MORNING EDITION Thursday, February 12, 2015 — Vol. 42, No. 7–M Cape Breton University, Sydney, NS K capertimes.ca f fb.com/cprtimes t @caper_times Cape Breton University’s Student Newspaper Caper Times heads mil- 19.8 lains rces. cials have SA’s n oil. hair- omy. sees ment. ska," osal." were ide.” oliti- on drill” 1977. many ANONYMOUS CONTRIBUTER Mental health in Sydney: A Patient’s Perspective Mental Health Special Writer’s note: This is my personal account of an unpleasant psychological crisis and the resultant care that I received (or at times lack thereof). I have included a few details which may disturb those special, beloved few I have told about the incident. If you don’t feel comfortable with this con- tent or are one of those friends, I would recommend you not read this article. I wake up from a version of the same dumb nightmare I’ve been having for weeks. I’m running down this bustling alleyway, being chased by men with guns. After seem- ingly hours of running down this alley, they begin shooting at me and I turn the corner, coming face-to-face with my crying ex. Somehow this dream was particu- larly jarring. I wake up in a panicked, ice cold sweat. My head feels weird but I don’t have a headache exactly. I try to look on some forums for a video game that I play, but it does nothing for me. I try messaging virtually all of my friends, but they’re all snugly tucked into their beds, their phones safely off (of course, that’s normal). I try calling my boss. I’m too panicked to come to work tomor- row - I can’t sleep and I’m working early. I’m lonely. So lonely I can’t think straight. I have nobody. I stare around my small room. My hands are cut and bruised and I don’t know why – I can never remem- ber injuring myself but I always have small injuries. The world seems to be cav- ing in. I’m trembling and my chest hurts. Then it hits me – a fair bit more so than usual this month: I wouldn’t have to feel any of this if I weren’t alive. I’m used to living with these kinds of thoughts. I’ve lived comfortably with the idea of death and suicide since I was at most sixteen years old. I used to have a morbid fascination with it and still do to some extent, reading philosophy texts about the morality of suicide a lot. But this time is different. I put on my coat and start walking outside. It’s a chilly enough Sydney night, and as I get further from the house I realize there’s not a single car on the main road. “Damn, there’s one less way to go,” I think to myself. Not that I probably would have done it that way, anyway. Too much chance of failure. Not clean enough. The idea of drowning myself enters my head, and right now it sounds fantastic. Apparently it’s euphoric, you know, after you get past the whole “Oh shit, I can’t breathe” part. And I’m close to the water - I could just walk in and never come out. I’m about halfway up the street. It’s a fair walk ‘til I get downtown. I check my phone one last time. I know I’m not in my right mind but somehow it doesn’t matter. There’s a text on my phone from ear- lier. I haven’t read it yet - too busy with the idea of not living to bother living. I check it on a whim, expecting an idle “hey we should do something sometime (but don’t expect me to follow up on that).” Instead it’s a heartwarming mes- sage from a friend. “I had so much fun [today]! I wouldn’t have missed it. I wish I could do it every day, honestly. Love hanging out, missed it too much.” Suddenly I can feel the cold in the air. I feel like I’m going to collapse again. It’s dif- ferent… again. I slow down. I’m still thinking of ending my life, but I start heading home. I can always come back. The loneliness will return again tomorrow, as bitter as ever. I get home and I start to bother myself again, “You’ll die alone. Who could want to be by your side, even as a friend?” I look at that text one more time. I close my messaging app and bring up Chrome. I search several things about suicide. At first it’s general reading, but eventually I’m searching for information on depression and what to do when having suicidal thoughts. Before I know it I’m reading about men- tal health resources in Canada for times of crisis. There are quite a lot of free, 24-hour national lines, and a few organizations that are based in the US as well. I specify “Syd- ney, NS” and suddenly the well dries up. Eventually I find out the crisis line based out of George Street is closed at midnight, resisting at every moment of my search to go out again and drown myself. Or maybe I could just do something else with items in the home. “Not clean enough,” I say to myself aloud, sobbing for the first time since my crisis started. Eventually I find a Nova Scotia-based line to call. Or so the press releases claim. I dial slowly, messing up the number the first time and getting prompted for a survey passcode. I key in the number correctly this time, but I hang up before the phone even begins to ring. I look at that text one last time, and pull myself together as much as I can. I’m shaking uncontrollably but not crying any- more. I dial the number one more time. “[something or other] cri- sis line, this is [name] speaking,” a calm voice on the other end says. Paralyzed, I say nothing. “Hello, are you there?” the male voice prompts. It’s still calm but there’s a bit more of a quiver in it now. “Hi, I’m wondering if this is a Nova Scotia based service,” I ask. “Yes, it is.” I manage to stammer out just a few sylla- bles before breaking into uncontrollable tears. “I’m thinking of killing myself right now.” The next fifteen minutes or so are a haze. “Yes, I’ve had these thoughts before. Since I was a teenager. Yes, I had a plan and was halfway to where I could carry it out. This episode started about a month ago. Last one was maybe a few months ago. They always go away. Yes, I’m alone. This is my phone number. No, I don’t have any weapons or any intent to harm others.” He reassures me that I’ve taken a positive step, and for the first while is generally sup- portive. I’m still crying but I’m glad I called. “Where are you right now?” he asks. “ H o m e . ” “Where do you live?” “Downtown Sydney.” Suddenly every- thing changes. He’s still supportive but doesn’t really know where to point me. After calmly talking to me, he tells me the service is based out of Halifax and he doesn’t know much about mental health services in Sydney. He tells me to Google a nearby crisis centre. When I inform him that I did so already and the centre is closed, he tells me that I could stay on the line but if I continue wanting to act on my suicidal thoughts, I should call 911 immediately. We wrap up, I tell him I might walk down to the hospital. He urges me to call back if anything changes. I hang up. At first I try to go back to bed. It last 30 sec- onds, tops. I’m up again, crying and thinking how great it would be to drown. I don’t feel safe with myself. I don’t want to walk there. I call 911. I tell them I’m think- ing about suicide. They put me through to an ambulance driver. The ambulance driver reassures me that he’ll be there shortly. He asks me if I’m alone, if I had a plan, and if I was car- rying any weapons or medication. I once again tell them I’ve no intent to harm oth- ers, I’m just thinking about harming myself. I meet the paramedics outside - they’re a very nice couple of guys. They ask non- invasive questions and introduce themselves. They just let me sit in the back and the pas- senger paramedic comes with me to comfort me. He tells me that, even though he doesn’t handle many calls of this nature, he thinks I made the right decision. He gives me a rough outline for what will happen, though he again admits he’s not too sure about this side of things. (I would like to note that except for a few temporal details he was bang on and also that he did a commendable job.) He tells the hospital we’re coming in. He walks ahead of me and I follow him into a small waiting area. I get the occa- sional glances from nurses as I walk by. I’m quickly taken to triage and my vitals get taken again. “TEARFUL IN TRIAGE,” he types in my patient notes. I’m sure I was crying but to be honest I barely noticed. There was a brief but sure numbness. I get into the ER pretty quickly. A nurse comes in. Other than my difficulty (or rather, impossibility) of finding Cape Breton-based services, this is the first major qualm I had. “Hi, how are you tonight?” she asks in a dis- gustingly bubbly, pizza chain waitress voice. “Not so great,” I say, try- ing to putting a smile on. Duh. She barely acknowledges it. She takes my blood pressure and continues babbling in her bubbly demeanour until eventually she tells me that a doctor will be by shortly. On her way out she vaguely touches my shoulder and, finally acknowledging my crisis, tells me I’m brave for doing this. The fellow on the other end of the cri- sis hotline said a similar thing, but it seemed so much more genuine with him. He never denied what was happening or stepped around it. It didn’t feel scripted. He responded to what I said and listened. The nurse, on the other hand, just asks routine questions (in that bloody annoying tone) – including the now-annoying “Do you have any weapons? Do you intend to harm others?” No. And no. When she leaves, I can hear some- one talking in the other room. They’re talking about suicide. I can’t hear much of the patient’s responses, but I can tell they’re in a situation similar to mine. About 20 minutes pass and the doc- tor comes in. He’s very friendly, in a genu- ine way. “So you’re having some troubling thoughts,” he says to me. I agree. “Well that’s just not right. We’ve got to get you feeling better,” he says. He barely asks me anything. The nurse (the one with the annoy- ing demeanour) comes back in again. She tells me I’ll likely stay the night. I agree. More questions ensue (again, do I have any weapons? Am I sure this time? I resist the urge to take off my glasses and tell her ‘my body is a weapon’ or ‘I brought some pen- cils’ or perhaps conduct a charade-esque strip search on myself to make sure). I’m furi- ously annoyed. Eventually she leaves, gets me a blanket, and tells me a crisis profes- sional will see me in the morning. She shuts the door behind her. I tell her not to turn the light off – I don’t feel like sleeping just yet. Finally I look around the room. It’s this off-eggshell colour. There’s a crack or two in the wall, lines and drag marks all over it. There’s something off about the light that makes it even worse – the one in the hall- way was so much nicer. There’s a brown stain on the floor – is that blood or coffee? I stay up on my phone for a while. This calms me down until I turn airplane mode off. There’s a message from my roommate, we’ll call him Steve. He’s begging me to call him. There’s a list of Facebook messages to me from him and a friend of his, begging me to call home because “Steve is worried.” Later I gathered that the police showed up at my house and basically told my roommate everything that happened – or at least enough that he could easily piece it together. He mes- sages me, telling me I worried him. I respond by saying that I’m trying to help myself, and the barrage of messages – and the knowledge he told someone else about what I’d rather stay a personal crisis – isn’t helping things. CONTINUED ON PAGE 4... This edition of the Caper Times is focused on issues of mental health, especially those happening locally. Some of these stories may be triggering or upsetting to certain readers. We hope that you find our approach both respectful and honest as we share these writers’ experiences with you. BILL STRAIN
K capertimes.ca f fb.com/cprtimes t @caper_timesCape Breton University’s Student Newspaper
Caper Times
Environmentalists and supporters of the energy industry are butting heads once again, this time over the Obama administration’s plans to protect 12.3 mil-lion acres of northern Alaska under the Wilderness Act. The area is part of the 19.8 million-acre Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, and 1.5 million acres of coastal plains that Obama is seeking to protect is believed to have rich oil and natural gas resources.
The plans still need approval from congress however, and many elected republican officials are opposed to the move on economic grounds. Those that support economic development have cited benefits such as a stabilized and improved Alaskan economy, a reduction of the USA’s foreign trade deficit as well as increased independence since the US relies heavily on foreign oil.
Alaskan Republican and Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee Chair-woman Lisa Murkowski called it a “stunning attack” on the Alaskan economy.
"It's clear this administration does not care about us, and sees us as nothing but a territory," Murkowski said in a statement.
"I cannot understand why this administration is willing to negotiate with Iran, but not Alaska," she said. "But we will not be run over like this. We will fight back with every resource at our disposal."
Other statements made by republicans contained the same sentiments, although some were much harsher, one equating the move with “spitting in our faces and telling us it’s raining outside.”
About two thirds of Alaska is designated as federal land and Alaskan politi-cal leaders have been in favour of further exploration and development on the lands to boost the state’s economy. However the “to drill or not to drill” debate in Alaska has been a hot topic for politicians on and off since 1977.
have also shown little regard While many
ANONYMOUSCONTRIBUTER
Mental health in Sydney: A Patient’s Perspective
Mental Health Special
Writer’s note:This is my personal account of an
unpleasant psychological crisis and the resultant care that I received (or at times lack thereof). I have included a few details which may disturb those special, beloved few I have told about the incident. If you don’t feel comfortable with this con-tent or are one of those friends, I would recommend you not read this article.
I wake up from a version of the same dumb nightmare I’ve been having for weeks. I’m running down this bustling alleyway, being chased by men with guns. After seem-ingly hours of running down this alley, they begin shooting at me and I turn the corner, coming face-to-face with my crying ex.
Somehow this dream was particu-larly jarring. I wake up in a panicked, ice cold sweat. My head feels weird but I don’t have a headache exactly. I try to look on some forums for a video game that I play, but it does nothing for me.
I try messaging virtually all of my friends, but they’re all snugly tucked into their beds, their phones safely off (of course, that’s normal). I try calling my boss. I’m too panicked to come to work tomor-row - I can’t sleep and I’m working early.
I’m lonely. So lonely I can’t think straight. I have nobody. I stare around my small room. My hands are cut and bruised and I don’t know why – I can never remem-ber injuring myself but I always have small injuries. The world seems to be cav-ing in. I’m trembling and my chest hurts.
Then it hits me – a fair bit more so than usual this month: I wouldn’t have to feel any of this if I weren’t alive.
I’m used to living with these kinds of thoughts. I’ve lived comfortably with the idea of death and suicide since I was at most sixteen years old. I used to have a morbid fascination with it and still do to some extent, reading philosophy texts about the morality of suicide a lot.
But this time is different. I put on my coat and start walking outside. It’s a chilly enough Sydney night, and as I get further from the house I realize there’s not a single car on the main road.
“Damn, there’s one less way to go,” I think to myself. Not that I probably would have done it that way, anyway. Too much chance of failure. Not clean enough.
The idea of drowning myself enters my head, and right now it sounds fantastic. Apparently it’s euphoric, you know, after you get past the whole “Oh shit, I can’t breathe” part. And I’m close to the water - I could just walk in and never come out.
I’m about halfway up the street. It’s a fair walk ‘til I get downtown. I check my phone one last time. I know I’m not in my right mind but somehow it doesn’t matter.
There’s a text on my phone from ear-lier. I haven’t read it yet - too busy with the idea of not living to bother living. I check it on a whim, expecting an idle “hey we should do something sometime (but don’t expect me to follow up on that).”
Instead it’s a heartwarming mes-sage from a friend. “I had so much fun [today]! I wouldn’t have missed it. I
wish I could do it every day, honestly. Love hanging out, missed it too much.”
Suddenly I can feel the cold in the air. I feel like I’m going to collapse again. It’s dif-ferent… again. I slow down. I’m still thinking of ending my life, but I start heading home. I can always come back. The loneliness will return again tomorrow, as bitter as ever.
I get home and I start to bother myself again, “You’ll die alone. Who could want to be by your side, even as a friend?”
I look at that text one more time.I close my messaging app and bring up
Chrome. I search several things about suicide. At first it’s general reading, but eventually I’m searching for information on depression and what to do when having suicidal thoughts.
Before I know it I’m reading about men-tal health resources in Canada for times of crisis. There are quite a lot of free, 24-hour national lines, and a few organizations that are based in the US as well. I specify “Syd-ney, NS” and suddenly the well dries up.
Eventually I find out the crisis line based out of George Street is closed at midnight, resisting at every moment of my search to go out again and drown myself. Or maybe I could just do something else with items in the home.
“Not clean enough,” I say to myself aloud, sobbing for the first time since my crisis started.
Eventually I find a Nova Scotia-based line to call. Or so the press releases claim. I dial slowly, messing up the number the first time and getting prompted for a survey passcode. I key in the number correctly this time, but I hang up before the phone even begins to ring.
I look at that text one last time, and pull myself together as much as I can. I’m shaking uncontrollably but not crying any-more. I dial the number one more time.
“[something or other] cri-sis line, this is [name] speaking,” a calm voice on the other end says.
Paralyzed, I say nothing.“Hello, are you there?” the male
voice prompts. It’s still calm but there’s a bit more of a quiver in it now.
“Hi, I’m wondering if this is a Nova Scotia based service,” I ask.
“Yes, it is.”I manage to stammer out just a few sylla-
bles before breaking into uncontrollable tears. “I’m thinking of killing myself right now.”
The next fifteen minutes or so are a haze. “Yes, I’ve had these thoughts before. Since I was a teenager. Yes, I had a plan and was halfway to where I could carry it out. This episode started about a month ago. Last one was maybe a few months ago. They always go away. Yes, I’m alone. This is my phone number. No, I don’t have any weapons or any intent to harm others.”
He reassures me that I’ve taken a positive step, and for the first while is generally sup-portive. I’m still crying but I’m glad I called.
“Where are you right now?” he asks.“ H o m e . ”“Where do you live?”“Downtown Sydney.” Suddenly every-
thing changes. He’s still supportive but doesn’t really know where to point me.
After calmly talking to me, he tells me the service is based out of Halifax and he doesn’t know much about mental health services in Sydney. He tells me to Google a nearby crisis centre. When I inform him
that I did so already and the centre is closed, he tells me that I could stay on the line but if I continue wanting to act on my suicidal thoughts, I should call 911 immediately.
We wrap up, I tell him I might walk down to the hospital. He urges me to call back if anything changes.
I hang up.At first I try to go back to bed. It last 30 sec-
onds, tops. I’m up again, crying and thinking how great it would be to drown. I don’t feel safe with myself. I don’t want to walk there.
I call 911. I tell them I’m think-ing about suicide. They put me through to an ambulance driver.
The ambulance driver reassures me that he’ll be there shortly. He asks me if I’m alone, if I had a plan, and if I was car-rying any weapons or medication. I once again tell them I’ve no intent to harm oth-ers, I’m just thinking about harming myself.
I meet the paramedics outside - they’re a very nice couple of guys. They ask non-invasive questions and introduce themselves. They just let me sit in the back and the pas-senger paramedic comes with me to comfort me. He tells me that, even though he doesn’t handle many calls of this nature, he thinks I made the right decision. He gives me a rough outline for what will happen, though he again admits he’s not too sure about this side of things. (I would like to note that except for a few temporal details he was bang on and also that he did a commendable job.)
He tells the hospital we’re coming in. He walks ahead of me and I follow him into a small waiting area. I get the occa-sional glances from nurses as I walk by.
I’m quickly taken to triage and my vitals get taken again. “TEARFUL IN TRIAGE,” he types in my patient notes. I’m sure I was crying but to be honest I barely noticed. There was a brief but sure numbness.
I get into the ER pretty quickly. A nurse comes in. Other than my difficulty (or rather, impossibility) of finding Cape Breton-based services, this is the first major qualm I had.
“Hi, how are you tonight?” she asks in a dis-gustingly bubbly, pizza chain waitress voice.
“Not so great,” I say, try-ing to putting a smile on. Duh.
She barely acknowledges it. She takes my blood pressure and continues babbling in her bubbly demeanour until eventually she tells me that a doctor will be by shortly. On her way out she vaguely touches my shoulder and, finally acknowledging my crisis, tells me I’m brave for doing this.
The fellow on the other end of the cri-sis hotline said a similar thing, but it seemed so much more genuine with him. He never denied what was happening or stepped around it. It didn’t feel scripted. He responded to what I said and listened. The nurse, on the other hand, just asks routine questions (in that bloody annoying tone) – including the now-annoying “Do you have any weapons? Do you intend to harm others?” No. And no.
When she leaves, I can hear some-one talking in the other room. They’re talking about suicide. I can’t hear much of the patient’s responses, but I can tell they’re in a situation similar to mine.
About 20 minutes pass and the doc-tor comes in. He’s very friendly, in a genu-ine way. “So you’re having some troubling thoughts,” he says to me. I agree. “Well that’s just not right. We’ve got to get you feeling better,” he says. He barely asks me anything. The nurse (the one with the annoy-ing demeanour) comes back in again. She tells me I’ll likely stay the night. I agree. More questions ensue (again, do I have any weapons? Am I sure this time? I resist the urge to take off my glasses and tell her ‘my body is a weapon’ or ‘I brought some pen-cils’ or perhaps conduct a charade-esque strip search on myself to make sure). I’m furi-ously annoyed. Eventually she leaves, gets me a blanket, and tells me a crisis profes-sional will see me in the morning. She shuts the door behind her. I tell her not to turn the light off – I don’t feel like sleeping just yet.
Finally I look around the room. It’s this off-eggshell colour. There’s a crack or two in the wall, lines and drag marks all over it. There’s something off about the light that makes it even worse – the one in the hall-way was so much nicer. There’s a brown stain on the floor – is that blood or coffee?
I stay up on my phone for a while. This calms me down until I turn airplane mode off. There’s a message from my roommate, we’ll call him Steve. He’s begging me to call him. There’s a list of Facebook messages to me from him and a friend of his, begging me to call home because “Steve is worried.”
Later I gathered that the police showed up at my house and basically told my roommate everything that happened – or at least enough that he could easily piece it together. He mes-sages me, telling me I worried him. I respond by saying that I’m trying to help myself, and the barrage of messages – and the knowledge he told someone else about what I’d rather stay a personal crisis – isn’t helping things.
CONTINUED ON PAGE 4...
This edition of the Caper Times is focused on issues of mental health, especially those happening locally. Some of these stories may be triggering or upsetting to certain readers. We hope that you find our approach both respectful and honest as we share these writers’ experiences with you.
BILL STRAIN
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While many people might see winter as a time for staying indoors, watching movies and waiting for summer to return, a select few wait all year for the snow to start fall-ing. For them, the cold means it’s time to hit the slopes. With the massive snowfalls over the last few weeks, snowboarders and skiers couldn’t be happier and ready to spend their days at Ski Ben Eoin. Although winter got off to a late start this year, there is still plenty of time to get out there and enjoy the hill even if you’re a newcomer to either sport.
Skiing and snowboarding are not cheap sports, and therefore some people are hesitant to give them a shot. Thankfully, our local hill, Ski Ben Eoin, offers a variety of options that make these sports available even to those on a budget. Don’t have your own gear? A full day’s rental at Ski Ben Eoin only costs $24 and includes everything you need to make your mark on the hill - hopefully not a crash mark. They offer full day, four hour and eve-ning prices which can be found on their web-site skibeneoin.com. They also offer great deals such as youth/school rates and group rates along with their family memberships.
If you find yourself falling in love with the sport, local shop Ollie Around is a great place to pick up your gear. Their friendly workers are very knowledgeable and can help you pick out gear that will keep you both stylish and safe on the hill.
For newcomers and seasoned snow-
lovers alike, there are a few important things to keep in mind as you get back on the hill this year. Be aware of your surroundings, always ski and snowboard at your own pace, but be mindful of those around you who could be going much faster or slower than you. Avoid swerving into oncom-ing skiers and snowboarders or cutting too close to those who might be less comfort-able and unable to steer clear of your path. Respect staff - their rules safety precautions are put into effect for a reason and should be respected by all snow-sport enthusiasts. Helmets are also mandatory at Ski Ben Eoin and staff will refuse chair lift access to anyone not wearing a certified helmet.
Most importantly: have fun! The winter months are a lot better when you have an enjoyable way to pass the time and stay fit. There’s no feeling closer to flying than soar-ing down the hill on a snowboard or skis. Get out there and try a winter sport this year!
WOLFVILLE, N.S. (CUP) — I woke up to a knock at my door. Puzzled and dazed, after completing my first exam of the semester, I threw myself out of bed to answer the visitors. Far from a stressed out friend or friendly Residence Assis-tant, I was greeted by the manager of Resi-dence Life and the director of the Student Resource Centre. I was being evicted with-out notice. Their phrasing, that I was “being asked to leave,” hardly comforted me.
I had been suffering through a severe bout of anxiety and depression, unfortu-nately all too common among university stu-dents. At Acadia we are no different. Most of us are touched by mental illness in some way; even those of us free of it often wit-ness the struggle of friends and loved ones. Tragically, sometimes an illness becomes horribly dangerous, resulting in the serious harm or even death of someone we hold dear. Suicide is not an issue Acadia is unfamiliar with, but it remains difficult to understand.
Why would someone choose to end her life? In my case, I felt worthless. Sometimes I even felt as if life were no longer real. I was lonely and isolated even in the midst of friends, lacking the energy, motivation, and appetite to enjoy the things I once did. My classes gave me purpose and something to keep my mind occupied, but I felt hope-lessly cloaked in darkness and I lacked the means to lift the veil. Depression insidi-ously warped my very identity and view of the world. There was only so much I could do myself: I reached out for help.
At first I spoke only to peers, but when I realized the severity of the situation, I decided to contact a Residence Life don to be directed to mental health resources. After some email correspondence, I met with the don in per-son, and we ended up discussing my serious thoughts and intentions of suicide. The don made me feel as safe as possible given the situation, and got me an appointment with a counsellor at the Student Resource Centre.
I felt supported. I felt hopeful. I felt like I could get through this and focus on recovery after exams. I was reminded that I have a life ahead of me, that it didn’t have to all end here. Two days later, I heard the
knock. My visitors had just come back from a safety and security meeting where my situation was discussed. I was told I wasn’t safe and was being “asked to leave”. They assured me I would still be given the oppor-tunity to complete my exams. My home was less than an hour away, so my mother was contacted at work to retrieve me. On her way to Dennis, I was given time to pack my bags and talk to the director of the Stu-dent Resource Centre, who is a counsellor.
We discussed her theoretical back-ground. I was told I was essentially expe-riencing a fight-or-flight response and thus my thoughts were not important. I needed to evaluate my emotions, but I didn’t feel any-thing. I didn’t know what to feel at the time. My thoughts ran in loops. I felt helpless and hopeless. I thought I would receive help, but instead lost my privilege to even live at Aca-dia. I was expelled from the residence com-munity. I lost the social support of my friends. I no longer had the opportunity to go to the counselling appointment I had the next day.
It was profoundly painful. They would allow me to die, as long as it was off-cam-pus. There was no warning and no oppor-tunity to advocate for myself: I was made to disappear from residence. The follow-ing day, I went to the hospital. I spoke to a psychiatrist who I still see now. On our sec-ond meeting, he qualified Residence Life’s actions as the worst case of discrimination he has ever seen. My case is not unique. Though he would not provide a number, the man-ager admitted that on a case-by-case basis, suicidal students are evicted from residence just as I was. My parents and I succeeded in organizing a talk with the manager of Resi-dence Life, director of the Student Resource Centre, and executive director of Student Resources for discussion and clarification.
At this appointment, I was expecting to be informed of the reasoning behind my eviction and to be somewhat appeased, but it turned out to be a disciplinary meeting.
I was suspended from residence until September or until such time that I could prove I was mentally well enough to return. There was no opportunity for appeal; the Residence Life manager’s decision was final. I would have to sign a release to have my private medical information shared with the Student Resource Centre director.
The Nova Scotia Human Rights Commis-sion informed us that only a letter from my psychiatrist would’ve been enough to see my return, but Residence Life is not too familiar with human rights, as you will see.
Like an informal criminal proceeding, Residence Life’s manager quoted passages from my emails with the don as evidence against me, evidence that I was an unaccept-able threat to the safety of other students and to myself. With life-threatening physical ill-nesses, you receive support, are sent to the hospital, and then reintegrated into school life if possible, if you wish to return. With life-threatening mental illnesses, Residence Life’s management labels you a threat and ejects you, separates you from the popu-lation of students under their care so you can’t harm them by harming yourself. You have to prove you are no longer a “threat” to get back in. If this seems like a double standard, that’s because it is – a common sign of mental health stigma and prejudice.
The specious reasoning behind main-taining this double standard is to mini-mize the psychological effect of a student’s suicide, something profoundly distress-ing, more so than the death of a student by physical illness. Residence Life’s strategy is hopelessly ineffectual. If someone you knew committed suicide, would you be comforted by the fact that it didn’t happen on campus and instead she was sent off in time to die somewhere else? Suspending students for being at risk of suicide does not protect others from the effect a possible suicide would have, it only protects suicidal students from a supportive community.
The manager, with a two-day suicide detection course under his belt, saw my overt suicidal ideation and acted quickly to surgically remove the cancer to the student community before I could metastasize. I was not, and will likely not be, the only tumour removed. This manager, on a case-by-case basis, makes decisions with his colleagues to suspend students from residence who are at an arbitrarily high risk of suicide, instead of doing what they can to help them. They have not told students this because we may be anx-ious to seek help. We should be anxious to seek help through them. Mental illness stigma has very clearly influenced Residence Life’s
Go die somewhere else BLAKE ROBERTTHE ATHENAEUM
CONTINUED ON PAGE 3...
Snow sports in Cape BretonJILL ELLSWORTH EDITOR-IN-CHIEF
ISIS dealt major blowAARON SAMPSON SPORTS REPORTERIn response to the brutal execution of a Jordanian pilot, the government of Jordan has launched a major series of airstrikes against ISIS strongholds in Syria and Iraq. Jordan has been a major participant in the US led coalition against ISIS, and some estimates state that the recent airstrikes in the days since the execution have crippled ISIS capabilities by up to 20 per cent.Canada continues to contribute to the fight against ISIS, launching airstrikes and providing Special Forces training to anti-ISIS insurgents. ISIS militants have threatened attacks against Canada, leading the government to call for increased security and civil liberties advocates to call for restraint.
DAVE O
3 Caper TimesThursday, February 12 , 2015
From two-time academy award winning director Clint Eastwood, comes American Sniper, the story of the late military marks-man Chris Kyle. Chronicling the struggles Kyle faced both on the battlefield and at home, American Sniper works to shed light on the sometimes forgotten personal horrors that come with deployment. At a point in time where Iraq’s position in America’s rear-view mirror has become much less than certain and with a myriad of veteran’s affairs issues in both Canada and the US, the large-scale success of the film is largely unsurprising.
Tying the knot prior to his first of four tours to the war-torn Iraq, Kyle tries to find the balance between family man and sharp-shooter. We’re initially presented with a strong and stoic but personable character
committed to marriage, children and the rest of the American dream. As the inva-sion is declared and Kyle is deployed, the audience becomes witness to a numb-ing transformation. Tour after tour, Kyle grows further and further from his family not just in terms of physical proximity but the emotional as well. At one point Kyle’s wife questions whether a family will be around when he returns home. This emo-tional plea along with subsequent battlefield defeats pushes Kyle into retirement and ultimately into a position helping veterans.
Despite some harsh criticism of the pic-ture as a propaganda machine, no one can doubt the fact that the movie illuminates the important issue of veteran’s affairs. With so many men and women falling through the cracks after returning home, it has become apparent that the system needs work. Ameri-can Sniper centers around one veteran’s story
Movie Review: American SniperDENNIS CURRIECONTRIBUTER
AARON SAMPSONSPORTS REPORTER
DIE SOMEWHERE ELSE CONTINUED...
Investors and policy makers are paying close attention to the situation in Greece, where the newly elected radical left-wing government is committed to ending the aus-terity many believe it needs to overcome its fiscal crisis. Were the Greeks to abandon the Euro, it would provide them with relief from the policies imposed on it by the European Central Bank, and enable it to devalue its new currency to make it easier to pay off its debt. However it could also cause a ripple effect that could destroy the value of the world’s sec-ond most important currency, which would upset the slowly recovering global economy.
While the decision to form a European monetary union was unwise from the begin-ning, breaking it apart now, in times of eco-
nomic uncertainty, would likely do more harm than good. Even though the Greek economy composes a very small percent-age of the global economy, the intercon-nectedness of global commerce means that even small economic shocks can have large effects. Whether or not a deal can be nego-tiated is unclear, but European leaders are clearly preparing for the possibility of an exit. If the new Greek government can avoid the mistakes that caused its fiscal situation to become so dire in the first place, it can pave the way for a return to an independent Greek currency - but hopefully they will realize that doing so now is far too risky.
Threat to economic stability
Study shows 6% self harmALEXIS STOCKFORDTHE OMEGA
KAMLOOPS, B.C. (CUP) — Men-tal health professionals are alarmed over self-harm on campus after a recent report revealed 6.6 per cent of post-secondary students had intentionally hurt them-selves in the last year and up to 20 per cent had done so at some point in their lives.
“The statistic is unsettling,” said Cliff Robinson, head of counselling at Thompson Rivers University. “But the thing that’s most sad for me is that for some people it’s easier to cut than it is to talk about their own mental health condition, and that speaks to stigma about mental health and mental illness.”
Self-harm among post-secondary stu-dents was one of four indicators marked red for “significant concerns.” Another eight came in yellow for “some concerns” or uncertain results. Only one indicator measured in the green. Released by the Mental Health Commission of Canada last week, the report measured 13 indica-tors of Canadian mental health, including self-harm among college students. Other indicators include suicide rates, anxiety among school-aged youth, anxiety or mood disorders in seniors and hospital readmis-sions within 30 days due to mental illness.
The report is part one of what the MHCC calls the “most comprehensive set of indicators for mental health illness in Canada,” measuring 63 different indica-tors of mental illness. Results on the other 50 indicators will be released in April.
Dealing with stigmaAccording to Robinson, only a small
percentage of self-harm cases are actually suicidal. People may also self-harm as a way to deal with personal upheaval, anxiety, depression or as a coping mechanism for
emotional distress. He also said not every-one who admits to self-harm is hospitalized.
“We’re not going to overreact on your behalf,” Robinson said. “Our job is to figure out what it’s going to take for you to deal with whatever mental health thing you’ve got going on, and in a vast majority of cases, you’re going to come in and talk to us and [the rest of the time] it’s business as usual.”
Other options available from TRU counselling include: assessment by the campus doctor, counselling sessions or day-to-day interventions such as interactions with professors or extracurricular clubs.
If intervention is necessary, students may be referred to Interior Health. Accord-ing to McLean, each patient is assessed by symptoms, mental health history and history of abuse (substance or otherwise) or trauma. Depending on that assessment, patients are streamed to outpatient services, single and group therapy, crisis intervention, connected to a life-skills manager or long-term care.
“They may have self-harming behav-iours, but you need to have a much fuller understanding of what might be driving those behaviours and then refer them properly,” McLean said.
She added that Mental Health and Substance Use Services has a unique part-nership with the university. TRU is one of the few campuses to have a regional health worker attached to the counselling depart-ment. McLean said in cases where interven-tion might be needed, the worker can then streamline the referral to Interior Health.
Long road aheadRobinson said he is excited to read
the full report come April, but knows it will highlight how much work is ahead for mental health professionals like him.
“We will no longer have the excuse CONTINUED ON PAGE 7...
management. So many resources have been dedicated to fighting the stigma, but we still have a long way to go. There is still prej-udice against those of us with mental illness.
During our meeting, the manager brought up the notion that Residence Life’s staff is essentially composed of landlords and thus ought not to be expected to care for students with mental illnesses like mine. I’m currently living in a house off-campus to continue my studies. My landlady can-not legally evict me without notice and cer-tainly not for the reasons Residence Life did. They are not landlords; they are caretakers of a community. One could easily argue that there should be a limit to what kind of burden should be imposed on them by stu-dents, but a discussion about this should be public, involving students, not between a few people in the upper echelons of Stu-dents Services’ management, and the burden certainly does not justify treating people such as myself like second-class citizens.
Had I committed a crime even as abhor-rent as rape, had I actually broken clearly expressed rules, or otherwise willingly threatened the safety of other students, I would have been afforded due process through Non-Academic Judicial, perhaps involving the RCMP. But suffering from a life-threatening mental illness is appar-ently seen as such an egregious crime and so dangerous that Student Services’ execu-tive director, in charge of counselling, accessibility services, Residence Life, etc., found it acceptable that I was promptly ejected from campus without warning.
My parents and I asked that the manager of Residence Life give us his decision and the reasoning behind it in writing. The letter I received had a completely shifted narrative from that of the meeting. I was not evicted because I was a threat to other students or because they shouldn’t have to deal with me, I was evicted because Residence Life required time to evaluate its ability “… to provide a safe and supportive housing option for [me].”
“We are all pleased that you have
been able to access positive sup-port this past week and hear that you have a plan to move forward. Aca-
dia University is committed to student success for all students living on and off-campus and provides access to resources and staff supports on an ongoing basis.”
I tried to access these resources and instead encountered an institution seemingly far more concerned with its own protection than that of my life. The absurdly transpar-ent bureaucratic rhetoric in the letter did little to alleviate my concerns. It did include an offer to answer my questions and provide clarification, but I had completely lost faith in Residence Life as a supportive institu-tion, at least with regard to mental health.
Following an alcohol-related death on campus in 2011, Acadia launched a compre-hensive reform of its alcohol management policy in order to help ensure safe drinking habits. “A number of dedicated and commit-ted people from students, faculty and staff, to parents and community leaders, to health care professionals and policy makers helped Acadia develop this comprehensive strategy and I am grateful for their important contri-bution,” proclaimed Ray Ivany, President of Acadia University. A report by Dr. Robert Strong, our province’s Chief Medical Officer of Health, included many references to men-tal health as a major concern in developing a policy, likely because substance abuse is a key contributing factor to mental illness and sig-nificantly increases the risk of suicide. Resi-dence Life was involved in Acadia’s updated strategy and its policy can be found in the Residence Life Handbook. Unfortunately, it includes no reference to mental health.
Does Residence Life believe it’s not important enough to discuss? Why is it that they are so open about alcohol policies but not mental health policies? I and likely all the other suicidal students suspended from residence had no idea this could happen to us. Why the timidity in discussing such an important issue and making sure that the most vulnerable students are properly informed? Why not inform the general population of students and parents how they deal with us
“threats”? Why the opacity with this issue but not dangerous alcohol use? If Student Services’ management is confident this is the best posture they can adopt, why is it not pub-lic when this posture could greatly impact the choice of students to live in residence? It may be because it’s a disgraceful posture to adopt.
In the far more litigious nation of the United States, some students evicted for attempting suicide as early as 2004 have suc-cessfully sued their schools for human rights violation, specifically discrimination on the basis of mental disability. This, along with some court rulings and bad national press, led many American universities to seek bet-ter means of caring for students in danger of harming themselves. It seems most universi-ties in Canada have not adopted that regres-sive and aggressive posture of evicting sui-cidal students. Though, apparently some have.
In a recent investigative report by CTV’s W5, it’s revealed that the mental health activ-ist Erin Hodgson of jack.org who graduated from the University of Toronto was evicted by a vote of her peers several years ago after attempting to end her life. It was an experi-ence likely far more traumatic than mine, but the same would have happened to her had she gone to Acadia, by the decision of the Residence Life manager instead of her peers.
There are universities that have treated life-threatening mental illness in outra-geously callous ways, and one would hope at least most of them have changed. Why is Res-idence Life so far behind with mental health, yet so up-to-date with alcohol safety? As an institution, it is a crucial part of the mental health support puzzle, while every other rel-evant institution at Acadia seems to play its role better. The Counselling Centre is fantas-tic, in my experience, and the Mental Health Society has made significant contributions to the mental well-being of the student body. For instance, they organize things like Men-tal Health Week, they provide a personal sup-port line, they have a safe space in the Stu-dent Union Building that anyone can visit, and they’re providing mental health training for many students that will surely save lives.
How could Residence Life possibly
save the lives of those that went through what I did? If anything, they significantly increased my risk of suicide. This has hap-pened to other students, and it will continue happening until someone dies after being evicted or until Residence Life is forced to change. I for one would prefer the latter. I have depressed friends that are now seriously concerned about their ability to stay in resi-dence. In writing this, I’m afraid of instill-ing this anxiety in other students living on campus, which is why included in this issue of the Athenaeum is a list of mental health resources you can access confidentially.
I cannot stand for Residence Life’s odious actions behind closed doors and do not believe opacity does anything to help students: it serves only to protect public image. As of January 6, the Equity Offi-cer has been conducting an investigation into Residence Life, but she agreed with their unofficial policy of simply barring students like me from living on campus.
A Canadian Mental Health Association representative I spoke to found Residence Life’s actions appalling and a clear case of discrimination; I was given valuable advice on how to handle the situation. But why should severely depressed students need to go to outside institutions to get any kind of effectual advocacy? Why should they ever feel the need for advocacy? I’m grate-ful that I’ve been able to receive counsel-ling this term through the Student Resource Centre, but I can safely say Residence Life has been the greatest threat to my mental health. It should not have been that way and should not be that way for other stu-dents that ever find themselves in a similar situation. The go-die-somewhere-else atti-tude of Residence Life’s management is absolutely reprehensible and has to change.
4 Caper TimesThursday, February 12 , 2015
He goes on a tangent. “How do you think I felt when I got woken up by the police,” a long, winding message asks selfishly.
It’s quickly back to airplane mode. I’m so angry and sad and anxious and hopeless that I quickly just get tired.
The bed is uncomfortable, and between that and the constant cries of “Nuuuurse” coming from across the hall-way, I somehow manage to sleep about an hour between 4:00 AM and 8:00 AM.
I wake up, thankfully, to a different nurse. She introduces herself and tells me that if I need something until so-and-so time I shouldn’t hesitate to call her. She isn’t quite completely genuine but after my experi-ences with the other nurse it’s a fair relief.
She tells me some hard details. Finally. A crisis counsellor will be here at 8:30. There’s one other patient and I will be the second one in. They’re also getting an on-call psychiatrist in. I’ll meet with them and they’ll suggest a course of action. She asks me if I’ve eaten, and I tell her I haven’t but I don’t want to either.
My boss calls me and asks why I’m not at work. I tell him in tears. He’s hard at first, asking if I’m really there or if I’m just lying. I tell him I’m really there and that he can call ER to confirm it. He accepts that and hangs up.
I expect a nurse to ask if they can tell him I’m here and what I’m here for. Instead, after lying down for a lit-tle while I hear “Just one moment.”
“Do you have a friend named Joseph [name altered]?” the nurse asks. I have to think for a second – he goes by Joe at work so it catches me off guard a lit-tle. “Joseph [last name]?” I ask. “Yes.”
I expect her to tell me I have a phone call, but instead she tells me “He’s here to see you.”
I hear the nurse tell him my room num-ber. I try my best to pull myself together. Nobody at work has ever seen me shed a single tear. I always make it to work and even when things get rough I can always be counted on to try and keep morale up. But the second he turns the corner, I start sobbing. By the time he’s in the room and I can see his face – worried out of his mind and confused – I’m full-on crying.
He won’t say anything before he greets me with the first genuine human-to-human interaction I’ve had since the whole ordeal started. A hug. He holds me for about fif-teen seconds, telling me he had no idea and that he was sorry he was hard on me during the phone call earlier. He tells me that he didn’t even call to check if I was here, and that he came right down. He had work that morning and took time out of his fairly busy schedule just to see me.
I start asking about work and if I’ll still have my job, and he tells me “not to even worry about that. This isn’t about work right now. I see all of you guys as my friends. And right now I’m here as a friend and I’m just confused that you didn’t tell me sooner.”
We talk. He tells me to tell him if I need anything and to remember to call him if I need to talk – as a friend. He gives me another hug and is on his way.
I call another friend, one of my few friends I feel extremely close to, and tell him what happened. Before I know it, he’s at the hospital too, giving me a hug, bring-ing me things to do, and sobbing. “I can’t believe I almost lost a friend because I didn’t answer my phone,” he says through tears. He begins explaining that his phone is normally on but due to a mishap it wasn’t charged, and I dismiss it, telling him with a smile, “I’d have had mine off at that hour, too.”
I spend the next while – it must be an hour or so – making jokes with him (mostly at my expense) and relaxing. He manages to make me feel genuinely okay for the first time since the night before. He asks me if I’m hungry, and suddenly all I can think about is food. He offers to buy me whatever I want, and deliver it to me. The crisis coun-sellor comes in for a moment and asks if we can talk. Before my friend leaves, he tells me he’ll buy me Swiss Chalet and we’ll eat it together when I’m done with the counsellor.
The counsellor was extremely friendly and knowledgeable for the most part. She was very keen on listening to what I had to say rather than ordering me to fill her checklist – it happens naturally over the course of our interview. She puts me much more at ease and tells me that I will likely be prescribed some sort of anti-depressant and given a referral for regular visits with a medical health pro-fessional. This treatment plan seems best to me, so I agree. She tells me a psychiatrist will be by later on to interview me a little more.
As soon as she leaves, my friend enters with the promised Swiss Chalet. It’s delicious but, as I had barely eaten at all in the last 24 hours and am beyond stressed, I can’t eat much.
We talk again for a while, making jokes. I feel a fair bit better at this point. Almost too happy. The situation seems temporary and distant somehow, even with the cracked eggshell walls and stains.
After what seems like hours, our conversation is over. The psychiatrist asks to see me alone. My friend waits.
The psychiatrist asks me if I’ve ever felt like this before, and asks me about my sleep patterns and appetite, in addition to previously asked questions about my intent to harm oth-ers and my lack of finding joy in usual hobbies.
He doesn’t give me a diagnosis per se, just telling me I likely have some sort of depression and that he recommends I fol-low a regimen consisting of SSRI’s (selec-tive serotonin reuptake inhibitors – a type of mood stabilizing drug) and therapy. He tells me that, because of my suicidal ide-ation and how suddenly it manifested, I should stay in the hospital for a while in the mental health unit. He explains I’ll always have access to someone there in a crisis and it will be safer, and that he will do an assessment before he discharges me.
After the scare of the night before, I tell him I’d like more information but tentatively agree. He tells me that it could be longer before he recommends I am discharged, perhaps three or four days. I still agree, as I will see someone the next day and that seems important right now. The crisis coun-sellor comes back in and jokes that “we’re not going to lock you up in a padded room.” She tells me I’d have my own room or share it with someone. I agree to be transferred.
A nurse comes by and tells me I’ll be transferred in about 30 minutes. She comes in again 5 minutes later telling me they’re ready.
She then explains that a security guard has to be there in addition to the porter, tell-ing me that “It’s policy.” I’m immediately torn between understanding and bafflement. On one hand, I understand the need for security, but on the other, I had no weap-ons and no intent to harm anyone – and was repeatedly questioned about that, including assessments from not just one but two medi-cal health professionals. It was intimidat-ing having him following behind me, and I would have much preferred if a porter or a nurse could do it. I understand, even, want-ing to have more than one person for escort, but it could be someone less threatening.
They transfer me to the Mental Health Unit and things start to deteriorate rapidly. The unit itself is nice enough. The beds are com-fier, which later on helped a little but didn’t outweigh everything else that was wrong.
They conduct an interview with me. I’m asked a series of questions, this time very much in a robotic question-and-answer format, by someone who (judg-ing by her notes) couldn’t even correctly spell some of the terms she was using. I’m also told another nurse who is trans-ferring into the mental health unit will be observing – which I find a little unsettling.
One of the questions I’m asked is what – if anything – still makes me happy. I tell them two things: being with friends and my appreciation for electronics.
Like that, she tells me my room is being prepared and to go to the front desk to “Sign off on some things.”
It’s here I find out that – despite what I said in my entrance interview – there is a strict policy against electronic devices and visiting hours are somewhat restricted.
There are also lots of cameras in the unit, preventing any semblance of pri-vacy, in addition to not having locks on the doors and regular checkups by nurses.
I’m asked to empty my pockets and turn in my wallet, phone, and some other miscellaneous items. Interestingly, while my phone was taken and they have a policy against letting patients shave alone (even ones that do not pose a risk of self-harm), I was allowed to bring pens into my room.
I also found it interesting that, even though these things were done in the name of security, I was not once searched. It seems to me a very bizarre sort of compromise between patient comforts and security risk management in that it does not fare partic-ularly well in either department. I still felt invaded and had my phone – a double cop-ing mechanism of sorts – taken away, and yet could have easily brought in something harmful to myself and either lied about it or simply reported it as a non-shaving tool. Also interesting was that they did not tell me what the hospital provided or what I should bring.
They tell me what times to order meals (but do not tell me any protocol or even what number to call) on the phones, and show me to my room. My room, thankfully, was empty other than me even though it was a double. Otherwise, it would have likely made the visit my friend gave me much more difficult.
They tell me someone will be by for a checkup shortly. A nurse comes in, checks my vitals, and carries on her merry way, barely speaking a word to me.
Being unaccustomed to the world of semi-assisted, walled-off living, I ask one of the nurses in the halls if there is any list of rules or some such I can read. She laughs at me, tells me there’s not, but tells me “comfortingly” that the rules are mostly obvious. These “obvious” rules, according to her, include a 15-minute limit on outgo-ing phone calls on the common phones in the hallway and a complete ban on going into other patients’ rooms, even if invited.
I sleep most of the day, on and off between reading one of the books I was allowed to bring in. A nurse tells me supper is here. I ignore her and go back to sleep – no one comes back and asks any questions after that, though there is a nurse that pokes her head in the door once every 30 minutes, pre-sumably to see if I haven’t died or come down with another mental illness since last time.
I wake up the second day extremely nervous. The bed isn’t that comfortable but it’s not bad and the other patients are noisy. The isolation and lack of electronic devices is killing me. I can’t talk to anyone, I can’t program, I can’t tinker or play games. I spend hours sleeping on and off again.
A nurse comes in and asks me how I’m doing. “I’m uncomfortable right now,” I tell her. She checks my vitals, tells me my blood pressure is higher than normal for someone of my age and build, and says “Discomfort’ll do that.” She leaves the room, asking nothing more. She comes back for a moment later with a pill and a small cup of water, telling me that the pill is Zoloft.
I would have expected my statement to be a red flag, or at least a good point to ask questions about why I’m uncomfortable. Peo-ple in general, and I suspect especially those with depression and anxiety-spectrum disor-ders might not be immediately forthcoming with information and the in-and-out approach made me feel very much like a number.
It was easy to see how one might fall into a vicious cycle of sorts at the MHU – I went in for what turned out to (appar-ently) be suicidal ideation resulting from major depressive disorder, but by the time I left I could easily see becoming so frus-trated with the environment that I came down with other symptoms of mental ill-ness - not necessarily illnesses themselves, but things that could be interpreted as such.
Eventually I get sick of the environment and, remembering I’m a voluntary patient, go up to the counter in the middle of the unit and ask when the medical health professional I was told of would be around to see me.
I’m told that there’s an on-call psy-
chiatrist, but he’s only for crises and otherwise I’d have to wait until Tues-day because of Thanksgiving weekend.
Right there and then, I asked to check myself out. I don’t understand how some-thing like this would happen, and then appar-ently it’s not important enough to either A) let me see a psychiatrist promptly for assess-ment and follow-up or B) let me have access to my coping mechanisms. I’m told at first that I can either check myself out and basi-cally lose all progress, or wait for them to call the on-call psychiatrist for an assessment, but that “I don’t know how long that will be.” Even with the conditions, I agree to wait.
The nurse comes back a few minutes later telling me that he’s not coming in and my options are to be discharged against medical advice and go through my fam-ily doctor (who is about as understanding as a brick) or wait in the depressing, infu-riating Mental Health Unit until Tuesday.
I asked what would happen if I discharged myself, and she told me that a report could be sent immediately to my family doctor and that chances I would get my prescription and referral were good. I agreed to be released.
On my exit interview, I told the nurse I wanted to leave because I had been deprived of my coping mechanisms. She was very receptive to the idea, even agreeing with me that perhaps this wasn’t the best ave-nue for treatment. What troubles me is that there doesn’t seem to be a happy medium in my scenario – I was either to go home against medical advice or stay in the soul-sucking communal/assisted living situa-tion. I understand that this type of facility is necessary for some patients, but I feel there should be a sort-of lower level unit for men-tal health patients that allows more outside contact and personal freedom. Even though I was in extreme discomfort, I did not act out and made no attempts to harm myself, plus I’d made the call myself. I was con-fused at how this warranted taking away my privacy and control of my schedule.
By the time I get out, I’m so angry that I can’t be sad anymore. My teeth are grimy because I wasn’t told to bring a toothbrush and toothpaste. I’m weak from hunger because I don’t want to venture out into the common areas and risk breaking one of their ‘obvious’ rules, and I’m lonely and bored senseless. It’s raining when I finally exit the building, and I almost cry a little.
It’s only been about thirty-six hours and I feel better. Not because I feel I was treated well or because I’m confident my family doctor will refer me to the appro-priate authorities so I can be treated out-of-hospital, but rather because the whole experience angered me to numbness.
It wasn’t by way of death, but I was finally free.
My reason for writing this is two-fold: to give a personal touch to something such as a psychological crisis, and also as a critique of our mental health system. Some patients may have had very good experiences in the MHU, and I don’t doubt that the unit has seen some success, but I also don’t doubt that it could see more success with some improvements. Not everything was bad, but most of the good experiences I had were before I was trans-ferred to the unit – while I was still in the ER.
My roommate later told me I had until the end of the month to leave our apart-ment because he “was scared to find me hanging in my room,” which to me reeks of discrimination against mental illness, but my name isn’t on the lease and I don’t know how much I could do – not that I’d want to live with him after all this anyway.
Thank you so much for reading. I know it’s been a long, bumpy, and not-at-all pleasant ride, but just your sticking through my account means a lot to me, even if I don’t know you.
Thank you, and please treat those with mental illnesses with respect. For the most part we’re just like you, not dangerous or scary.
Thanks especially to my friends who were with me through this difficult time. There were only three of you, but your involvement meant the world to me. If I lost all my other friends, I wouldn’t care as long as I had you.
GINA MARTELL NEWS EDITOR
EXPERIENCE CONTINUED...
5 Caper TimesThursday, February 12 , 2015
Mental Health Services at CBUWith regards to a joke
made in the Janu-ary 28th edition of
the caper times, staff would like to clarify that Warren Gordon Photography is in no way affiliated with practices of abor-
tion or said joke. Our sincerest apologies go
out to Mr. Gordon.
Cape Breton University is a school that cares greatly about the mental health and wellbeing of their students, offering several services to students who find themselves reaching out for support. CBU offers stu-dents counselling services with the clinical social worker and human rights officer Helen Boone. Helen works with students dealing with issues such as anger, grief, depression, anxiety, relationship issues, family conflict, time management and anything else that is causing students stress. She can be contacted at [email protected] or 902-563-1873.
The Women’s Centre, founded in 1997 is also a great place dedicated to the well-being of Cape Breton University’s female student body. The Women’s Centre is a safe,
confidential place to talk that is open to all self-identified women. If a woman feels uncertain about what her next step should be in dealing with mental health concerns the centre is a great service that will point her in the right direction. The women’s cen-tre has many resources available to them such as access to a social worker, doctor, and psychiatrist referral. Mental illness is something that a lot of women struggle with throughout their university career and the Women’s Centre wants students to know that this is nothing to be ashamed of.
Another one of CBU’s great student services is the Pride and Ally Centre (pre-viously known as the sexual diversity cen-tre), which works to make all students, both LGBTQ and allies, feel comfortable at CBU and provides a safe space to discuss the
issues that are affecting their lives. Lastly, if students feel as though their issues may be negatively affecting their schoolwork, they can contact the Jennifer Keeping Accessi-bility Centre. JKAC exists to provide ser-vices to students who require additional resources due to barriers that prevent them from achieving their academic goals. Stu-dents with psychological disorders are on the list of students who can make use of the Jennifer Keeping Accessibility Centre and their friendly and helpful staff. Although documentation from a qualified health prac-titioner must be presented to receive certain services from JKAC, all students are wel-come to reach out to them with any questions or concerns about their academic hurdles.
If you would like to find more informa-tion on any of these services, go to cbusu.ca
JILL ELLSWORTH EDITOR-IN-CHIEF
Retraction
The New Pornographers Want To Pleasure You
MONTREAL (CUP) — When Kathryn Calder joined The New Pornographers nearly a decade ago, the band’s second album, Elec-tric Version, had recently broken into the U.S. Billboard top 200. Only 23 at the time and nearly a decade younger than most of her band mates, they took to calling her “the kid.” Since then, she has not only outgrown the nickname, but gone on to contribute vocals and keyboards on four New Pornog-rapher albums - all of which broke the top 50 in the U.S. - and released two solo albums.
When Calder was asked to join The New Pornographers by Carl Newman, vocalist and guitarist in the band as well as her uncle, she felt as though she had “been plucked out and put in the band,” a group she admits having been a fan of. Calder confessed that some of the early formative elements of the band, like where the name came from, are lost in time. “People like to say that the name came from a televangelist who said that ‘music is the new pornography,’ but other people say it’s because of a movie called The Pornographers—I don’t know.” Wherever it came from, Calder likes it. “It stands out,” she said, “It even offends some people.”
With seven full members as well as a
touring member, many of whom also have ongoing side projects, the band is larger and busier than most acts. It is not exactly a chore to get everyone together, however: “It’s annoying in the way that it’s annoying to get eight people to decide on what restaurant to go to,” Calder said. But being part of such a large band also has its advantages, “There’s
so many of us that there’s a good safety blanket,” she said, “I don’t really feel nerves purely due to the fact I’m surrounded by seven other people.”
There have been many memorable moments with The New Pornographers for Calder, but a few stand out: “We were in Mexico City around ‘07 doing this huge show and the fans were so excited,” she
said. What really stood out for Calder in Mexico City was that, “outside the show, these people were selling all this fake merch with hijacked images; it was a really funny moment,” she said. Calder made sure to buy some of the counterfeits as souvenirs.
Before joining the band, Calder was a member of the now defunct Immacu-late Machine. “I was in a group called The Reactions in high school, grade 12,” Calder said, “But Immaculate Machine was the first band where we went on tour and had fans, and people would come out to see us.” One of the biggest differences between Calder’s former group and The New Pornographers is that in the Immaculate Machine, “We all wrote the songs together, in the same room,” she said. “In The New Pornographers [New-man] and [Dan Bejar] do the writing.” Calder’s role in the creation of the group’s music is geared more towards arranging her keyboard parts. “I come up with ideas and then [Newman and Bejar] sort of decide what’s cool,” she said. “It’s a messy process and I never really know what they’ll keep.”
Being largely absent from the song writ-ing process is, in part, the reason Calder decided to start her solo project. “I started writing my solo album partly for my mother, who was dying at the time. I wanted to do it for her and I wanted to know what my
own music sounded like,” she said, “I had spent all this time making music in a group and I didn’t even know what my own music was.” Whatever the project, Calder feels a link to all the music she helps create: “I feel connected with both [projects]. In The New Pornographers, I like to find my space within the larger picture,” she said, “They fulfill different artistic roles for me.”
Calder only recently started thinking of her future in music though, “When I joined the band I had no idea. I never thought that far in advance,” the 32-year-old said, “You never really know. An opportunity would come-up and I would just take it without thinking ‘oh, this will be good for my career.’ I still don’t really know, but we just keep going,” she said. “I know I’ll always be mak-ing music, but it was only in like the last five years or so that I started thinking long term.”
JUSTINAS STASKEVICIUS THE CONCORDIAN
BRENT PEARSON
The latest measles outbreak and why you should vaccinateGINA MARTELL NEWS & SPORTS EDITOR
The resurgence of anti-vaccination rhetoric in the face of the latest measles outbreak has me hopping mad. Repeatedly regurgitated opinions peppered with pop-pycock such as references to outdated or invalid sources, strong emphases on corre-lational relationships and the words “just a theory” seem to be evidence of widespread scientific illiteracy more than anything. In an age where so much of our life is dependent upon science and the technologies it pro-duces, most of the population appears out-right incapable of critical evaluation. Most people can get by in Canada’s education system without ever learning about concept that are fundamental to understanding the world around them and how to think criti-cally for themselves. Instead, most rely on whatever information is most accessible to them without questions. To me, this is the cause of the pervasiveness of anti-vaccina-tion sentiments and the myths that fuel them.
Most young people in Canada have never experienced or seen the effects of measles and other contagious diseases because vac-cines have essentially eliminated them, so they no longer appears to be a real threat to us. However, before the measles vaccine was developed and stringent sanitation measures were put in place, the illness was a very real threat and a leading cause of death amongst children. It is still a leading cause of death
in some countries, however here in Canada it’s practically exotic – a disease of the past. We are not aware of how serious a measles outbreak can be or how crappy it is to have, so we aren’t particularly motivated to pro-tect ourselves from infection. However if we do not continue to vaccinate ourselves and our children, the threat of contagious disease may very well rear its ugly head once again. In fact, it’s already beginning to do just that.
“Vaccines make me sick”: this is a com-mon reason for why people choose not to be vaccinated however it is usually accompa-nied by an ignorance of how vaccines and the immune system work. So here’s a little bit of background for those of you that don’t know: once your immune system fights off a contagious disease, your immunity to that strain of the disease is heightened and your immune system is better equipped to fight off infection – for example, most people only ever come down with the chicken pox once in their life. Vaccines contain a weak-ened form of the disease they are meant to prevent and this allows your immune system to eliminate the disease with minimal risk to your health with the benefit of increased immunity. However, sometimes you will have symptoms of the disease after being vaccinated, such as a fever. Some symptoms associated with disease are actually caused by your immune system – a fever raises your body’s internal temperature to levels that some pathogens cannot thrive in, killing them off or reducing their fitness. Addition-
ally, people that come into contact with a disease soon before or after receiving their vaccine can still become sick – both diseases and vaccines takes a little while to kick in.
Anti-vaxxers often credit the dramatic decrease in deaths caused by contagious dis-eases to the widespread increase in sanita-tion measures in the mid-20th century, con-veniently coinciding with the development of many vaccines. While awareness of how diseases are spread and the resulting empha-sis on sanitation did reduce the spread of dis-ease, this is not evidence for the ineffective-ness of vaccines – it is merely evidence that there is more than one way to reduce disease in a population. Sanitation may reduce the likelihood that we come into contact with pathogens but by no means does it fully protect us. In general, people and places are more hygienic than they used to be, but that doesn’t mean every place or person is sani-tary. Even if we obsessively disinfect our own homes, we would still often come into con-tact with less than adequately clean people and environments in our daily life. In reality, you would probably be labelled as obsessive compulsive if you actually did all that you could to prevent disease through sanitation – even then you wouldn’t be 100% protected. Even the exceptionally strict sanitation pro-tocols followed by doctors and nurses fight-ing Ebola (which is not as contagious as measles) don’t prevent their infection and many risk their lives to treat the disease.
The more people that are vaccinated, the
stronger our herd immunity is. This means that as the number of people protected against a particular disease increases, the number of people at risk decreases because they are less likely to come in contact with the disease. Some people believe that those who believe vaccinations protect them will be vaccinated anyway, making herd immunity irrelevant. This is entirely untrue – some people can’t be vaccinated, and these people are often the ones that have the most to lose. Infants that are under a year old cannot be vaccinated as well as some elderly people and immuno-compromised individuals (such as those with AIDs and leukemia) – mostly because they are not strong enough to fight off the weak-ened disease found in vaccines, let alone the actual disease. Increasing our herd immunity protects these vulnerable individuals. By not protecting ourselves, we put others that are less well equipped to deal with the disease at risk. Deciding whether or not you should be vaccinated affects everyone around you, not just yourself. If you are fond of travel-ling to foreign and exotic countries, I suggest you look into what happened when diseases such as measles and smallpox were intro-duced to Native Americans during the colo-nization of the new world. Let me spoil the ending for you: up to 95% of Native Ameri-cans were wiped out in 150 years because, unlike Europeans, they did not have a natural immunity to these diseases. Some people are much more at risk than others, especially in areas that have had minimal exposure to the
CONTINUED ON PAGE 8...
6 Caper TimesThursday, February 12 , 2015
We asked students how they cope with university stress...Taylor White, CBU“I do go to the gym to clear my head,
sometimes I take my books to the gym and read them there, then it doesn’t feel so much
like schoolwork.”
Katie Sammon, DAL Law Graduate
Blair Thompson, CBU
Larissa Anthony, SMU
Nicole McNeil, CBUMatthew Moore, CBU
Tess Carrigan, CBU
“Denial.”
“Exercise helps relieve a lot of my stress that comes from
school, yoga is great because when you’re doing it, it’s the only thing that you think
about because you’re focusing on the poses
rather than how many papers you have to
write.”
“I literally just go to sleep. Can’t stress if
you’re not conscious.”
“Take a breather and tell myself it will all
be worth it in the end and all I can do is give it my best. Then watch some Netflix for a bit
and resume to my school work.”
“Take a few minutes to put things into perspective… like telling myself that
my life will not end if my assignment is not perfect or a day late.”
“Generally, I find the best way to relieve stress is to window shop for vacations
in locations that are above 20 degrees
Celsius right now.”
Nicole MacDougall, CBU Graduate
Gina Martell, CBU
Amanda Vaughn, NMSU
John Bury, CBU
“If I’m not careful I end up not relaxing at all until whatever
it is that was stressing me goes away, but to distress I spend time
on my own, doing creative things. Go to Starbucks with a magazine to collage or sketch or write or
sit in Harvard Square and people watch (my personal favourite). If I’m too overwhelmed to go anywhere I take
a really, really long shower.”
“To de stress I would walk around campus,
go eat with friends, on Fridays I would go out for a drink with friends at the local
spot... I also read a lot of non required texts... I had written to relieve stress in high school, but found writing to induce anxiety once I was at university. I also did yoga and
crocheted when I had time.”
“Sticking my head in the sand while it piles it into an even more
looming a threat in the background.”
“Hot bubble bath. Glass of red wine/chocolate on extra
stressful days.”
Bea Govani, LU
“First, I try to minimize it by preventing it – I was always a
procrastinator in high school but now I know that it’s a lot less stressful to give yourself ample time to get things done, so I try to make school
work a priority. When I do mess up and
have to deal with a hairy situation, such as cramming for a
midterm, I just focus on putting in my
best effort because I know that it’s the only thing that’s going to help. Putting things
into perspective can do wonders but
sometimes it’s difficult to do – that’s when I meditate. Meditation is both physically and mentally beneficial, relaxing your body and providing you
with peace of mind. It has myriad other
benefits and you only need to do it for about
five minutes!”
The Long, Tragic History of Head Trauma in Professional SportsAARON SAMPSONSPORTS REPORTER
Before you start reading this, go on You-Tube and look up “Scott Stevens hits Paul Kariya.” In it, you will see one of the small-est players in NHL history get blindsided by one of the largest, getting hit directly on the head. Kariya lay motionless on the ice, his visor filling with steam at one point as if he had started breathing again. But per-haps the most shocking thing about this for newer hockey fans is what happened after the hit: nothing. Stevens was not suspended, he was not fined - he was not even penal-ized, because hits like that were not against the rules. They were encouraged, even cel-ebrated, and no one was better than Stevens at dishing them out. Fast forward to the pres-
ent day, with all we’ve learned about head trauma and concussions, and such a hit looks horrific. Kariya is one of many players whose career was mired with concussion issues. He, along with Eric Lindros - another player who was on the receiving end of a famous hit from Stevens - have become poster boys for the discussion about player safety and head trauma in the NHL. Their subsequently shortened careers, full of lost potential, are part of a discussion on how all sports are struggling to find a balance between pro-ducing an entertaining, physical product, while keeping players safe and healthy.
The discussion about head trauma in sports arguably began outside the world of competitive sports. In 2007, professional wrestler Chris Benoit was found dead in his
home, along with his wife and son. It soon became apparent that Benoit had murdered his family before taking his own life. While Benoit is ultimately solely responsible for his actions, many questioned whether the repeated head trauma Benoit had suffered over the years (his signature move was a div-ing head-butt off the top rope) had affected his mental state at the time of the incident. This vaulted the issue of head trauma in sports into the national conversation. Research demonstrating the severe consequences that repeated concussions have on the physical and mental health of athletes began to reveal a strong link between repeated head trauma and a slew of serious medical conditions.
The Benoit tragedy caused an outpour-ing of public support for the increased pro-
tections for athletes, especially in the more physically intense contact sports hockey and football. During the 2011NHL offseason, three players, aged 27, 28 and 35 respectively were found dead, two of which were ruled suicides. All three were known as enforc-ers (aka fighters) in the league and all three had suffered repeated concussions. Weeks before his death, 35-year-old Wade Belak opened up about his battle with depression and the impact that his enforcer role had had on his mental well-being. These three tragic deaths caused the NHL to rapidly accelerate its efforts to prevent and reduce concussions. Rules were implemented to protect players’ heads and if any sort of head trauma were to occur, the player would receive a thorough examination by medical officials not affiliated
CONTINUED ON PAGE 7...
7 Caper TimesThursday, February 12 , 2015
with his team before being allowed to return.The NFL experienced a similar series
of tragedies that forced it to rethink its own concussion protocol. A much more physical game than hockey, football players take hits to the head far more frequently. Repeated concussions in NFL players have been linked to Chronic Traumatic Encephalopa-thy, a neurological disorder that is known to cause dementia, depression, anxiety, and aggression. CTE can only be diagnosed post-mortem and, unfortunately, several tragic and premature deaths of both active and retired NFL players have produced far too many subjects to diagnose. When retired NFL player Dave Duerson commit-ted suicide in 2011, he left a note asking to have his brain tested for CTE. His request was heeded and it was found that he did indeed have CTE. Since then, the brains of 34 deceased NFL players have been tested, with 33 coming back positive for CTE. One of those players was Junior Seau, who committed suicide in May of 2012. Despite never having been diagnosed with a concus-sion during his career, he tested positive for CTE, suggesting that the league was neg-ligent in taking care of its players. After 25-year-old Kansas City Chiefs linebacker Jovan Belcher murdered his girlfriend before shooting himself at his team’s practice facil-ity, the NFL could no longer ignore the pub-lic pressure to do something about the safety of its athletes. Protocols similar to that of the NHL were introduced and they cracked down on hits to the head. Nevertheless, the NFL still faces a massive lawsuit from for-mer players, alleging they were negligent in protecting them from head trauma. If the players win the lawsuit, there could be severe financial implications for the league.
It is unquestionable that both the NFL and the NHL have taken massive steps to increase player safety and protect them from head trauma. However, for many athletes, the damage has already been done, and trag-edies like the ones described above will con-tinue to occur. Where the respective leagues go from here is unclear. Ultimately, it is up to the fans and what kind of product they wish to see, as well as the tradeoffs they are willing to make. No sport will ever be com-pletely free of risk however - professional athletes will continue to put great strain on their bodies and minds in order to entertain fans and earn a living. But it is hard to deny that the sporting world is at a better place now that it was a decade ago. We are see-ing significantly fewer careers shortened as a result of head trauma and far more atten-tion paid to player safety than ever before.
The Glace Bay High School Pan-thers have won the 2015 Red Cup Hockey Championship after defeating the Memorial Marauders 7-3 in the championship game. Sydney Academy fell 2-0 in the consolation game to Dr. J.H. Gillis. Hosts Riverview Redmen were originally scheduled to face Gillis, but were ejected from the tournament following a physical altercation between players and coaches after their game against the Dalbrae Dragons, who were also ejected.
Glace Bay Panthers win 2015 Red CupAARON SAMPSONSPORTS REPORTER
HEAD TRAUMA CONTINUED... Election results
of ‘we didn’t know,’ or that excuse that I often use, which is ‘I can only speak to my own clients,’” he said. “Now I kind of know what my clients are
6% CONTINUED...
of ‘we didn’t know’, or that excuse I often use, which is ‘I can only speak to my own clients,’” he said. “Now I kind of know what my clients are saying in the con-text of people in general, and we’ve got to put some money and resources and strate-gic planning into where the problems are.”
Your Student’s Union President Is...
Your Executive Vice President Is...Elizabeth Quirk
Brandon Ellis
8 Caper TimesThursday, February 12 , 2015
VACCINATIONS CONTINUED...
disease. Measles has an incubation period of 10-14 days, so you could carry the dis-ease to another country unwittingly, poten-tially causing an epidemic if vaccination is not common in that country. So if you’re thinking of travelling and you’re not up to date on your vaccinations… Maybe don’t.
Many people are also concerned about the trace amounts of potentially dangerous ingredients found in vaccines. For example, there are trace amounts of heavy metals such as aluminum in some vaccines. This sounds frightening; however babies receive much more aluminum in breast milk and formula than they do in a vaccine. Some vaccines also have small amounts of compounds con-taining mercury within them, yet most of us don’t think twice about the mercury con-tent of fish. And I’m sure most of us eat fish much more often than we receive vaccines. Many substances you are exposed to on a daily basis are lethal when you are exposed to enough of it; however in trace amounts your body has no problem eliminating most of these. Arguments that cite that a substance can be lethal or adversely affect your health given the proper amount capture audiences with their shock factor but mean very little in actuality unless they can demonstrate that the vaccine actually contains this amount or sub-stantially contributes to it. Many of these so-called dangerous ingredients, such as thimer-osal, are no longer found in vaccines anyway.
Some anti-vaxxers cite examples from the 20th century in which vaccines were not entirely effective in preventing the spread of disease to support the claim that vaccina-tion is not synonymous with immunization. These were often newly developed vaccines and vaccines have been greatly improved since then – decades of scientific research can change a lot, making these examples just about irrelevant. No one ever really claimed that vaccines make you immune anyway and even so, it’s a hell of a lot closer to immuni-zation than anything anti-vaxxers might have up their sleeves. Even if it doesn’t make you immune to disease, it greatly decreases your chances of being infected, especially with herd immunity. Vaccines aren’t perfect but nothing really is – plus they do not have to be 100% effective all the time to be beneficial.
What about all of the potential side effects and complications? Pretty much every medical treatment has potential side effects – if the side effects of vaccines deter you, it would be hypocritical for you to even use aspirin or undergo minor surgery. But we do it anyway because the benefits outweigh the potential risks. Many of the more severe side effects listed on information labels are extremely rare and depend upon differences
in individual physiologies. When they say that a certain drug increases the risk of some-thing, it may only be an increase from 1 to 2 in 10,000. They are merely legally obligated to make you aware of the risks – otherwise, they could be sued if someone experienced these side effects. Just one case may cost a company millions in legal fees and com-pensations. Additionally, the probability of contacting measles without vaccination is much higher than the probability of expe-riencing the side effects of the drug. While complications associated with vaccines are rare enough for them to be approved by the FDA, complications associated with measles itself are relatively common and can have a lasting effect on your health.
“My grandpa never got vaccinated and he never had the measles” I’ve heard a lot of
people say things along these lines for mul-tiple diseases and my response is: that’s great for your grandpa but it means nothing to me. Anecdotal evidence is the lowest form of evidence – there’s a lot of variation amongst individuals. Not being vaccinated doesn’t guarantee you will contact the disease – maybe their grandpa was just old-fashioned lucky. In any case, you should never believe something will always happen just because it happened to one person or even a few persons.
Perhaps the most frustrating of all vac-cine myths is that the MMR vaccine, a rou-tine shot for children to prevent measles, mumps and rubella, is linked to autism. This myth has been repeated over and over and is largely based upon one small study whose results could not be replicated. Data was fudged, information was fabricated, the few participants in the study were cherry picked, the researchers were financially motivated to
produce certain results, the findings could not be replicated… In other words, the study was total bull as far as science is concerned. Basi-cally, some pharmaceutical company wanted to sell an alternative treatment to people and decided to do so by scaring them into think-ing that they could be responsible for giving their children autism by using the MMR vac-cine. Unfortunately, once someone is fright-ened by some piece of information, they often listen to it just in case it’s true. Remember to be critical of the interpretations of results and the credibility of the researcher. It’s gen-erally okay to trust something that has been rigorously tested by many different scientists with the same results, however new research whose findings haven’t yet been replicated in another study should always be questioned.
Another seri-
ous error is thinking that correlation implies causation. When researching this article, I came across an anti-vax mother that said she researched the subject for months before deciding not to vaccinate her baby. She listed the reasons for not vaccinating her child, and this was one:
” The drastic increase of the number of vaccinations given over the past 30 years. And what do we have to show for it? Sky rocketing sickness, disease, allergies, ADHD, autism and other signs of illness. I’m not suggesting that vaccinations are the only cause for these increases, but I do think they are a factor.”
Off the top of my head, I can think of quite a few things that happened over the last 30 years that could account for some of these, such as a massive increase in popula-tion sizes and increased urbanization. How-ever I’m not going to jump to conclusions - just because two things coincide doesn’t
mean one caused the other. Just think of how ridiculous it would be if this were valid evi-dence; I might as well attribute the onset of puberty to my dog since it seemed to happen shortly after I adopted her – except I wouldn’t because that is scientifically absurd. While most of us know dogs don’t trigger puberty, we are less knowledgeable concerning other causal relationships and are more suscep-tible to believing that a correlation implies causation if we don’t know much about the subject. The author had no evidence beyond correlation to include vaccinations as a fac-tor therefore I dismissed the argument. Addi-tionally, there has been a dramatic decrease in contagious disease following measures to introduce vaccination. According to the World Health Organization, measles vaccina-tion resulted in a 75% drop in measles deaths between 2000 and 2013 worldwide. This prevented an estimated 15.6 million deaths.
As for you conspiracy theorists that believe pharmaceutical companies just want to frighten you into vaccinating your-self so they can make a pretty penny… why not simply avoid everything that is sold to make money? And what makes it so impos-sible to profit from a product that is safe and effective? Plus it would be a pretty intense conspiracy, with thousands of doctors and researchers in on it. Companies would need to spend a lot more money maintaining the illusion than they would receive in selling vaccines. Maybe I’m just naïve though…
In conclusion, the benefits of vaccina-tion by and large outweigh the risks. Most of us expose ourselves to greater health risks on a daily basis anyway, even if we aren’t aware of it. Of course I’m not the most cred-ible source myself – as a second year sci-ence student, I have a basic scientific back-ground but calling that a qualification would be laughable. My experience with science helps me make informed decisions and I have researched the subject myself, however I encourage you to research it for yourself rather than take what I say at face-value. Think critically about the logic behind argu-ments; question the credentials and potential motivations of sources; seek out recent, pub-lished and peer-reviewed scientific literature as your most reliable source; know that cor-relation does not imply causation and anec-dotal evidence is the lowest form of evidence.
Remember – you need to be regularly vaccinated to receive the full benefits, so please make sure your booster shots are up to date if you do support vaccination.
SANOFI PASTEUR
Four’s a Crowd: Dating with Depression and AnxietyCELINE COOKEARTS & LIFESTYLE EDITOR
It’s pretty much unanimous that dating, while painfully awkward, is a necessary evil. You are constantly re-evaluating and renego-tiating your feelings; watching your tongue so you don’t say the wrong thing; trying to divide your attention between listening and contributing to conversation while avoid-ing walking into a door or wall… Not to mention the constant self-monitoring one does while eating, trying to make sure noth-ing is on your face or caught between your teeth while trying not to stain that cute top you’re wearing. It’s an exhausting affair - not meant for the faint of heart. Imagine all those rational and irrational anxieties with a low to non-existent sense of self-worth on top of them. Now you’ve just imag-ined dating with depression and anxiety.
This has been my reality for about a third of my life now, though it is only recently that I sought out the help that I needed. In that period, my dating life was non-existent, as was my life in general. After my first foray into post-secondary education was a failure (to put it nicely), I retreated back home to reassess where I wanted to go in life. Slowly,
things got better as I sought out the help I needed after I realized that it was my one way out of the pit I fell into, which now included a second failed foray into post-secondary education. Following the advice I was given, I began reading into thought traps and other related things. This helped me at the time and it still continues to help me.
Before trying to date with depression and anxiety, my first suggestion is that you edu-cate yourself. You won’t feel as much like an odd man out and you’ll realize how common both disorders really are. Depending on how long you’ve been ill, you may need time to redefine yourself. Illness can become a large part of one’s identity to the point of being all-consuming. You need to remind yourself that you are not your illness and it’s just another thing that you had no control in determining. You do, however, have a role in determining what road you take from illness to wellness.
When actually dating, try to keep things in perspective. Acknowledge that some of your thoughts may stem from distorted think-ing, so you should question the validity of these thoughts. The other thing that helps is being honest. This is important in all relation-ships but it is of special importance in rela-tionships where one or more individuals are
struggling with depression or anxiety. Being upfront about your illnesses and the feel-ings that come with them can be an empow-ering experience in a relationship. This makes miscommunications easier to avoid and lessens the thought traps either of you could fall into concerning your relationship.
As a partner of someone who has depression or anxiety, there are many things you can do to help. Patience is the key here. Talk through your partner’s distorted thoughts with them in a rational manner and help them see exactly how distorted they are. Accept that sometimes your partner may become withdrawn and that this is a part of their illness, not a reflection of you or the relationship. Check in on them every once in a while when this happens to make sure they’re okay, both mentally and physically.
While a relationship with someone who is coping with mental illness can be just as rewarding as any other relationship, they can be just as toxic as well. Any relationship should be rewarding, and shouldn’t feel drain-ing all the time. Some people learn to take on the role of sickness instead of learning how to help themselves. If this is the case, get out before you burn out. Taking care of a partner is great, but you need to make sure that your
own health and wellness are your priority.One thing I did while in one of my
depressed periods was binge watch tele-vision shows, which included Doctor Who and RuPaul’s Drag Race. The lat-ter always ended the show by saying: “If you can’t love yourself, how the hell are you going to love somebody else?” I can’t disagree more with this statement, espe-cially when you’re depressed. It’s easy to see faults in yourself, and this shouldn’t keep you from searching for love; a part-ner can offer a much needed reality check.
