Health care better for EVERYONE?!

      In the exchange below I respond to the statements and positions of a person who thinks that mandatory government coerced insurance is the answer to the need for better health care.  My conclusion is that more freedom and less government will lead to more choices.  The more choices we have the better the chances of finding a policy right for each individual.  I propose that explicitly providing charity will actually serve our society and individual better.   Government coerced health care is certain to reduce health care quality, increase price and result in less charity because that is always the result of coercive government policies.

=============================================
Pro-Mandatory Health Insurance Person: 
       "I hate the word "entitlement." It assumes a lot of judgmental things about the people who use assistance in this country. The problem is that the "healthy" 25 year olds that have to take a gamble are more likely to be poor. As a 25 year old I opted out because I was in grad school and couldn't afford it. In the meantime I knew healthy 20 somethings who suddenly got very sick. At that time if I had gotten sick with cancer or such it would have been a preexisting condition and I would have been stuck. Making you pay extra for the big things is a way that the insurance company avoided having to pay for the big things while making more money off the fear/caution of those that had the means. Insurance is unaffordable for many in this country, but not because it has to be. It could be cheaper if insurance companies didn't need to make record profits each year. There are plenty of hard working people in this country who are one diagnosis away from financial disaster and neither the ACA or the ACHA will fix it.  Also, as a married 20 something I would have had to pay extra in case of pregnancy if I hadn't had the unusually good UMass insurance. Is that pro-life? I have since had all natural, insured births and still had a healthy balance afterwards.

Freedom Response:
    Entitlement is an attitude that some institution or individual should provide a service to another not by choice but out of a requirement dictated by social norms or government edict.  It merely names something that exists.  Right, wrong, judgmental the meaning of entitlement is what it is.  Why is it an emotional trigger for so many?  People do, in fact, feel entitled and that is merely a fact. 
    There are many things that contribute to the "unaffordable" insurance you speak of.  There are evil corporations seeking profit (got to have that one!)  There are politicians who are corrupted and supported by insurance companies and professional organizations who supply regulations and laws that favor thier biggest donors.  There are doctors seeking to maximize income through fraud, deceit, anxiety and fear.  There are hospital and medical equipment owners seeking to fetch the maximum price for use of equipment and facilities sometimes with excessive multiple charges in a single day or visit.  There are patients seeking to use insurance for elective surgeries such as sex changes, abortion, tubal ligation, vasectomies and plastic surgeries.  No matter how the government dictates people find some way to exact wealth and advantage at the expense of the person who needs the insurance.  No amount of Government coercion will change this fact.  The result is that government coercion only increases the pay off and makes insurance cost MUCH worse.
    Freedom is the answer.  When a policy becomes to expensive or corrupt people move to policies that are more reasonable and provide the services desired for the price they are willing to pay.  If the insured  are not personally paying then you can be assured that corruption in inefficiency will become the norm.  People are capable of making good choices when there are as many choices available as possible.  People are unable to make choices if the insurance policy is one they must select because it is mandated by rule of law.
    I just want my high deductible back that we had and then the government terminated arbitrarily.  That awesome plan was taken away from my family (HSA's are no longer allowed). We can no longer contribute and that contribution instead now goes to insurance executives. Why not give people freedom? Why force a particular "health care" view on everyone? Why tell others that they MUST pay in to a health care plan that they find objectionable? Why not let UMass offer the insurance nationwide and let others stay on the policy they WANT to have? 
     Our policy was terminated by rule of law. We had no choice. Despite the "promise" I did not get to "keep my policy". Meanwhile donor insurance companies laugh all the way to the bank (based on stock prices and splits since the boondoggle was delivered in 2008). A purchase is now REQUIRED by law, forced on everyone by fine and legal threat. Helps sell the product when the law requires the purchase! Insurance companies are so delighted! Take away the coercive force of law and and 20 million people flee the government yoke called "health care" by the press. Why? Maybe they know that "government care" is truly an oxymoron?
     We had 4 children via natural child birth and for 3 of them we paid cash to state approved midwives (in SC, TX) and did not use "insurance" at all (all in our 20's). It was far CHEAPER to do it that way than pay insurance premiums for that benefit (we were home the entire time-the midwife came and left our home). In that time we thought our insurance was for sickness, illness and disease and did not consider pregnancy a sickness, illness or disease. We liked it that way and is seemed pro life to us. So maybe the idea that policies WITHOUT pregnancy coverage are seen by some (like us) as pro-life because they are more affordable and free up more resources for our family. Just want you to know that there is another perspective.

============================================
Pro-Mandatory Insurance Person:
        "I was curious, and I looked up the cost of a home birth. It is about the same as what we had to pay out of pocket for a natural hospital birth (not counting premiums of course). We were able to do an interest free payment plan with the hospital, it would have been difficult for us to pay cash. And we have always been able to pay our bills, if not much more. And we have supportive families who we can rely on. Many people in this country cannot say as much, even working full time. Paying cash for a home birth (even without preemies, or NICU, or preeclampsia, or c-sections) is not affordable for every family. But then neither is the alternative. That's why I will restate my belief that our system should be much better for families than it is."

Response:
     The midwife was MUCH MUCH less for us at home than in the hospital combined with the very high premiums for the full policy.  I do count the premiums because the exact so much money over time (for us the high deductible was $500 less a month for the family per month!)  We looked into it and realized that in addition to the cost of the premiums, the room, the nursing care and the typical "hidden expenses and charges" at the hospital all meant multiple times more than just the midwife in our home. In Texas we had to have an ambulance on call but that was a standby deal (notification provided but not a call). Hospitals love complications and profit from c-sections as well. Guess what? They have much much more in the way of complications and c-sections than home births. Disability from hurried deliveries, brain damage from excess oxygen and complications from numerous other intrusive procedures appear to make hospital births very risky using available data. Yet no one discusses how dangerous hospital births can be. Why not look at the data? Is it possible that there is a lot of money to be made in "health care" using fear and anxiety as motivators? Is it possible that the insurance companies, hospitals and associated services have a vested financial interest in maintaining fear and anxiety about something that happens naturally and is not an illness? 
     Our sixth child was in the hospital due to projected possible complications (that did not happen) and it was 5 times the price as our latest home delivery (but ONLY double the out of pocket costs).
      It appears that your research (home vs. hospital) did not match our experience. I am not surprised. The data out there often does not match reality. I wonder why? Is there a vested interest in making sure the supplied data supports the present system income model (fear/anxiety provided to increase demand and price)? Why must the government force ALL to accept some "wonderful pro-life system" with laws, mandates, taxes, fines, penalties and jail. Does a "mandate" make anyone wonder besides me?
     Why FORCE us to accept federally mandated "health care" that we do not want? Why not let us choose a path we can emotionally and financially manage? What is wrong with freedom?  My point is that freedom allows people to choose their poison as well. By restricting my freedom I am definitely hurt.  It is so sad for me to see a country that once had people yearning for freedom now scramble to find ways and reasons to exchange it for medical care.
    Freedom will make ALL health care better than it is.  Less freedom will ALWAYS make it worse (as it has done).

==============================================
Pro-Mandatory Insurance Person: 
       "It doesn't seem right that riches can buy you better cures, unless you buy into the idea that rich people are all rich because of their many virtues (and therefore are more deserving), and poor people are all poor because of their many personal failings and therefore do not deserve it (never mind if they are children or the elderly, those entitled types, you know). I can never buy that."

Response:
     The incredibly wealthy Steve Jobs (multi-billionaire founder of Apple) found out that it doesn't matter how rich you are (he died of liver cancer in his 50's).  We all meet the same end no matter our wealth.  All the king horses and all the kings men could not put  Mr. Jobs back together again (there are lessons in those stories of old). Things happen to rich people and poor people alike.
     It is true that those who eat healthy foods, exercise, avoid unhealthy activities and have both parents as good examples tend to live better and longer. Those things (according to the raw data) combine to be the MOST unfair advantage of all (even more so than wealth). It is totally unfair that some understand that they are personally responsible for their health have better health than those who do not take responsibility. 
      How about the data? How about the fact that for the first time in a century mortality in the US increased as universally mandated insurance was implemented? Then Life expectancy declined! That is the exact opposite of what we were told "health care" would do.  The fact that this unexpected result happened is not discussed except in vary narrow terms.    
     Could the reason for opiate and medication deaths may be ease of access to narcotics and "health care"?  Do we have a system that benefits and profits from addiction.  Then our generous and corrupt government, with good public intentions, funds those enticing addiction and then those seeking to end addiction.  So many are then making a profit using the vulnerable to obtain government mandated funding. 
     Some people want out. Why not let them out? Why punish them with mandates, fines and threat of prison? We just love this discussion. Thank you for helping me understand better.

==============================================
Pro-Mandatory Insurance Person: 
      "The idea that everyone has control of their own health is problematic and puts an unfair value judgement on sick people. We can try to be healthy but we don't always have control. Preemies are born to healthy mothers. Environmental issues affect people's water without their knowledge. Others are born with genetic predisposition to cancer. We need to be careful not to blame people for getting sick."

Response:
It may be "problematic" and seem "judgmental" but reality requires that insurance and society recognize what reality tells us in the data and statistics. Generalizations ALWAYS have exceptions but that does not stop what generally happens. Yes there are obese, sedentary, heavy smokers that who drink heavily and abuse narcotics living long lives. That is not fair. Insurance will never make life fair any more than finding the pot at the end of a rainbow will make one rich.
I happen to think it is impossible for insurance to "make things fair". Insurance can only mitigate the suffering that befalls you. Insurance deals with generalizations. It happens that as a general rule people who live with less risk, who take PERSONAL responsibility for health, who eat wisely, live active lives, are engaged in service will in fact live longer AND better quality lives whether they are rich or poor, black, white, gay or straight. It has nothing to do with value judgement of those people.
Those unfairly burdened with genetic dispositions that take compensatory behavior will almost always do better than those who do nothing and then expect a government program to foot the bill after a disease becomes chronic. Then the same "victims" have the audacity to claim the treatment is not better because the taxpayer is not generous enough to cure the disease! To think that we can stop the rain from falling (on the just and unjust alike) and attempt to "make all life fair" is certain to end in BOTH a bankrupt and declining culture. Coming soon to a culture near us?
I happen to think freedom is the only way out. Genuine charity (not government coercion) is a real solution (example: St Jude's which treats thousands of victims without charge). Government edict and coercion will ALWAYS end with politicians enriching cronies and donors. That is the sad fact (more government means more corruption). Freedom and charity, in contrast to more government and coercion, are (in my view) the only way out of the mess. I am also confident that genuine charity will flower whenever there is freedom. A system that relies on coercion in the form of fines, mandates and seizure of assets from those unable to protect them will never work to make things fair. Those like me who are too poor to hire lawyers and accountants to hide assets are stuck and bullied and accused of being "judgmental".

Review: The Great PARTNERSHIP

The Great PARTNERSHIP

Science, Religion, and the

Search for Meaning

by Rabbi Jonathan Sacks

The book is organized, well researched and fluently written. Three parts of the book are followed by a letter to the scientific atheist.  The first part "God and the Search for Meaning" asserts that man is a meaning seeking animal that science alone can not, by itself, satisfy.   The second part addresses the question of "Why it matters" ending in a chapter titled "A meaningful life".  Part three addresses "Faith and Its Challenges" which addresses the confusion brought on by the modern understanding of evolution, why religion goes wrong, evil and the answer that addresses our need for meaning: God.  One of the finest parts of the book is the letter to the scientific atheist.

The truths we hold for life are often metaphors we have to manage our view of reality. They approximate reality, but if we mistake them for the literal truth we can make a leap too far.  The book early and often uses the separate hemispheres of the brain which are called upon to explain how religion and science relate to each other.   We must come to grips with the limits of the metaphor for that metaphor to serve us.  The author warns us that this is the trap of fundamentalism in the faithful and materialism in the scientific.

The author reminds us throughout the book that science breaks things down and analyzes them.  Religion creates and builds meaning.  He systematically juxtapositions treatment of faith and scientific reasoning so that the reader can clearly see the contrast.   In the end science and religion address different questions and when they overlap an issue it may be that there is a misunderstanding of religion or of the science or of both.

Surprising to me was the extensive treatment of culture and politics.  Eventually it dawned on me, because of the book's careful development, that science flourishes where there is freedom.  Freedom only flourishes where there is the recognition of the divine dignity because we are all made in the image of God.  The connection between freedom and science had escaped me until reading this book.  

The greatest feature of the book is the large number of quotes.  The impressive array of thoughtful reflections on the the place of faith and science in our lives as humans make this book a real treasure.  It is the type of book put on the shelf to be reread well into the future.

=======================

My highlighted quotes had to be redacted because there were so many.  In addition Rabbi Saks quotes a variety of writers and thinkers.

PART I: God and the Search for Meaning

   "Science takes things apart to see how they work.  Religion puts things together to see what they mean."                                                                                                                                   pg 2

    "When you treat things as they were people, the result is myth: light is from the sun god, rain from the sky god, natural disasters from the clash of deities, and so on.  Science was born when people stopped telling stories about nature and instead observed it; when, in short they relinquished myth.

     "When you treat people as if they were things, the result is dehumanization: people categorized by color, class or creed and treated differently as a result.  The religion of Abraham was born when people stopped seeing people as objects and began to see each individual as unique, sacrosanct, the image of God." 

                                                                                                                                     pg 3

    "Religion and Science [They] perform different functions and if one is damaged or the connections between them are broken, the result is dysfunction."

                                                                                                                                     pg 6

    "People who are confident in their beliefs feel no need to pillory or caricature their opponents.  We need genuine, open, serious, respectful conversations between scientists and religious believers if we are to integrate their different but cojointly necessary perspectives."

                                                                                                                                    pg 15

    "Faith begins with the search for meaning, because it is the discovery of meaning that creates human freedom and dignity.  Finding God's freedom we discover our own."

                                                                                                                                     pg 15

    "Science is the search for explanation.  Religion is the search for meaning. Meaning is not accidental to the human condition because we are a meaning seeking animal.  To believe on the basis of science that the universe has no meaning is to confuse two disciplines of thought: explanation and interpretation."

                                                                                                                                     pg 37

     "There is only one thing capable of defeating tragedy, which is a belief in God who in love sets his image on the human person, thus endowing each of us with non-negotiable, unconditional dignity."

                                                                                                                                     pg 38

     "Science takes things apart to see how they work.  Religion puts things together to see what they mean."

                                                                                                                                     pg 39
     "When the Hebrew Bible want to explain something, it does not articulate a theory.  It tells a story."

                                                                                                                                     pg 44

     "Europe lived with the heritage of Democritus and his successors who believed the physical universe was made up of atoms, and who thought in terms of the analysis of substances into the smallest component parts.  For the Chinese by contrast, 'Their universe was a continuous medium or matrix within which interactions took place, not by the clash of atoms but by radiating influences.'"

                                                                                                                                     pg 47

     "Argument appeals to verifiable truth, story appeals to verisimilitude, lifelikeness.  Argument comes together with theory, analysis, logical coherence and empirical testing.  Narrative speaks to imagination and the emotions."

                                                                                                                                     pg 53

     "There are truths we can express in systems, but others we can only tell through story.  There is a kind of knowledge for which we need detachment, but another kind of knowledge we can only achieve through attachment - through empathy and identification with an other."

                                                                                                                                     pg 54
     "Christendom drew its philosophy, science and art from Greece, its religion from Israel."

                                                                                                                                     pg 61
     "the rabbinic literature records a conversation between Rabbi Judah the Prince, head of the Jewish community in the early third century, and Antoninus, a Roman Sage, about when the soul enters the child. Rabbi Judah says, at birth. Antonius says, at conception.  The rabbi then astonishingly declares that Antoninus is right.  Thereafter, when he repeats the teaching, the rabbi is careful to say, 'Antoninus taught me this.'  This is a religious attitude to science both open-minded and willing to learn."

                                                                                                                                  pg 67

Genesis creation commentary:
     "It was as if from the outset Jews knew that science - what they called wisdom - was one thing, and religion another.  Natural laws are laws that predict and explain, moral laws are laws that command and constrain.  Science was about things, religion about people and their freely chosen acts."

                                                                                                                                     pg 68

    "Equally radical is the idea that, since God created everything, he is God of everywhere.  For the first time, God and religion are de-territorialised.  There is no longer a god of this place or that; a god of these people opposed to those.  Abrahamic universalism is born here. "

                                                                                                                                     pg 69
   "It is about a God who creates and makes a being, Homo Sapiens, able to create; a God who is free and bestows on his most cherished creation the gift of freedom.  Virtually everything that follows in the Bible is about this personal relationship between Creator and creation, at times tender, often tense."
                                                                                                                                    pg 70

  "Faith is not certainty. It is the courage to live with uncertainty."

                                                                                                                                     pg 97
  "God lives wherever we open our eyes to his radiance, our hearts to his transforming love."

                                                                                                                                     pg 98
PART II:  Why it Matters

   "When religious faith goes five things happen , gradually and imperceptibly.  First there is a loss of belief in human dignity and the sanctity of life....
    The second sign is the loss of the politics of covenant, the idea that society is a place where we undertake collective responsibility for the common good....
    The third is a loss of morality....words that once meant a great deal begin to lose their force - words like duty, obligation, honour, integrity, loyalty and trust...
     The fourth sign is the loss of marriage....
     The fifth is the possibility of a meaningful life...I mean life with meaning that comes from outside us, as a call, a vocation, a mission"

                                                                                                                                     pg 102-04
   "The fact that we  occupy a small space in the universe and a small stretch of the totality of time says nothing about our significance or lack of it."

                                                                                                                                     pg 118
   "For the sake of human dignity, science must be accompanied by another voice.  Not in opposition to science, but as the humanizing voice of what we call the soul.  There is no greater defense of human dignity that the phrase from the first chapter of the Bible that dared to call the human being 'the image of God.' "

                                                                                                                                     pg 127

Plato talking about signs of decline in the democracy of Athens:
     " 'People lose a sense of shame.  Rudeness is taken as a sign of sophistication.  People pursue the pleasure of the moment.  They lose respect for their leaders.  The young no longer defer to the old, and the old behave as if they are young.  The difference between the sexes is blurred.  People get irritated by the least touch of authority and they dislike any rules that inhibit their freedom to do as they like.'  [The Republic by Plato 560-64]
                                                                                                                                     pg 161

     "Faith is about relationship sustained without the use of power."

                                                                                                                                     pg 169
     "The story of the first humans in Genesis 2 begins with God giving Adam the ability to use language to classify things. He names the animals..."

                                                                                                                                     pg 174
     "Faith for the prophets, was a kind of marriage.  Marriage is an act of faith."

                                                                                                                                     pg 181
A Meaningful Life:
     "In the age of fiction - what has come to be called the postmodern condition - everything people once thought was true is now seen as merely constructed, invented, a fiction.  There is no truth any more, only the various stories humans devise to make sense of their lives...Of course, we can liberate oursleves from these naratives, but there is nothing to put in their place because we are now too sophisticated, too knowing."

                                                                                                                                     pg 195
     "Happiness is a state of being, not having, and still today, as it always did, it depends on a strong and stable personal relationship and a sense of meaning and purpose in life."

                                                                                                                                     pg 202
     "Love is what redeems us from the prison cell of the self and all the sickness to which the narcissistic self is prone - from empty pride to deep depression to a sense of nihilism and the abyss."

                                                                                                                                    pg 205
PART THREE:  Faith and Its Challenges

     "Science cannot solve the ultimate mystery of nature.  And that is because, in the last analysis, we ourselves are part of nature and therefore part of the mystery we are trying to solve."
                                                                                                                              by Max Planck

                                                                                                                                     pg 209
     "The way of testing a scientific hypothesis is to do science, not read scriptures.  The way of testing religion is to do religion - to ask, in total honesty, and full understanding, is this really what God wants of us?  It is not to make assertions about the truth or falsity of some scientific theory...
For if science is about the world that is, and religion about the world that ought to be, then religion needs science bacause we can not apply God's will to the world if we do not understand the world."

                                                                                                                                     pg 214
"Darwinism has immense religious implications.
     First is tells us that God delights in diversity...

     Second, and this is Darwin's wondrous discovery, the creator made creation creative...
     Third, we now know that all life derives from a single source.  That is a remarkable unexpected fact....
     Fourth, science and Genesis have now converged, in an utterly unexpected way, on the same metaphor.  Life is linguistic....discovery of DNA. It has hardware and software.  The cell is an information processing system...
    Fifth, the interconnectedness of all life."
                                                                                                                                     pg 215-9
     "If we give up in belief in the God of justice, we relinquish belief in objective reality and categorical imperative of justice also.  In such a world there is no comfort for the sufferer, no rebuke for the oppressor, no hope, just the stoic endurance of hopelessness."
                                                                                                                                     pg 240

     "Bad things happen when religion ceases to hold itself answerable to empirical reality, when it creates devastation and cruelty on Earth for the sake of salvation in heaven.  And bad things happen when science declares itself the last word on the human condition and engages in social or bio-engineering, treating humans as objects rather than as subjects, and substituting cause and effect for reflection, will and choice."
                                                                                                                                    pg 265

     "Human self consciousness lies at the heart of all art, metaphysics, poetry; of all science, mathematics and cosmology; of everything that makes humanity different, distinct, unique.  The least significant fact about Homo sapiens is that we evolved to survive....What makes us different is that we are meaning seeking animal"

                                                                                                                                     pg 271
     "Science gives us a sense of wonder. It does not disclose the source and origin of that wonder."
                                                                                                                                     pg 273

     "Tested on attitudes, religiosity as measured by church attendance turns out to be the best predictor of altruism and empathy: better than education, age, income, gender and race."
                summary of R. Putnam, D. Campbell, S Garrett
                American Grace: How Religion Divides and Unites Us, Simon-Schuster 2010
                                                                                                                                     pg 278

     "To explain the world we have science.  To control it we have technology.  To negotiate power we have democratic politics.  To achieve prosperity we have a market economy.  If we are ill we go to a doctor, not a priest.  If we feel guilty we can go to a psychotherapist; we have no need of a confessor.  If we are depressed we can take Prozac, we do not need the book of Psalms.  Schools and welfare are provided by the state, not by the church.  And if we seek salvation, we can visit the new cathedrals -  the shopping malls at which the consumer society pays homage to its gods.
    Faith would seem to be redundant in the contemporary world. And yet far from disappearing it is alive and well and flourishing in every part of the world except Europe.....In Russia , where religion was exiled for seventy years, a poll in 2006 showed 84% of the population believed in God.   ANd as the Editor in the Economist writes, whereas in the past religion has been associated with poverty, today the growth in faith has coincided with a growth in prosperity. [Micklethwaite, Wooldridge God is Back (2009)]"
                                                                                                                                     pg 281-2
"The Bible is not proto-science, pseudo science or myth masquerading as science.  It is interested in other questions entirely. "

                                                                                                                                     pg 285
"Without belief in a transcendent God-the God of freedom who acts because he chooses - it is ultimately impossible to sustain the idea that we are free, that we have a choice, that we are made by our decisions, that we are morally responsible agents."
                                                                                                                                     pg 289

Letter to a Scientific Atheist

  "Science fulfils three functions...It diminishes human ignorance.  It increases human power.  And it exemplifies the fact that we are in God's image."
                                                                                                                                     pg 292
"We are desecularising in a destablilising age.  That brings fear, and few things are worse than the politics of fear.  It creates a sense of victimhood and a willingness to demonize those from who we differ...The best thing to do in such a circumstance is for moderates of all sides to seek and find common ground."
                                                                                                                                     pg 295 

Commentary: Does Everyone Need Insurance?

     There are people who can live life without fear, anxiety or health insurance.   There exist people (myself among them) who would prefer to be left alone and allowed to face life without the help that insurance companies or the government desires to impose.   In fact there are some who think that there is ample evidence is to conclude that insurance can often do harm by financing treatments that are ineffective, are focused on symptoms and even those that actually harm.

       This story details how good insurance can nurture sickness for the sake of profit rather than cure.  Many tens of thousands of insured victims have similar stories.

================================

       Jaye sought help for depression and she thought how lucky she must be to have generous insurance policy that could help pay for her care.  A psychiatrist and "expert" in "trauma" arranged for her insurance sponsored hospitalization.  Over a period of many months the doctor and hospital provided care, counseling, medication and restraints when needed during the nurtured emergence of horrid memories.  When the insurance ran out Jaye was discharged.  The medications stopped.  The mind cleared.  The " repressed memories" faded.   Jaye realized that the memories were never true and that her father was a good man.

My name is Jaye

It is common to desire perfect parents.  Like most, I yearned for all knowing, protective, caring, nurturing Mommy and Daddy to shower me with unconditional love.  This unrealistic desire was much like feeling warm fuzzies at the mere thought of Santa Claus as a child.  Santa's round belly, puffy pink cheeks, soft white beard, and contagious chuckle came close to the ideal father.  Dr. Stratford, my new psychiatrist, resembled Santa Claus and had the same charming disposition.

My role as a psychiatric patient began with the naïve idea that unyielding depression would be alleviated if I followed Dr. Stratford's treatment regime.  Desperate for relief, I failed to ask questions regarding his specialty, professional credentials, clinical experience, success rate, and treatment plan.

Unbeknownst to me, Dr. Stratford was considered an expert in repressed memory therapy and in the diagnosis of multiple personality disorder, which has since been redefined and renamed dissociative identity disorder.  Dr. Stratford's area of expertise led him to believe my depression was caused by buried memories of child sexual abuse.  I, therefore, had unwittingly become a patient of repressed memory therapy after agreeing to a short hospital stay under his care.

Treatment plucked me from home and sequestered me in a psychiatric hospital in a large city an hour away.  My lucrative job as an administrator was placed on hold; my social life and friends in community theater were avoided, and graduate school ended.  My relationship to family methodically began to fold after Dr. Stratford explained that buried memories could not surface unless I was free of family influence.  When he claimed depression was caused by events I could not remember his theory made sense because medication and talk therapy had been unsuccessful.  Dr. Stratford's novel approach to a very old problem seemed logical.

Disconnected from everything I loved and held dear, I was seduced by lavish attention from my charming doctor who was accessible twenty-four hours a day.  Nurses and attendants became mommies and siblings of sorts.  The hospital was home and a skewed sense of family was created after I assumed the role of dependent, little-girl patient.

It was 1986, and it was fashionable to seek psychotherapy.  The counseling environment offered an opportunity to find an external source to blame for personal difficulties, incompetency, failure and fear while basking in the warmth of a loving psychotherapist.  Dr. Stratford and I embarked on a course of treatment that focused on this blame game which I practiced with abandon.  I based the cause of depression on sexual torture rather than faulty biochemistry.  By this time, I had been sequestered for months, separated from family and friends, was high on narcotics, lacked sleep, ate poorly, was isolated on a locked unit from the general patient population, and often tied to a bed by leather restraints as a means to deal with horrific memories.

Dr. Stratford oversaw treatment in a gentle, kind, loving, and devoted manner.  When restraints and narcotics were ordered to help me cope with the bizarre content of new memories, I viewed the act as a display of concern and affection.  I trusted Dr. Stratford with my life and the goal was to have faith in the process of therapy so I could triumph over depression.

Old memories of the father, who raised me by working hard five days a week to provide for our family, quickly receded.  My Father, who had sent me to church camp, who had provided piano and dance lessons, who mowed the lawn and cleaned the swimming pool in the heat of summer, who taught me to drive and paid for my college education, was accused of nefarious acts.  The content of newly recovered memories became paramount while facts that countered them were disregarded.  Dr. Stratford eagerly stepped in as the emotional Daddy he believed I needed.

As years passed I became totally dependent upon Daddy Stratford and my hospital family.  It was not until insurance monies ran out, and I was discharged immediately, that I understood the truth of my role as psychiatric patient.  I had been the source of income for many mental health professionals - nothing more.  When I was destitute and in poor health due to the severity of treatment, no one from the hospital came to rescue me, no one helped me find a new apartment, no one called by telephone to ask how I was, and no one came to visit.  With a mind clear of narcotics, I was alone with the realization that my true family had not abused me and my hospital family, on the other hand, had used, and then discarded me.

Daddy Stratford returned to Dr. Stratford.  My Father carried on as my Father - which is the way it should have been all along.

How My Psychiatrist Became "Daddy" 
Jaye D. Bartha 
author, Orphan of the Memory Debate 

Obtained from:  
http://www.fmsfonline.org/?qmemories=RetractorsOwnStories#feb95

NOTE:   This retraction is a rare example of integrity and courage.  Many live with the false memories their entire lives and rob their children of grandparents, cousins, aunts and uncles.  Losing contact at a time when the children most benefit from the contact.
=========================

WARNING:

 If you are seeking help for personal struggles and a therapist, counselor or friend says that "recovering childhood memories can help you get better" then IMMEDIATELY get up from your chair (or off the couch), run to the door, open it and flee. Hundreds of thousands have lost families, years of productive living and squandered immense wealth with tragedy inducing therapy that produces horrid false memories, splinters families, isolates the client and is documented to cause decline in mental health.