I’ve wanted to write about this for months now, but felt compelled to stay as far away from the media’s scary-unremorseful-rabid-stalker coverage of the story as possible. Now I feel like it’s okay to write about it because something positive has happened- Britney Spears may very well get the help she needs.

You can always tell that a person’s life has taken a turn for the better when the media starts compiling montages of past tragedies and airing them over and over and over again.

I’m not in a position to speculate about or diagnose the nature of Britney’s condition but it is obvious that, for what ever reason, her mental health has deteriorated dramatically over the past year. It’s horrifying to watch a person go through that, as a fellow human being and as a fellow mental patient. The greatest fear I’ve had is that she would not survive the ordeal. So many of us don’t.

It’s been doubly horrifying to watch the reaction of the media and general public. People have laughed at Britney Spears, called her names, shamed her- all but spit on her as she walked down the street. Every day I am thankful that I have, with the abundant support of others, been able to treat my illness. I can say with certainty that had I been judged and ridiculed to the degree that Britney Spears has, I would not be alive right now. Let’s be frank shall we? I’d have blown my fucking brains out.

I’ve read a few good articles this morning calling for responsible action on the part of the media and public:

“In the case of Britney Spears, professional ethics also are involved which the media must confront. Roy Peter Clark, vice-president of the Poynter Institute, a leading center of journalism training and ethics, recently wrote. “There is clearly a danger zone, when life and health are at stake, when the best thing the press can do is back off. That time for Spears is probably now.” – Michael J. Fitzpatrick, executive director of the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI )

“The paparazzi are not known for their scruples when it comes to hounding their celebrity quarry. So the resignation of a British photographer from his LA agency in protest at the “aggressive” treatment of Britney Spears is a signal that media harassment of the unravelling celebrity has reached a new and troubling level.

Nick Stern predicted that the pursuit of Ms Spears would end in tragedy as he quit his job at Splash, a Los Angeles-based, British-owned celebrity picture agency, over the tactics employed to feed the media obsession with the troubled pop star.”- Times Online

Sadly, the majority of the coverage seems to have been dictated from a conversation between two terribly insecure 13 year olds. There seems to be so little actual knowledge or understanding about mental illness. There seems to be even less compassion. As a person who periodically finds herself in the midst of her own mental disintegration, I have to say how afraid it makes me that we seem to find the psychological torture of our fellow humans highly entertaining.

I sincerely hope that Britney Spears gets help- voluntary or otherwise. I hope she is able to be healthy again, to care for her little boys, to live a happy and productive life. I hope that we as a society will allow her to do so. I hope that we will learn to treat mental illness as a potentially deadly disease and not a platform upon which we can stand, looking down with vicious judgment and self-gratifying amusement on it’s sufferers.