of her husband Bobby Jr. He is (according to legal divorce affidavits) allegedly attacked with scissors by Mary while in the bath, punched in the eye and face and subjected to multiple incidents of premeditated manipulation, coercion, and emotional blackmailing which all are said to stem from her underlying diagnosis of Borderline Personality Disorder. When Mary Kennedy isn’t busy attacking her husband or haranguing his children from a prior marriage, she is depicted by everyone else as a lovely, highly intelligent, warm, generous, talented architectural designer and meticulous homemaker. The psychological disconnect between her “crazy” side and her seemingly angelic side is chilling and helps one understand how so many neighbors in news stories about serial killers and murderers always start out by saying, “Gee, I thought they were lovely people and a very tight family…She used to come to the door with fresh cookies and milk”. In this case, however Mary Kennedy was not a murderer or serial killer, at least not of other people. Her self-destructive ways are another thing. If Newsweek’s sources are to be believed the best single metaphor for Mary’s sad life and ultimate demise was the home she transformed into an ecologically advanced model of green building and energy savings, except that by the time they were done with the majestic transformation it cost twice its projected budget, the solar panels were breaking down, and both parties were bleeding profusely financially as well as emotionally. They literally could no longer afford to live there. While such renovation nightmares are common, the symbolism of a woman who looked and acted nearly perfect on the outside but ended up hanging herself with a neat hand-tied noose in the backyard barn seems particularly apt, and perhaps something to learn from for the rest of us with or without personality disorders. Maybe the first time there was water flooding into the basement, the original inspiration for the uber-renovation, they should have recognized this as a sign, not to re-do the house, but to look more deeply at what was broken in the foundation of Mary’s psyche as well as in her marriage. Next Up: If Mary was afflicted with BPD…..then what ails Bobby Kennedy, Jr. besides “Man, its a bitch being married to a crazy person” syndrome. In my opinion Newsweek let him off WAY too easy. Not only does it take “two to tango” but for every Sylvia Plath there tends to be a Ted Hughes, and their philandering hands are often not so clean either. Couples create a different kind of toxic comorbidity and that can be just as deadly especially for the more emotionally sensitive partner as well as for the surviving children.
Help Wanted: Articulate individuals needed to help me explain to my relatives in Chicago and anyone living out west (especially in Northern California) why the KKK in Georgia where I live want to adopt a stretch of highway and participate as a group in organized clean-up efforts. An alert 18 year old reader, Devon brought this news article to my attention and I am still having trouble wrapping my head around it. Actually, I really want to wrap THEIR hooded heads around a stop sign or utility pole and light them on fire at night in an effort to conserve on public utilities. Now that would be a public service. They are actually having to seriously consider this request due to the fact that these antiquated he-haws are following “proper channels” as well as their stated intentions to “not wear our robes during the public clean-up”. I say let them wear the full monty, beer belly guts and all but insist that they: 1) walk together down the center of the busy roadway and 2) notify everyone exactly what time and place they will be there working to make America red, white, blue and green ….so that the rest of us can meet them in cars, steamrollers, snowplows and bowling balls. I know I’ll be bringing my “grabber”, the thing I got on QVC. This may not be as bad as Nazis marching in Skokie, but it’s still an insult to humanity and to all the litter these dimwits have previously dumped out of their gun rack toting pick up trucks with Confederate flags.
Sample quote:
“This is about membership building and rebranding their name in a public way,” Brooks said. “What’s next, are we going to let neo-Nazis or the Taliban or al-Qaida adopt highways?”
In Greek Mythology Prometheus was a Titan who tricked Zeus and as a result (out of revenge) was forced to bear an eternal burden (chained to a rock while an eagle ate his liver every day). Just how he managed to piss Zeus off and the details of his offense are less well known. I thought it was just about stealing fire and giving it to mortal human beings. As usual there is more to the story.
Excerpted from Wikipedia: Prometheus played a trick against Zeus (545–557). He placed two sacrificial offerings before Zeus the Olympian: a selection of beef hidden inside an ox’s stomach (nourishment hidden inside a displeasing exterior), and the bull’s bones wrapped completely in “beautiful glistening fat” (something inedible hidden inside a seductive and pleasing exterior). Zeus predictably chose the latter, setting a precedent for future sacrifices.[4] Henceforth, humans would keep that meat for themselves and burn the bones wrapped in fat as an offering to the gods. This angered Zeus even more, who hid fire from humans in retribution. Prometheus in turn stole fire in a giant fennel-stalk and gave it back to mankind. This enraged Zeus, who finally sent Pandora, the first woman, to live with men.[5]
Pandora was fashioned by Hephaestus out of clay and brought to life by the four winds, with all the goddesses of Olympus assembled to adorn her. “From her is the race of women and female kind,” Hesiod writes; “of her is the deadly race and tribe of women who live amongst mortal men to their great trouble, no helpmeets in hateful poverty, but only in wealth.”[6]
Moral of the story? 1) Dont mess with Zeus 2) Not only dont judge a book by its cover but also dont be FOOLED by its cover and finally 3) Ahhhh….now THAT explains a lot more about women, doesnt it?
“Judge Not Lest Ye Be Judged” (Matthew 7, King James Bible) is sometimes called the most misquoted verse in the Bible. Probably they are all misquoted thanks to our tendency to see things the way we want to see and read them. The better question is can we help ourselves be less judgmental or is it part of our human condition and essential make-up? I know I catch myself doing it all the time and sometimes getting others to join in like “piling on” or late hits in football. I usually feel embarrassed afterwards thanks to my Jiminy Cricket like conscience, but to be honest, sometimes I see that I use it to make myself feel better about myself……ewww. Not a pretty admission and not exactly what I imagine either Jesus or the Dalai Lama doing while surfing the internet together, ie. “OMG, can you believe what she’s wearing??” or “What an idiot comment, posting, Facebook photo, I cant wait to eviscerate them with my cutting wit…etc.” (while high fiving each other). Lately I have been using a simple technique to combat my tendency to judge others. I quickly ask myself if I have ever done, said, thought, or imagined doing the same thing that I am perceiving to be so foolish, dumb, biased, or ridiculous. Not so surprisingly, usually I realize I have done so and therefore, its not that “lest I be judged” but rather, I can understand how it is possible and empathize. I get it that I might do or say dumb foolish things now, in the past or god forbid in the future, so I might as well step off my high horse. If that doesnt work, I watch an old movie on tv or look at pictures of myself during the ’80s (disco era) and realize what was hip and cool once is plain dorky today. That pretty much knocks my fat ego off the pedestal… Roller Boogie/Saturday Night Fever moustache, madras vest and all.
On a more philosophical note……….I remember watching the campy sci-fi movie, “The Incredible Shrinking Man”, when I was 10 years old and never ever forgot it ( see Youtube clip below) . The Infinite and the infinitesimal……..a dialectic in space-time. We are all metaphorically “shrinking” in an ever expanding Universe among nearly infinite universes. Is life as a cosmic speck in the so-called Multiverse worth something? I think it is when you learn to love generously and when you learn to grow in wisdom. When I feel I am doing that and allow myself to experience all of the very human qualities that go with personal growth like the bittersweet emotions of regret and remorse ( often in hindsight), wonder and awe in the present, and hope for the future….that’s when I feel my existence is “worth it”, even if I dont have all the Stephen Hawking like quantum physics and Albert Einstein like mathematics worked out (see previous blog on the Big Bang).
I just finished a science article in Newsweek entitled “Secrets of the Universe” and my brain is still swimming laps in my head. God forbid it was a book or more then 4 pages long. I think my head would have exploded like the Big Bang. I know I have a Ph.D. but that string theory-multiverse stuff goes from thought provoking to brain damaging in one quantum nanosecond, if there even IS such a thing.
I realize most people dont give a shit and would rather watch, “Things Douchebag Guys Say” on You Tube, but still, I want to keep abreast of scientific developments, especially when it comes to little things like the known and unknown universe. The problem is that Cosmology and the so called “new physics” became the NEW NEW NEW PHYSICS while I was going to the bathroom and attempted to create my own whirling galaxy and gravity sucking black hole, Kohler style.
My ADHD and its attendant distractability problem often gets the best of me. For example, while I was pondering Stephen Hawking and his all-in-his-head conclusions about black holes and the “event horizon”, I started wondering how he, with his ALS disease and degenerative condition manages to go to the bathroom and empty his bowels. Can he still poop or pee unassisted and/or does he have his genius Math grad students helping him evacuate? More important, does he sometimes have his remarkable flashes of insight about dark energy, accelerated expansion, and the big bang while he is on the can, and if so, does he have his specially trained assistants write it down immediately on a napkin or a…..nevermind. Now that I think of it, I never saw Mr. Spock excuse himself to take a leak on Star Trek either. Dont brainiacs have to go like the rest of us and what in the world did a toilet look like on the Starship Enterprise?
Bottomline: I cant help wondering how our basic life functions like taking a crap might inspire once in a millennium Nobel prize revelations like E=MC2 or how some more recent brainiac/genius figured out something called “inflationary cosmology”, which is how cosmic “fuel” gets “smeared” clear across space and then replenishes itself to create other Big Bangs and other universes, hence the Multiverse. Maybe I really shouldn’t be reading this kind of stuff in the bathroom. http://www.thedailybeast.com/newsweek/2012/05/20/brian-greene-welcome-to-the-multiverse.html
A Two-fer. One blog old, one blog new….yet still connected in the quantum universe by One son and One slightly crazy father
The Older One: Remembering to Breathe and Hold Babies by Cliff Mazer, Ph.D. (April,2010)
My youngest son Benjamin recently accused me, a single father of three young men, of not acting “serious” enough for a Clinical Psychologist. He said I make a “joke” out of everything except Auschwitz. He’s probably right. He said I should “act more professional”, which I assume means stroking my beard thoughtfully and portraying a more solemn and professional demeanor. Here’s what I DIDN’T tell him but wrote this morning after he left to go back to college following Spring break:
Dear Ben, Do you really want to know why I joke around and make light of myself, the world and practically everything else? I think its honestly because I feel so much hurt and pain for a world in perpetual conflict rather than in love with life. To survive and NOT lose our minds we often have to purposely not think about all the injustice, the unimaginable cruelty, the children who are starving, the wars, the needless bloodshed, the grief of parents who have lost children to accidents, illness, drug addiction, etc., the unmistakable greed and inhumanity, and especially all the fighting over anything and everything…….over diamonds, over land, over designer jeans, oil rights, human rights, and now the right to quality health care.
I witness (practically on a daily basis) humans arguing over ideas and inventions, personal property, intellectual property, sex, child custody, money, politics, furniture…over being right and god forbid, never being wrong.
The conflict is an endless existential cacophony that would keep any sane person awake all nite and haunted all day until they, like most other people, find some way to harden their hearts and stifle their tears……..a waterfall of human tears that God watches in stunned silence………Some drink too much, or we scheme about how to get rich or buy real estate with no money down….We get excited about Thighmasters and Stairmasters and the Masters Golf Tournament and Ginsu Knife Sets with a Lifetime Warranty. We plan social events and throw elegant dinner parties. We join political parties…..and then argue even more. We create religious myths to explain the wretched silence like Deism and Theism and Atheism and fervently believe in a multiplicity of angry gods and benevolent saints. We analyze and theorize upon the nature of the Universe and pore over mathematical proofs and quantum models to try and make sense of it all, but also just to help us all not go totally bonkers that we understand so little and dont have all that much time to figure it out.
In the meantime, we(I) worry and obsess about our thyroids, adenoids, and hemorrhoids and we take our blood pressure and temperature to make sure we are still “normal”. We create new mental disorders to diagnose and then manufacture expensive psychotropic medicines to treat them and their alarming side effects. We conduct shaky scientific studies to warrant their use and often overuse. Even tho millions of people, including ourselves and our own kids take these medicines every day, a lot of them dont work much better than placebo sugar pills.
Ben, my son, my youngest son the Pre-Med student genius (I had to throw that in). NONE of that really matters as much as simple human kindness and stopping for a second to take a deep breath …to gain clarity and to REMEMBER to care for one another…including all the people we havent even met and who arent in our cellphone, buddy list, Facebook Timeline or Contact file at work. Maybe that’s why so many individuals are profoundly moved by the birth of a new baby and want to hold a soft little newborn and smell its baby fresh head and hair…Because, in that long, sweet, fragrant smell and touch Ben, we sense the RENEWAL of something real and uncomplicated like human love and caring and we get a chance to experience the absolute primacy of something pure, innocent, and yet untouched by the madness. It is something so holy and miraculous that it literally makes us come to our “senses” and remember our true humanity.
Finally Ben, I am so proud of you. Keep up the good work at college and remember to breath. Love, Dad
P.S. Also, dont forget I wouldn’t mind having a grandchild someday (not yet) so that I can remember (for the fourth time) the single sweetest moment of my life…you and your brothers birth.
Cliff Mazer, Ph.D., Atlanta, 404-932-7193, Clinical Psychologist and Pirate Fanatic
One New: Reviewing Augusta/Disgusta (May 2012)
I realize this is not politically correct but….I just spent two days in Augusta, Georgia to get my Med School bound son settled into his temporary summer “dorm” room. Could a city/town and campus be any more disgusta? We looked around for interesting, good, non-chain food establishments. Nada. We attempted to overcome the biases and prejudices we’ve heard about a crumbling downtown and dilapidated housing with outdated plumbing, leaky water fixtures and about zero “green” architecture, restaurants, public works or cultural initiatives. We doubted the place could literally stink to high holy hell like others have reported (see Urban Dictionary under Disgusta/Augusta). Unfortunately, it all appears to be true.
To be fair, some people were nice and friendly, others appeared to be in a strange “Children of the Corn” like mental fog with glazed eyes and fixed stares. There were a lot of cop cars around and security guards intermingled with poverty and suburban blight. I could swear the Pad Thai I had at a Thai-Chinese lunch place had not one ingredient that resembled either the Pad or the Thai. We retreated to known entities including the Mellow Mushroom on Broad Street for dinner, and while the pizza looked familiar, we all got food poisoning later that night. Let’s at least give the town an A for consistency. How about a new Reality TV show where someone like Alton Brown from the Food Network teams up with someone from the US Department of Energy Conservation and Public Works/Redevelopment and they publicly humiliate the politicians and planners of Augusta for allowing a historic town with a Savannah-Charleston like potential to become something ugly and yucky and sterile and depressing? Hey, I know, they could hold such an event at the band shell at the highly touted “Riverwalk” area in front of the Augusta Mariott, which honestly is not a bad looking place, but appears to be mostly a minor diversion for wealthy businessman, drug reps, and confused tourists. Not to be extra picky but we watched the tail end of a Memorial Day Concert at the band shell and 1) they were missing half the requisite instruments in their orchestra and posted a desperate flyer for musicians and 2) the crowd was sparse, elderly and looked, dressed and acted like the non-Jewish middle class citizens of St. Louis….circa 1964. Music Man would have been more appropriate. What does this town do when the Masters is not in town and how do they justify a goy golf fest like that in the midst of rampant decay and economic collapse? Maybe I’m being all Atlanta snooty, but I’m just sayin’….”Ya Got Trouble”…trouble in river city.
Usually I reference my ideas and blog topics with supporting information/websites below. This time the web based graphic IS the idea, and I will only make a few comments. The cartoon (above) is an attempt to put into visual form ALL of the main ideas that Carl Jung found to be most significant over his lifetime. Imagine doing the same thing for Albert Einstein or Michelangelo. A pretty ambitious reduction of a complex universe into a Marvel Comics size frame, yet, why not? Anyway, let’s give the illustrator and the old man, CJ some credit.
I tend to agree with most of it and dont see what I would add to it except maybe chronic indigestion, gas and bloating.
It struck me recently that just about everyone I know has been diagnosed with bipolar. No, I’m not kidding. It seems that with increasing frequency, rivaled only by the period of time around 10 years ago when everyone was being diagnosed as ADD (including everyone in my immediate family including myself) nearly every person I know and love is bipolar or somewhere on the “spectrum” of what we in the business call affective disorders. These are the mental diseases and diagnostic categories that refer to problems managing ones moods and emotions and often accompanied by a certain tendency to become manic or hypomanic, which is characterized by recklessness, racing thoughts, substance use and abuse, insomnia, and/or hyper-irritability. Wait, now that I say that……that really sounds like me too. Seriously. Plus, I’ve got the family history. Trust me. I come from a long line of people who start out pretty normal and end up either killing themselves or swinging from trees completely naked after not sleeping for two weeks in Belize or Costa Rica. They really discourage behavior like that in foreign countries and it can be quite grueling attempting to retrieve someone from the rain forest canopy who believes they are God or the pack leader of a family of Bonobo chimps.
To be fair there is another side to my family. They are the ones who worked on the Manhattan Project, became successful (and primarily sane) engineers, businessmen, scientists and college professors. For some reason they werent diagnosed with autism, ADD, or bipolar and managed to lead productive lives without taking mouthfuls of stimulants, SSRIs, atypical anti-psychotics, Lithium, or hidden flasks of whisky conveniently stashed in bottom desk drawers. As with the ADD epidemic, one becomes suspicious when they see too many soccer moms filling prescriptions for Adderall because their 10 year old, “focuses more and scores more goals when medicated”. Still, as a helping professional and someone from a family with both a lot of brains and a lot of raving lunatics (myself included) I know these diseases are real and often devastating. Somehow, somewhere we have to find a better balance between over-diagnosing, over-prescribing, over pathologizing on the one hand and excessive denial on the other. How bout this? If you think you’re crazy, you’re probably not as crazy as you think, but if you believe you’re completely sane and even the family dog cocks his head to the side when you say that at 3AM while watching Law and Order reruns and binging on Doritos, Tequila, and someone elses Vicodin….you might want to call a shrink for a second opinion. Dont be surprised if he/she (the good doctor) admits to being bipolar or ADD themselves.
In the spirit and memory of Eugene Polley, the inventor of the TV remote control who passed away today, I dedicate this blog.
Did you ever have a tv remote, ceiling fan, or other battery operated appliance type device that started to behave quirky and unreliably, no matter how much you shook it, pointed it, prayed to it or cursed the Gods? Am I the only one who for some reason prefers to frustrate myself for days, weeks, and even months, even tho deep down I really know I just need to go downstairs to the kitchen and get a new battery? What is with us, we ego driven, maniacal yet totally lazy humans that we would rather scream at a ceiling fan for ruining our day and quite possibly our dysregulated body temperature all night then accept that our main source of energy has run its course and is in need of replacement?
Ok, can you see I am using a metaphor here? I am talking about double AAs and triple AAAs and the funny square ones that never plug in easily or correctly, but Im also talking about our health… physical, emotional and psychological. It takes a long time for alot of people, including myself to admit they have gotten worn down from lifes many stress and strains, and might need more then a good vacation (altho never ever say no to a good vacation). Some of us need therapy. Some need a blood test or physical exam, including the kind that involves a doctor, a rubber glove, and a sarcastic comment like, “Now that wasn’t too bad, was it?” We might even need to see a shrink or accept the fact that certain medications are necessary. Worse yet, we might have to exercise and lose weight. The point is we have to, I have to, get better at admitting when I need help and my “internal remote control” is on the blink. In my TV room at home is one of my many self created “Ironic Art” exhibits. It’s really just a large bowl with all the many remote controls I have had over the years that span the many generations of new technology and new fangled ways to avoid getting off my lazy ass. I used to even have one that had a super long wire connected to it and was like a skinny jump rope…which I suppose defeats the purpose of both being lazy or getting exercise. Anyway, the art exhibit is pretty self-explanatory. Even when we feel like we have control, we really dont. We must accept the duality of both the absence of complete control as well as being more responsible and self-correcting. Life is just like that, but as guys, we often just like to pretend anyway. Thank you Mr. Polley. May you rest in peace and merrily keep on clicking the “clicker”…..for all eternity.
