Schizophrenia: Three Moms in the Trenches

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Guests: Rakesh Jain, MD, and Sherland Peterson, who has experience living with TD

More than 14 million Americans have a serious mental illness, such as bipolar disorder, major depressive disorder or schizophrenia – conditions that can be treated with antipsychotic medicines. Use of these medicines has increased 22% in recent years, particularly within the last 10 years, in turn increasing the risk of a debilitating chronic movement condition called tardive dyskinesia (TD), which can cause uncontrollable and repetitive movements that make eating, drinking and walking difficult.

While TD can be treated, integrating new medicines into existing treatment plans can be difficult, and people living with schizophrenia may worry that treating TD could cause regression in their mental illness. A one-pill, once-daily treatment option exists that can be integrated into existing mental health treatment plans, helping people manage their mental health and TD in tandem.

We Ask:

Dr. Jain:

·       What is tardive dyskinesia and what are the common signs and symptoms of this condition?

·       What is the connection between tardive dyskinesia and the use of antipsychotics, and what are the primary challenges that patients and doctors face when treating this condition?

·       What is this one pill, once-daily treatment option and why is it an important option to consider?

·       Where can people go to learn more?

Sherland:

·       Can you share your personal story of living with tardive dyskinesia?

·       What impact has tardive dyskinesia had on your life, from daily activities, to your mental health and social events?

·       What do you wish more people knew about tardive dyskinesia?

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Mindy and her book: https://mindygreiling.com/

Randye and her book: https://randyekaye.com/

Miriam and her book: https://www.miriam-feldman.com/

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Randye Kaye
Mindy Greiling
Miriam (Mimi) Feldman

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Guest: Laura M . Brancato, Esq. - Elder Law And Vulnerable Client Specialist

“As an attorney and an advocate, my mission is to provide specialized legal advice and support to families with vulnerable loved ones. With a focus on mental health, special needs, elder law, substance abuse disorders and related matters, I am dedicated to helping clients navigate complex legal landscapes and achieve the best possible outcomes for their families.”

TEXT re HIPAA and patient privacy  (link below):

Even when the patient is not present or it is impracticable because of emergency circumstances or the patient’s incapacity for the covered entity to ask the patient about discussing her care or payment with a family member or other person, a covered entity may share this information with the person when, in exercising professional judgment, it determines that doing so would be in the best interest of the patient.

Past Episodes: Conservatorship, ep. 6

Judge Lisa Wexler on Mental Health and Legal Matters, ep. 12 and 13

SSDI: Ep. 50

Laura on LinkedIn:

https://www.linkedin.com/in/laura-m-brancato-67728814/

Video on Silver Hill website:

https://silverhillhospital.org/community/video/families-in-a-double-bind-the-need-for-legal-advice-in-navigating-the-psychiatric-health-system-by-laura-brancato-esq/

HHS and HIPAA:

https://www.hhs.gov/hipaa/for-professionals/faq/488/does-hipaa-permit-a-doctor-to-discuss-a-patients-health-status-with-the-patients-family-and-friends/index.html

Thanks for liking and sharing the podcast! 

Mindy and her book: https://mindygreiling.com/

Randye and her book: https://randyekaye.com/

Miriam and her book: https://www.miriam-feldman.com/

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Randye Kaye
Mindy Greiling
Miriam (Mimi) Feldman

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Guests: Natasha Williams and Liz  Sjaastad

Natasha Williams  -The Parts of Him I Kept: The Gifts of My Father's Madness  (Natasha’s book) is an intimate account of a daughter’s coming of age in the face of her father’s schizophrenic unraveling. Williams investigates the limits of our medical and cultural understanding of schizophrenia while chronicling the shared burden and benefits of caring for a mentally ill family member.

Liz Sjaastad - Liz has written a memoir, You’re Too Young to Understand, about growing up with, and then caring for, her father – a quiet Russian immigrant, an intellectual who drank too much and her mother – a smart and proper beauty who suffered with the life-altering brain illness of schizophrenia, though she never acknowledged it. 

We ask: 

If you could give one piece of advice to a child with parents like yours, what would it be?

When did you begin to understand?

Did your family life affect your siblings differently? If so, how?

Have you forgiven your parents and if so when and how?

When did you think your children were old enough to understand? How did you talk with them?

Have you stopped fearing for yourself getting a serious mental illness? Your children?

LINKS:

Liz Sjaastad

[email protected]

www.lizsjaastad.com

Facebook

Instagram

NatashaWilliams:

https://www.natashawilliamswriter.com/

Thanks for liking and sharing the podcast! 

Mindy and her book: https://mindygreiling.com/

Randye and her book: https://randyekaye.com/

Miriam and her book: https://www.miriam-feldman.com/

Support the show

Please share and support the podcast so we can reach more people who need the info and support.

Want to know more?
Join our facebook page 
Our websites:
Randye Kaye
Mindy Greiling
Miriam (Mimi) Feldman

Send a Text to the Moms - please include your contact info if you want a response. thanks!

Guest: Regina Graham, MD (she/her)

Medical Director of Early Psychosis Programs,

Health Sciences Clinical Professor

UC Davis School of Medicine

According to the National Institute of Mental Health, nearly one in five U.S. adults live with a mental illness ( 52.9 million people in 2020). While People of Color (POC) have rates of mental health disorders similar to Whites, these disorders are more likely to last longer and result in more significant disability for POC. Most mental illness goes untreated, especially in communities of color. Fifty-two percent of Whites with AMI received mental health services in 2020, compared to 37.1% of Blacks and 35% of Hispanics.

Dr. Graham is a child, adolescent, and adult psychiatrist, with expertise in intensive mental health settings -- including inpatient, residential, and emergency interventions -- working with vulnerable populations. She has a passion for prodromal, early and first-episode psychosis and its management utilizing specialized care models to optimize outcomes for patients, their families, and communities.

Definition of Minoritized Communities:

• Groups who have experienced systemic discrimination and marginalization due to factors like race, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, or socioeconomic status
• Groups excluded from opportunities and power structures in our society

Questions:

• How does cultural background impact the experiences of schizophrenia for the individual and their loved ones?
• How could trauma impact members of minoritized communities with schizophrenia?
• How are members of minoritized communities with schizophrenia being served in mental health services, and what are the barriers to treatment?
• Specific story about how individuals from minoritized communities with schizophrenia hesitate in seeking treatment during a crisis?

Thanks for liking and sharing the podcast! 

Mindy and her book: https://mindygreiling.com/

Randye and her book: https://randyekaye.com/

Miriam and her book: https://www.miriam-feldman.com/

Hosts:

Who:

Randye Kaye - was a morning Radio Personality bringing humor to CT families when her own son was diagnosed with schizophrenia. Now she is still a Broadcaster, Actress, Voice Talent, Speaker, and Author (Ben Behind his Voices, Happier Made Simple)

Miriam Feldman -  is an artist, writer, and the mother of an adult son with schizophrenia. Her book, He Came in With It chronicles her family's story and was released to rave reviews on July 21st, 2020.

Mindy Greiling - Mindy Greiling was a member of the Minnesota House of Representatives for twenty years. She helped found the nation's first state mental health caucus, which successfully lobbied for a significant increase in Minnesota's mental health funding Her acclaimed memoir is Fix What You Can.

Support the show

Please share and support the podcast so we can reach more people who need the info and support.

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Our websites:
Randye Kaye
Mindy Greiling
Miriam (Mimi) Feldman

Send a Text to the Moms - please include your contact info if you want a response. thanks!

• Letters…we get letters…well, actually emails, comments, and messages. In this episode we do our best to respond with perspective, information and resources.
• Please know that we are not doctors, cannot prescribe medication - nor do we know all the legalities and resources in each state or country (hello, international listeners!) - but, often, our guests do.

Her are some of the episodes we mention for your references:

108. Should our Loved One with SMI Live With Us?

99. What Will Happen When We’re Gone? Trusts, Pooled Trusts and More

83. What Do I Do Now?: THE Handbook for SZ Caregivers: guest, Nicole Drapeau Gillen

71. Help and Tips for Families in Mental Illness Crisis: Treatment Advocacy Center

56. Housing That Heals: Essential for Many with SMI

50 and 70. Help! I Don’t Understand SSI/SSDI - guest: Dani Page, JD

33. Fellowship Place, One Supportive Community Fostering Mental Health

18. Rethinking Clozapine: Should it be the First Resort to Treat Schizophrenia? - with Dr. Robert Laitman

12 and 13. Let’s Talk about the Law - Mental Illness and Legal Matters (Judge Lisa Wexler

6. Conservatorship for Schizophrenia: Who Needs it? Why? and How?

Thanks for liking and sharing the podcast! 

Mindy and her book: https://mindygreiling.com/

Randye and her book: https://randyekaye.com/

Miriam and her book: https://www.miriam-feldman.com/

Support the show

Please share and support the podcast so we can reach more people who need the info and support.

Want to know more?
Join our facebook page 
Our websites:
Randye Kaye
Mindy Greiling
Miriam (Mimi) Feldman

Send a Text to the Moms - please include your contact info if you want a response. thanks!

Actionable strategies for these family members and friends who give so much but whose needs and sacrifices are often unappreciated. Written by clinical psychologist Dr. Michelle Sherman and her mother, DeAnne Sherman, an advocate and educator, the book provides:

• Tools to cope with difficult emotions
• Strategies to empower loved ones, including how to navigate the mental health system
• Communication and limit-setting skills
• Approaches to supporting loved ones who have experienced trauma or have PTSD
• Ways to manage common challenges, such as alcohol or drug misuse, and when a loved one declines professional help
• Strategies to support children
• Skills to build personal resilience and strengthen relationships

Links:

I Am Not Alone book:

https://www.seedsofhopebooks.com/i-m-not-alone

Loving Someone with Mental Illness book:

https://www.seedsofhopebooks.com/loving-someone-with-a-mental-illness-or-history-of-trauma

Website for Michelle and DeAnne (has free resources):

https://www.seedsofhopebooks.com/

Mindy and her book: https://mindygreiling.com/

Randye and her book: https://www.randyekaye.com/

Miriam and her book: https://www.miriam-feldman.com/

Support the show

Please share and support the podcast so we can reach more people who need the info and support.

Want to know more?
Join our facebook page 
Our websites:
Randye Kaye
Mindy Greiling
Miriam (Mimi) Feldman

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Guests:  Robert C. Smith, MD and  Vinod Srihari, MD, 

Every day, millions of Americans face untreated mental health challenges—and too often, their first point of contact is a medical doctor unequipped to help. Most physicians - and many others who teach and advise youth - aren’t trained to recognize or treat mental health conditions, yet they’re the ones patients turn to first. This gap in training has devastating consequences, contributing to the mental health crisis we see today.

Dr. Robert Smith, a seasoned physician and thought leader, is sounding the alarm: medical doctors need fundamental training in mental health care. His new book, Has Medicine Lost Its Mind? Why Our Mental Health System is Failing Us and What Should Be Done to Cure (Prometheus Books, March 4, 2025) addresses the poor state of mental health care in the US, why it occurred, what needs to be done, and how to accomplish this politically.

Our Second Guest, Vinod Srihari, MD, spearheads a new program in CT which has just been expanded to reach the whole state after a trial run in 10 towns around New Haven. STEP is a clinic staffed by mental health providers in different fields – psychology, psychiatry, nursing, and social work. This "interdisciplinary" team seeks to provide comprehensive care for individuals who are early in the course of a psychotic illness in order to prevent symptoms from becoming disabling.

We Find Out:

• Why so many mental health issues go untreated and misdiagnosed—and what it costs us as a society.
• The value of early detection and treatment in Mental illness to help with prevention and recovery
• How medical doctors can better address mental health needs with proper training. And tips on how patients should talk to doctors about mental health.
• The hidden consequences of the mind-body split in modern medicine. The importance of integrating mindfulness and exercise into "treatment."
• Practical solutions for integrating mental health care into the broader medical system.
• 
  

LINKS:

Bob’s website:

https://www.robertcsmithmd.com/

 Bob’s Book:

https://a.co/d/2yOHhlp

Mindmap:

https://mindmapct.org/

Mindy and her book: https://mindygreiling.com/

Randye and her book: https://www.randyekaye.com/

Miriam and her book: https://www.miriam-feldman.com/

Hosts:

Who:

Randye Kaye - was a morning Radio Personality bringing humor to CT families when her own son was diagnosed with schizophrenia. Now she is still a Broadcaster, Actress, Voice Talent, Speaker, and Author (Ben Behind his Voices, Happier Made Simple)

Miriam Feldman -  is an artist, writer, and the mother of an adult son with schizophrenia. Her book, He Came in With It chronicles her family's story and was released to rave reviews on July 21st, 2020.

Mindy Greiling - Mindy Greiling was a member of the Minnesota House of Representatives for twenty years. She helped found the nation's first state mental health caucus, which successfully lobbied for a significant increase in Minnesota's mental health funding Her acclaimed memoir is Fix What You Can.

Support the show

Please share and support the podcast so we can reach more people who need the info and support.

Want to know more?
Join our facebook page 
Our websites:
Randye Kaye
Mindy Greiling
Miriam (Mimi) Feldman

Send a Text to the Moms - please include your contact info if you want a response. thanks!

Eric J Dias is no stranger to the struggles people with addiction and severe mental illness experience. He has lived with schizoaffective disorder since he was a teenager. Eric has been a tireless advocate for people with SMI and their families. 

He writes about the many issues and emotions associated with SMI (Severe Mental Illness) in his novel, I Got Sober For This.

In the story, he weaves the stories with issues that affect us all, especially when it comes to SMI - in our homes, the courts, the streets, AA meetings,  detention centers, and the criminal justice system.

He currently hosts a show for the National Shattering Silence Coalition’s YouTube Channel interviewing people with lived experience with mental illness, care givers, advocates and clinicians.

We ask Eric about his story, his research, stigma, the need for community, and the power of hope in recovery.

Links:

I Got Sober for This book: https://a.co/d/4PV7Vh8

Mindy and her book: https://mindygreiling.com/

Randye and her books:  https://www.randyekaye.com/

Miriam and her book: https://www.miriam-feldman.com/ 

Randye’s substack: 

https://randyekaye.substack.com/

Support the show

Please share and support the podcast so we can reach more people who need the info and support.

Want to know more?
Join our facebook page 
Our websites:
Randye Kaye
Mindy Greiling
Miriam (Mimi) Feldman

Send a Text to the Moms - please include your contact info if you want a response. thanks!

Returning Guest: Brian Stettin. NYC City Hall’s senior advisor on severe mental illness.

In Episode 61, we interviewed Brian Stettin, senior advisor to the Mayor Eric Adams administration on severe mental illness.

Brian drafted the legislation that became Kendra's Law when he was an assistant attorney general in 1999, after a young journalist, Kendra Webdale, was shoved into an oncoming train by a young man from Queens with a long history of mental illness.

The  Adams administration's push was to have more severely mentally ill people brought to hospitals for psychiatric evaluation as compassionate intervention, and to change the state laws about the length of hospital stays.

This law is designed to apply to those who can't recognize their mental condition or take care of themselves, not just those who present an immediate threat to themselves or others.

Lately, with so many SMI and homelessness incidents in NYC making news (a homeless woman set on fire in the subway; a symptomatic mentally ill man’s death by chokehold; NY Governor Kathy Hochul’s support of getting help for those with SMI). we revisit this important issue. 

Almost two years later:

• How is the program going? 
• What are the successes and challenges? 
• What more can be done?

Links:

Randye’s blog posts about these issues:

https://randyekaye.substack.com/p/journalists-please-stop-saying-against?r=j36ce

https://randyekaye.substack.com/p/luigi-mangione-jordan-neely-where?r=j36ce

https://www.randyekaye.com/benbehindhisvoices/journalists-stop-saying-against-their-will-its-about-care-not-force

https://www.randyekaye.com/benbehindhisvoices/my-son-will-be-homeless-this-friday-heres-why-it-didnt-need-to-happen

https://www.randyekaye.com/benbehindhisvoices/luigi-mangione-jordan-neely-mental-illness-in-the-news-one-mothers-opinion

Articles About NYC’s Compassionate Intervention:

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/06/25/nyregion/mentally-ill-homeless-nyc.html?unlocked_article_code=1.n04.XLWi.cts0Q8s7hfkd&smid=url-share

https://gothamist.com/news/adams-launches-new-overnight-homeless-outreach-program-pairing-police-clinicians-on-nyc-subways

https://www.nydailynews.com/2024/12/10/the-penny-case-mental-health-law-too-many-sick-people-are-left-on-the-streets-and-subways-without-care/?share=eica4pteitwyw2rtyyca

https://www.nyc.gov/assets/home/downloads/pdf/press-releases/2022/Psychiatric-Crisis-Care.pdf

Support the show

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Our websites:
Randye Kaye
Mindy Greiling
Miriam (Mimi) Feldman

Send a Text to the Moms - please include your contact info if you want a response. thanks!

GUEST: Darrell E. Herrmann

WANT THE TRANSCRIPT? CLICK HERE

Millions of Americans are affected by psychosis, a condition that includes schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, and depression.

One man, Darrell Herrmann, is sharing his story in an effort to help others who may be diagnosed with similar conditions.

Herrmann, who holds a degree in physical science and served as a military officer, is diagnosed with schizophrenia and has lived with it for 40 years. 

Herrmann has written a book titled Straight Talk About Living with Severe Mental Illness. He hopes readers gain a better understanding of psychosis and how to adjust their lives to manage the condition.

We Ask:

• Your Story
• Your Views on Anosognosia
• Difference Between Hallucinations and Psychosis
• Thoughts About Anti-Psychiatry
• Your document on NSSC and your book
•  greatest frustrations with the family advocacy movement with regards to serious mental illness
• Re involuntary hospitalization; “A change in the delusion or a different hallucination can totally change the person’s patterns of action in moments. Remember to the person in psychosis the hallucinations and delusions are reality, and for example if he hears a voice that convinces him that someone is out to kill him, he may act in perceived self-defense and kill or harm that person. “
• “Currently the criterion for hospitalization is danger to self or others. This should become actively psychotic instead. ”

Darrell Herrmann - CURESZ Foundation (The guide to psychosis and psychotic illnesses  for NSSC)

NSSC_Guide Psych+Illnesses 

The YouTube video of Darrell's speech for NSSC on 6 June :
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hpR4Jv1o2Gk&t=684s

The article I published on LinkedIn titled "The Illusion Of Recovery Oriented Hospitals": Darrell Herrmann’s Post

A link to my book on Amazon (It can also be purchased through Barnes & Nobel)

Straight Talk About Living With A Severe Mental Illness: Herrmann, Darrell Ernest: 9781707189779: Amazon.com: Books

Mindy and her book: https://mindygreiling.com/

Randye and her book: https://www.randyekaye.com/

Miriam and her book: https://www.miriam-feldman.com/

Support the show

Please share and support the podcast so we can reach more people who need the info and support.

Want to know more?
Join our facebook page 
Our websites:
Randye Kaye
Mindy Greiling
Miriam (Mimi) Feldman