The loss of another

Another death is touching me today.  She wasn't a celebrity to anyone outside of the dog world but to us, she was a profound and talented trainer that did so much.  Dr. Sophia Yin was first a veterinarian.  when she entered the field and saw how clueless the veterinarian community was to training and behavior, she went back to school to become a behaviorist.  Her contribution to the positive reinforcement and dog training world has been huge.  Her low stress handling techniques are incredible and something that everyone in the pet industry should learn.  I was lucky enough to hear her speak several years ago and even got up to do a demo with her.  I was in awe of her knowledge and skill but she came across as a very loving and approachable person who cared and just wanted everyone to learn and do right by their animals.

Dr. Sophia Yin passed away on September 29th, leaving the dog training world and, I'm sure, all who knew her reeling.  I was devastated to hear this but even more devastated to learn that she committed suicide.  So soon after Robin Williams did the same thing, it is hard to believe that someone so talented and such an inspiration to so many of us would do such a thing.  Didn't she have so much to live for?  What about her dogs?  When I was struggling with depression, my dogs were the number one thing keeping me fighting and I find it very hard to cope with someone who did so much for the dogs around her leaving her own.  It really hit close to my heart.

Every time I hear of this happening I hope that people take the loss and apply it to their lives.  So many people around us, even talented and inspirational people that we look up to, struggle with mental illness and private dark battles.  Many people, like I was, are very good at hiding it.  They may be in the darkest place personally and still smile and act normally.  It is the fear of being judged and thought weak that keeps those of us who need the most help from voicing the fact that we are in a dark place.

Please, be the voice of strength, courage and most of all, understanding and acceptance.  Reach out to those around you and help them.  I am so lucky that my sister was a strong voice in my life and I never felt like she judged me for struggling.  Mental illness is real and it affects more people than you know.  Make sure the people in your life know that you are there for them.

And most of all, if you are someone struggling, please reach out.  Ask for help.  People love you.  People care.  You are never alone.

National Suicide Prevention Hotline: 1-800-273-8255

RIP Robin

Robin Williams killed himself.  I never would have said that he or his work has had a profound influence on my life but I am really feeling his death.  It makes my heart hurt that a man that was so loved by so many for making them laugh and smile was hiding so much darkness in him that it destroyed him.  No one really knows what goes on below the surface of another person.  Here was my Facebook status today:

As everyone mourns Robin Williams, remember a smile can hide a so much private pain. I know the feeling of debilitating depression and I thank God that I never considered the act of suicide. Mostly because I was just too damn stubborn to let something beat me. But remember that people all around you struggle. Be a voice of strength and support now instead of when it is too late to reach someone. It can make a difference in someone's life.

It's true.  People all around us fight private battles and shoulder private demons everyday.  Mental illness is a real thing that real people face.  It isn't something "other" that you'll never run across.  Chances are someone and someone you know well is or has struggled with it.  I struggled with major depression for years.  Sometimes I didn't even realize just how unhappy I was and I only see it now that I am looking back from a place of relative mental health.

I struggled with depression and, at the time, I had a very hard time admitting it.  That, of course, only made it worse.  I felt like I had to hide this giant thing that was slowly sucking the life out of me from anyone and everyone.  I was so afraid that of people's judgements and that they would think I was weak.  Mental illness is not only debilitating but it is isolating.  Dealing with it is the one time you really need to draw strength from the people around you but it is also the one time you feel you really need to hide.

I struggled with that for a long time.  A silent struggle until I almost broke.  I never felt the need to commit suicide but I can see how someone would reach that point.  Somehow, I had a stubbornness inside of me that refused to give up and I managed to drag myself out of a very deep hole.  The few people I did tell, gave me so much support that I was able to recover.

I just wish that people would look around them and recognize that anyone that struggles with a mental illness is still a person and probably a very strong person.  It takes INCREDIBLE inner strength to be able to survive something like that and work your way through to a healthy place.  Help and understanding is so needed.  No one struggling should feel so judged that they hide it until it kills them.

If you are the one who needs support, speak out.  Know that the person who judges you is worthless but the person that steps up and offers you unconditional support is priceless.

Thank you to all the priceless people in my life.  Most especially my sister, who was a light when I was lost in darkness.

Sadness

I've been avoiding posting for the last couple of days.  The topic I want to talk about is, once again, incredibly hard to fathom and accept.

Last Friday, December 14th, a young man entered Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, CT with a rifle .  He then killed 20 first graders and 6 staff members.  Earlier that morning he had killed his mother in their home.  Details are still unfolding about what actually happened that horrible morning and I fear that we will never know exact details and we will never understand why.

This sick and evil young man killed his mother while she slept.  He smashed the hard drives on the home computers then loaded the car with her firearms and drove to the nearby elementary school.  I can't imagine how someone could set their feet on a path that planned to massacre innocent children.  Because yes, this was a plan.  He knew what he wanted to do.  He did not just snap.  If he'd just snapped he would have gone on a shooting rampage around the neighborhood.  He thought about this.  That can be seen in the destroying of the computers.  There must have been something on them to hint as to why he chose to do this.  It's just terrible.  He must have known society could never condone shooting children at school so any excuses he might have had on those computers would never be enough.  He must have known society would condemn him to hell where he belongs.

He drove to the school and forced his way in.  The office staff tried to stop him.  The principal was killed lunging at him.  Someone in the office managed to turn on the intercom system so that the rest of the school would know what was happening and know to hide.  A custodian also ran the halls yelling that there was a shooter and everyone should hide.

The shooter then went to two first grade classrooms and killed teachers and students alike.  Little kids, 6 to 7 years old, gunned down.  I feel sick thinking about it.  No child should be murdered so coldly.  I just... There aren't words.  That is why I have put off this update because there is nothing anyone can say about the murder of children to justify it, make it better or say anything to capture the memories of their beautiful lives cut short.  There are no words.

I feel for those lives lost.  I feel for the families who are going I to the holidays with so much pain and loss in their hearts.  I feel for the community left reeling and struggling to come to terms with their new identity.  I hope though that this does not come to define them.  I hope healing comes to everyone involved. This horror should define NO ONE but the sick young man who picked up a gun to kill.

It feels like it has been a hard year.  There has been so much loss and horror this year.  Innocent people becoming victims.  It is hard to focus on anything else.  It is always the horrible events that shock us and grab our attention.  But that's not the way it should be.  I want to quote Mr. Rogers here: “When I was a boy and I would see scary things in the news, my mother would say to me, 'Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping.'” ~ Fred Rogers.

That is what I would tell my child, if I had one.  But that's what everyone should be doing.  We should all be looking for the helpers:  The heros that give their lives to protect others in the seconds they have to act.  The people who rush toward danger to save others.  Those who offer comfort and strength.  The world is full of people who are good at heart and care deeply.  Selfless and good acts happen everyday.  We should not allow ourselves to only see the bad things.  To do so would not do justice to those good people out there.  One evil person should not take away the power of many good people.  We just have to remember to look for them and to remember.

~ ~ ~
 
 Once again we find our society debating why these evil things happen.  Why do evil people kill the innocent so horribly and destroy so many lives?  I think we are frustrated and frightened that there is no answer.  So, since we're unable to find an answer, we turn our frustration to other debates.  I am going to talk about my views on gun control and what needs to be done to make sure these things don't happen again.  If you don't want to know don't read from here on.  My views are not meant to offend anyone.

First of all, I think that people that get all outraged about guns because of shootings are a little bit like ostriches with their heads in the sand.  Just because a handful of people get a gun and use it to do something so evil does not mean that guns should be banned.  Yes, guns are instruments that are meant to kill.  That is what they do.  But it is a person that pulls that trigger.  That person could be ignorant.  That person could be mentally ill.  That person could be evil.  Either way, a person pulls the trigger.  So the problem is the underlying reasons why people pick up guns and kill each other, not the gun.

I am against hard gun control.  Maybe it should be more difficult to get a gun and the screening should be more intense, yes.  However, just saying no more guns is not going to make them go away.  Heroin, cocaine, meth and other horrible things are illegal yet they are still out there and relatively easy to get.  Making guns illegal is just going to make law abiding citizens not able to get guns.  You think the criminals or the mentally ill are going to care that it is against the law to have a gun?  No.  They're going to get one.  The genie is out of the bottle and there is no putting it back.  Guns are here to stay.  And yes, I am going to buy one.  Yes, I will have a concealed carry permit and by God I am going to have a gun on me.  That is my right.  Does that mean I'm going to start shooting people?  No.  But the best thing to stop a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun.

I'm not saying everyone should run out and buy guns now but I think that everyone should be comfortable with a gun so if something were to happen you know what to do.  EVERYONE should be able to pick up a gun and know what to do with it whether that is defend yourself or those you love, or to make sure that that gun is no longer dangerous.  I bet that over half of the people in the USA don't have any idea what to do with a gun or to even safely see if it is loaded and ready to fire.  That's frightening to me.

It is also horrible that the guns used to kill those kids at Sandy Hook were not his.  They were his mother's guns.  If you own a gun.  If it is your gun you should be 110% positive that you are in control of that gun at ALL TIMES!  Your gun should not be available to anyone else ever.  If it is my gun, I need to know it is safe whether or not I am holding it.  That is my responsibility.  That means that when it is not in use, I have it in a place that only I can get to.  When I buy my guns, I am going to get a safe that opens only to my fingerprints.  No one should be able to get a hold of my guns and use them to do horrible things.  Never.  I think responsible gun ownership is WAY more important than a gun ban.  Bans never work.  Education does.  (Crazily enough this is exactly the same on stupid laws like BSL.  Pit bulls aren't the problem.  The culture of pit bull owners and bad owners is.)

Gun control should mean let's control who gets guns better, not let's get rid of guns.

And I think, more important than gun control is the state of mental illness in our society.  Mental illness is such a black topic and gets swept under the rug WAY too often.  Yes sometimes it is uncomfortable to talk about because it is hard to understand.  But the more we don't discuss it the more mentally ill people go without proper care or treatment.  That is dangerous to them, the people around them and society.  TREATMENT is needed.  Right now, the only treatment for mentally ill people who act out in society is jail.  It is incredibly hard to get someone committed against their will and the majority of mentally ill people have no where to go to get the help they need.  I was really moved by this article:

Mental illness

The problem is never going to get solved until we dig down and discuss these hard topics.  Maybe if Adam Lanza had gotten proper care and help, this would not have happened.

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