David McElroy

making sense of a dysfunctional culture

David McElroy

Mental illness can be hidden in any family, changing lives forever

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Mental health issues devastate lives and they destroy families, but a lot of people don’t take them seriously. Those aren’t “real problems,” they say.

I was sad to discover this evening that some kind of mental illness has taken the life of Marilane Carter, a Kansas pastor’s wife who’s been missing for two weeks. She was the mother of two small boys and a little girl, who you’ll see in this family photo, and she had been having unspecified mental issues.

About two weeks ago, she left home in Kansas to drive to Birmingham, where she planned to visit her pregnant sister — and she also planned to seek mental help.

Carter had graduated from divinity school here in Birmingham, so she felt comfortable asking for help here. But she never made it. Her family lost touch with her near Memphis and she completely disappeared. Searchers discovered her car today just west of Memphis and her body was still inside.

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Briefly: Researcher shares results of psychedelic treatment for depression

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I’ve spent a tremendous amount of time over the last couple of years thinking and writing about love and connection. I’ve come to understand that this lack of love and connection is at the root of a lot of human tragedy and unhappiness, including addictions and depression. As I talked with others and researched the psychology behind the issues, I ran into the surprising fact that researchers are increasingly using psychedelic drugs to allow volunteers to have experiences which are giving them a sense of connection which they’ve lost — something that allows them to feel connected to love and God in a way they didn’t understand before — which is having dramatic effects in combating things such as depression and addictions. In this 15-minute TED talk — without an audience in the age of COVID-19 — Johns Hopkins researcher Mary Cosimano shares her experiences with guided psilocybin sessions being used to treat addiction, depression and end-of-life issues. One of her key observations is the importance of love and connection. She said that it seems love is literally part of the answer. In her role as director of guide/facilitator services for the program, Cosimano is responsible for training and supervising session facilitators.

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Trivial distractions keep us from focusing on love and connection

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It was dark outside as I rode toward home on the YMCA bus that night, so it must have been fall or winter. I was about 11 years old when I rode that bus twice a week from Golden Springs Elementary School to the YMCA in downtown Anniston, Ala., where I took swimming lessons and played on a basketball team, among other activities, depending on the time of year.

I was sitting at the very back of the darkened, noisy bus looking forward at all the other kids. The song on the speakers at that moment — from the radio, I presume — was the Partridge Family’s “I Think I Love You.” I don’t know why the scene is so strongly imprinted on me.

“I’m not like y’all and I don’t really like you very much,” I thought. “I’m all by myself.”

I felt a little bit afraid — not for my physical safety, of course — but I mostly felt completely alone. It’s the first time I can recall ever feeling so disconnected and alone and alienated. And in a very simple and childlike way, it was the first time I felt a yearning to be connected to someone.

It’s the first time I remember feeling so alone that I had a powerful need for love and understanding to fill a part of me that I couldn’t yet understand.

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