<p>Excellent resources. Kay Redfield Jamison is firmly entrenched in my personal pantheon of secular saints! I admire her so much. Robert Sapolsky at Stanford is another scientist I admire. He has devoted his professional life to studying the effects of stress in primates and humans. I’ve already linked to a lecture of his on depression in another thread, but you can find more by him on You tube.
It sounds as if you are doing all the right things for your sons. A friend of mine told me that she thought the world was very different nowadays than it was for us and from when we attended college. She said she heard that only a third of our 18-year-olds are ready, both academically and emotionally, to attend college away from home now. I think our generation of parents on average has sort of fetishized the college experience and especially the bragging rights of having our offspring go to an elite university. Not all, but many. In the UK, there is what is known as a gap year, during which students explore activities of interest to them, whether near home or abroad. I think this might become a more appealing route for some who just need a few more years of maturation. Also, the major mental illnesses tend to manifest beginning at 18, precisely the time when a college freshman is also confronted with a lot of major stressors by going off to university. Even though the suicide rate for that age cohort is higher for non-college-attending students than for those who are attending colleges, the non-disclosure stance of some universities (like my son’s) and the pitiful mental health care available on many campuses makes going off to college riskier for those predisposed to mental illness. That said, if a child has been diagnosed and is stable on medications before entering college, the structure and challenge of college can be better for them than being at home, and there are colleges that do provide good services to help students with mental illness survive and thrive while there. I feel the need for a guidebook for just which colleges in the country these are. Can I persuade “US News and World Report” ever to give a ranking of colleges based on how well they take care of students with diagnosed mental illnesses or which colleges notify parents when there is a suicide attempt on campus? I think that would be a wonderful resource. Our kids aren’t just academic automatons–they have emotions, strong ones at that age, and with brains that are not fully matured and more highly impulsive than at any other time in their lives. Yet they are also trying to break away from parents and become independent–a very tough age.
Regarding your sons, I am glad they realized what was happening to them early on. The earlier the intervention, the better the outcome. Not being ashamed is a huge first step. Managing the condition will ensure they live fully functional lives. I am very happy that you posted this success story and very, very happy, too, that your sons are alive and well.</p>