Expert on Mental Illness Reveals Her Own Struggle - NYTimes.com

<base href="data:"><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px; color: black; text-align: left; "><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">Are you one of us?</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">The patient wanted to know, and her therapist — Marsha M. Linehan of the<a href="http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/organizations/u/university_of_washington/index.html?inline=nyt-org" title="More articles about University of Washington" class="meta-org" style="color: rgb(102, 102, 153); text-decoration: none; ">University of Washington</a>, creator of a treatment used worldwide for severely suicidal people — had a ready answer. It was the one she always used to cut the question short, whether a patient asked it hopefully, accusingly or knowingly, having glimpsed the macramé of faded burns, cuts and <a href="http://health.nytimes.com/health/guides/disease/angioedema/overview.html?inline=nyt-classifier" title="In-depth reference and news articles about Angioedema." class="meta-classifier" style="color: rgb(102, 102, 153); text-decoration: none; ">welts</a> on Dr. Linehan's arms:</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">"You mean, have I suffered?"</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">"No, Marsha," the patient replied, in an encounter last spring. "I mean one of us. Like us. Because if you were, it would give all of us so much hope."</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">"That did it," said <a title="http://www.depts.washington.edu/brtc" href="http://www.depts.washington.edu/brtc" style="color: rgb(102, 102, 153); text-decoration: none; ">Dr. Linehan</a>, 68, who told her story in public for the first time last week before an audience of friends, family and doctors at the <a title="Web site" href="http://www.harthosp.org/InstituteOfLiving/default.aspx" style="color: rgb(102, 102, 153); text-decoration: none; ">Institute of Living</a>, the Hartford clinic where she was first treated for extreme social withdrawal at age 17. "So many people have begged me to come forward, and I just thought — well, I have to do this. I owe it to them. I cannot die a coward."</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">No one knows how many people with severe mental illness live what appear to be normal, successful lives, because such people are not in the habit of announcing themselves. They are too busy juggling responsibilities, paying the bills, studying, raising families — all while weathering gusts of dark emotions or delusions that would quickly overwhelm almost anyone else.</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">Now, an increasing number of them are risking exposure of their secret, saying that the time is right. The nation's <a href="http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/health/diseasesconditionsandhealthtopics/mentalhealthanddisorders/index.html?inline=nyt-classifier" title="Recent and archival health news about mental health and disorders." class="meta-classifier" style="color: rgb(102, 102, 153); text-decoration: none; ">mental health</a> system is a shambles, they say, criminalizing many patients and warehousing some of the most severe in nursing and group homes where they receive care from workers with minimal qualifications.</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">Moreover, the enduring stigma of mental illness teaches people with such a diagnosis to think of themselves as victims, snuffing out the one thing that can motivate them to find treatment: hope.</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">"There's a tremendous need to implode the myths of mental illness, to put a face on it, to show people that a diagnosis does not have to lead to a painful and oblique life," said Elyn R. Saks, a professor at the University of Southern California School of Law who chronicles her own struggles with <a href="http://health.nytimes.com/health/guides/disease/schizophrenia-disorganized-type/overview.html?inline=nyt-classifier" title="In-depth reference and news articles about Schizophrenia - disorganized type." class="meta-classifier" style="color: rgb(102, 102, 153); text-decoration: none; ">schizophrenia</a> in "The Center Cannot Hold: My Journey Through Madness." "We who struggle with these disorders can lead full, happy, productive lives, if we have the right resources."</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">These include medication (usually), therapy (often), a measure of good luck (always) — and, most of all, the inner strength to manage one's demons, if not banish them. That strength can come from any number of places, these former patients say: love, forgiveness, faith in God, a lifelong friendship.</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">But Dr. Linehan's case shows there is no recipe. She was driven by a mission to rescue people who are chronically suicidal, often as a result of <a href="http://health.nytimes.com/health/guides/disease/borderline-personality-disorder/overview.html?inline=nyt-classifier" title="In-depth reference and news articles about Borderline personality disorder." class="meta-classifier" style="color: rgb(102, 102, 153); text-decoration: none; ">borderline personality disorder</a>, an enigmatic condition characterized in part by self-destructive urges.</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">"I honestly didn't realize at the time that I was dealing with myself," she said. "But I suppose it's true that I developed a therapy that provides the things I needed for so many years and never got."</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); "><strong>'I Was in Hell'</strong></p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">She learned the central tragedy of severe mental illness the hard way, banging her head against the wall of a locked room.</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">Marsha Linehan arrived at the Institute of Living on March 9, 1961, at age 17, and quickly became the sole occupant of the seclusion room on the unit known as Thompson Two, for the most severely ill patients. The staff saw no alternative: The girl attacked herself habitually, burning her wrists with <a href="http://health.nytimes.com/health/guides/specialtopic/smoking-tips-on-how-to-quit/overview.html?inline=nyt-classifier" title="In-depth reference and news articles about Smoking - tips on how to quit." class="meta-classifier" style="color: rgb(102, 102, 153); text-decoration: none; ">cigarettes</a>, slashing her arms, her legs, her midsection, using any sharp object she could get her hands on.</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">The seclusion room, a small cell with a bed, a chair and a tiny, barred window, had no such weapon. Yet her urge to die only deepened. So she did the only thing that made any sense to her at the time: banged her head against the wall and, later, the floor. Hard.</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">"My whole experience of these episodes was that someone else was doing it; it was like 'I know this is coming, I'm out of control, somebody help me; where are you, God?' " she said. "I felt totally empty, like the Tin Man; I had no way to communicate what was going on, no way to understand it."</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">Her childhood, in Tulsa, Okla., provided few clues. An excellent student from early on, a natural on the piano, she was the third of six children of an oilman and his wife, an outgoing woman who juggled child care with the Junior League and Tulsa social events.</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">People who knew the Linehans at that time remember that their precocious third child was often in trouble at home, and Dr. Linehan recalls feeling deeply inadequate compared with her attractive and accomplished siblings. But whatever currents of distress ran under the surface, no one took much notice until she was bedridden with headaches in her senior year of high school.</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">Her younger sister, Aline Haynes, said: "This was Tulsa in the 1960s, and I don't think my parents had any idea what to do with Marsha. No one really knew what mental illness was."</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">Soon, a local psychiatrist recommended a stay at the Institute of Living, to get to the bottom of the problem. There, doctors gave her a diagnosis of schizophrenia; dosed her with <a title="National Institutes of Health Web page on Thorazine" href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmedhealth/PMH0000553/" style="color: rgb(102, 102, 153); text-decoration: none; ">Thorazine</a>, <a title="National Institutes of Health Web Page on Librium (Chlordiazepoxide)" href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmedhealth/PMH0000568/" style="color: rgb(102, 102, 153); text-decoration: none; ">Librium</a> and other powerful drugs, as well as hours of Freudian analysis; and strapped her down for electroshock treatments, 14 shocks the first time through and 16 the second, according to her medical records. Nothing changed, and soon enough the patient was back in seclusion on the locked ward.</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">"Everyone was terrified of ending up in there," said Sebern Fisher, a fellow patient who became a close friend. But whatever her surroundings, Ms. Fisher added, "Marsha was capable of caring a great deal about another person; her passion was as deep as her loneliness."</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">A discharge summary, dated May 31, 1963, noted that "during 26 months of hospitalization, Miss Linehan was, for a considerable part of this time, one of the most disturbed patients in the hospital."</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">A verse the troubled girl wrote at the time reads:</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">They put me in a four-walled room</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">But left me really out</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">My soul was tossed somewhere askew</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">My limbs were tossed here about</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">Bang her head where she would, the tragedy remained: no one knew what was happening to her, and as a result medical care only made it worse. Any real treatment would have to be based not on some theory, she later concluded, but on facts: which precise emotion led to which thought led to the latest gruesome act. It would have to break that chain — and teach a new behavior.</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">"I was in hell," she said. "And I made a vow: when I get out, I'm going to come back and get others out of here."</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); "><strong>Radical Acceptance</strong></p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">She sensed the power of another principle while praying in a small chapel in Chicago.</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">It was 1967, several years after she left the institute as a desperate 20-year-old whom doctors gave little chance of surviving outside the hospital. Survive she did, barely: there was at least one suicide attempt in Tulsa, when she first arrived home; and another episode after she moved to a Y.M.C.A. in Chicago to start over.</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">She was hospitalized again and emerged confused, lonely and more committed than ever to her Catholic faith. She moved into another Y, found a job as a clerk in an insurance company, started taking night classes at Loyola University — and prayed, often, at a chapel in the Cenacle Retreat Center.</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">"One night I was kneeling in there, looking up at the cross, and the whole place became gold — and suddenly I felt something coming toward me," she said. "It was this shimmering experience, and I just ran back to my room and said, 'I love myself.' It was the first time I remember talking to myself in the first person. I felt transformed."</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">The high lasted about a year, before the feelings of devastation returned in the wake of a romance that ended. But something was different. She could now weather her emotional storms without cutting or harming herself.</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">What had changed?</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">It took years of study in <a href="http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/health/diseasesconditionsandhealthtopics/psychology_and_psychologists/index.html?inline=nyt-classifier" title="Recent and archival health news about psychology." class="meta-classifier" style="color: rgb(102, 102, 153); text-decoration: none; ">psychology</a> — she earned a Ph.D. at Loyola in 1971 — before she found an answer. On the surface, it seemed obvious: She had accepted herself as she was. She had tried to kill herself so many times because the gulf between the person she wanted to be and the person she was left her desperate, hopeless, deeply homesick for a life she would never know. That gulf was real, and unbridgeable.</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">That basic idea — radical acceptance, she now calls it — became increasingly important as she began working with patients, first at a suicide clinic in Buffalo and later as a researcher. Yes, real change was possible. The emerging discipline of behaviorism taught that people could learn new behaviors — and that acting differently can in time alter underlying emotions from the top down.</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">But deeply suicidal people have tried to change a million times and failed. The only way to get through to them was to acknowledge that their behavior made sense: Thoughts of death were sweet release given what they were suffering.</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">"She was very creative with people. I saw that right away," said Gerald C. Davison, who in 1972 admitted Dr. Linehan into a postdoctoral program in behavioral therapy at Stony Brook University. (He is now a psychologist at the University of Southern California.) "She could get people off center, challenge them with things they didn't want to hear without making them feel put down."</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">No therapist could promise a quick transformation or even sudden "insight," much less a shimmering religious vision. But now Dr. Linehan was closing in on two seemingly opposed principles that could form the basis of a treatment: acceptance of life as it is, not as it is supposed to be; and the need to change, despite that reality and because of it. The only way to know for sure whether she had something more than a theory was to test it scientifically in the real world — and there was never any doubt where to start.</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); "><strong>Getting Through the Day</strong></p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">"I decided to get supersuicidal people, the very worst cases, because I figured these are the most miserable people in the world — they think they're evil, that they're bad, bad, bad — and I understood that they weren't," she said. "I understood their suffering because I'd been there, in hell, with no idea how to get out."</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">In particular she chose to treat people with a diagnosis that she would have given her young self: borderline personality disorder, a poorly understood condition characterized by neediness, outbursts and self-destructive urges, often leading to cutting or burning. In therapy, borderline patients can be terrors — manipulative, hostile, sometimes ominously mute, and notorious for storming out threatening suicide.</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">Dr. Linehan found that the tension of acceptance could at least keep people in the room: patients accept who they are, that they feel the mental squalls of rage, emptiness and anxiety far more intensely than most people do. In turn, the therapist accepts that given all this, cutting, burning and <a href="http://health.nytimes.com/health/guides/disease/suicide-and-suicidal-behavior/overview.html?inline=nyt-classifier" title="In-depth reference and news articles about Suicide and suicidal behavior." class="meta-classifier" style="color: rgb(102, 102, 153); text-decoration: none; ">suicide attempts</a> make some sense.</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">Finally, the therapist elicits a commitment from the patient to change his or her behavior, a verbal pledge in exchange for a chance to live: "Therapy does not work for people who are dead" is one way she puts it.</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">Yet even as she climbed the academic ladder, moving from the Catholic University of America to the University of Washington in 1977, she understood from her own experience that acceptance and change were hardly enough. During those first years in Seattle she sometimes felt suicidal while driving to work; even today, she can feel rushes of panic, most recently while driving through tunnels. She relied on therapists herself, off and on over the years, for support and guidance (she does not remember taking medication after leaving the institute).</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">Dr. Linehan's own emerging approach to treatment — now called dialectical behavior therapy, or D.B.T. — would also have to include day-to-day skills. A commitment means very little, after all, if people do not have the tools to carry it out. She borrowed some of these from other behavioral therapies and added elements, like opposite action, in which patients act opposite to the way they feel when an emotion is inappropriate; and mindfulness meditation, a Zen technique in which people focus on their breath and observe their emotions come and go without acting on them. (Mindfulness is now a staple of many kinds of psychotherapy.)</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">In studies in the 1980s and '90s, researchers at the University of Washington and elsewhere tracked the progress of hundreds of borderline patients at high risk of suicide who attended weekly dialectical therapy sessions. Compared with similar patients who got other experts' treatments, those who learned Dr. Linehan's approach made far fewer suicide attempts, landed in the hospital less often and were much more likely to stay in treatment. D.B.T. is now widely used for a variety of stubborn clients, including juvenile offenders, people with <a href="http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/health/diseasesconditionsandhealthtopics/eatingdisorders/index.html?inline=nyt-classifier" title="Recent and archival health news about eating disorders." class="meta-classifier" style="color: rgb(102, 102, 153); text-decoration: none; ">eating disorders</a> and those with drug addictions.</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">"I think the reason D.B.T. has made such a splash is that it addresses something that couldn't be treated before; people were just at a loss when it came to borderline," said Lisa Onken, chief of the behavioral and integrative treatment branch of the National Institutes of Health. "But I think the reason it has resonated so much with community therapists has a lot to do with Marsha Linehan's charisma, her ability to connect with clinical people as well as a scientific audience."</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin: 0px 0px 1em; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">Most remarkably, perhaps, Dr. Linehan has reached a place where she can stand up and tell her story, come what will. "I'm a very happy person now," she said in an interview at her house near campus, where she lives with her adopted daughter, Geraldine, and Geraldine's husband, Nate. "I still have ups and downs, of course, but I think no more than anyone else."</p><p itemprop="articleBody" style="color: black; font-size: 1.2em; margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 0px; line-height: 24px; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: -webkit-auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); position: static; z-index: auto; ">After her coming-out speech last week, she visited the seclusion room, which has since been converted to a small office. "Well, look at that, they changed the windows," she said, holding her palms up. "There's so much more light."</p></div><a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/23/health/23lives.html?">http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/23/health/23lives.html?</a><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px; color: black; text-align: left; "><br class="webkit-block-placeholder"></div>

Expert on Mental Illness Reveals Her Own Struggle - NYTimes.com

Are you one of us? The patient wanted to know, and her therapist — Marsha M. Linehan of the University of Washington , creator of a treatmen...

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When Treating Cancer Is Not an Option - NYTimes.com

<base href="data:"><div style="text-align: left; "><div class="postContent" style="color: black; font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px; margin-left: 126px; "><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1em; font-size: 1.4em; line-height: 1.5em; ">When my husband learned he had advanced lung <a title="In-depth reference and news articles about Cancer." href="http://health.nytimes.com/health/guides/disease/cancer/overview.html?inline=nyt-classifier" target="_blank" style="color: rgb(102, 102, 153); text-decoration: underline; ">cancer</a>, he didn't even want to speak to an oncologist about<a title="Recent and archival health news about chemotherapy." href="http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/health/diseasesconditionsandhealthtopics/chemotherapy/index.html?inline=nyt-classifier" target="_blank" style="color: rgb(102, 102, 153); text-decoration: underline; ">chemotherapy</a>. He saw no point in treatment that could not cure him and might make him feel worse.</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1em; font-size: 1.4em; line-height: 1.5em; ">Not so, though, for a majority of patients diagnosed with cancers of the lung or colon that have spread well beyond their original site and are currently not curable by any drugs in the medical armamentarium. Most patients with these so-called stage 4 cancers who choose to undergo chemotherapy seem to believe, incorrectly, that the drugs could render them cancer-free.</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1em; font-size: 1.4em; line-height: 1.5em; ">That is the finding of a recent national study of nearly 1,200 patients with advanced cancers of the lung or colon. Overall, 69 percent of those with stage 4 lung cancer and 81 percent of those with stage 4 <a title="In-depth reference and news articles about Colon Cancer." href="http://health.nytimes.com/health/guides/disease/colon-cancer/overview.html?inline=nyt-classifier" target="_blank" style="color: rgb(102, 102, 153); text-decoration: underline; ">colon cancer</a> failed to understand "that chemotherapy was not at all likely to cure their cancer," Dr. Jane C. Weeks, an oncology researcher at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston, and colleagues <a title="Link to the study" href="http://www.nejm.org/doi/pdf/10.1056/NEJMoa1204410" target="_blank" style="color: rgb(102, 102, 153); text-decoration: underline; ">reported in The New England Journal of Medicine</a>.</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1em; font-size: 1.4em; line-height: 1.5em; ">When patients do not understand the limitations of such treatment, their consent to undergo it is not truly informed, the authors concluded.</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1em; font-size: 1.4em; line-height: 1.5em; ">This is not to say that chemotherapy is pointless when cancer is far advanced. Various drugs, some with limited toxicity, can be used as palliatives, perhaps shrinking <a title="In-depth reference and news articles about Tumor." href="http://health.nytimes.com/health/guides/disease/tumor/overview.html?inline=nyt-classifier" target="_blank" style="color: rgb(102, 102, 153); text-decoration: underline; ">tumors</a> temporarily to relieve symptoms, slowing the cancer's growth and prolonging the lives of some patients.</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1em; font-size: 1.4em; line-height: 1.5em; ">But aggressive chemotherapy when death is but weeks or months in the offing can seriously compromise the quality of patients' remaining time and may delay their preparations for the end of life, to the detriment of both patients and their families.</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1em; font-size: 1.4em; line-height: 1.5em; ">"If you think chemotherapy will cure you, you're less open to end-of-life discussions," Dr. Weeks said in an interview.</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1em; font-size: 1.4em; line-height: 1.5em; ">When patients pursue chemotherapy under the false belief that they still have a chance for a cure, it often delays their transition to the comfort care of <a title="Recent and archival health news about hospice care." href="http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/health/diseasesconditionsandhealthtopics/hospice_care/index.html?inline=nyt-classifier" target="_blank" style="color: rgb(102, 102, 153); text-decoration: underline; ">hospice</a>. When patients spend only a few days or a week in hospice, caretakers don't have enough time to get to know them and their families and offer the physical, emotional and practical benefits hospice can provide.</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1em; font-size: 1.4em; line-height: 1.5em; ">Dr. Weeks said continued chemotherapy involves more trips to the hospital, blood draws and X-rays, whereas hospice attends to patients' symptoms and concerns, and encourages them to leave meaningful legacies. When my husband entered hospice after two miserable weeks in the hospital undergoing palliative radiation, he experienced such relief that he said cheerfully, though in jest, "What if I decide I want to live?" and then enjoyed a treasured last visit with two of his grandchildren.</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1em; font-size: 1.4em; line-height: 1.5em; "><strong>'Optimistic Bias'</strong></p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1em; font-size: 1.4em; line-height: 1.5em; ">Communication is a two-way street; doctors and patients alike contribute to patients' failure to appreciate medicine's limited ability to treat advanced cancer.</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1em; font-size: 1.4em; line-height: 1.5em; ">In <a title="Link to the editorial " href="http://www.nejm.org/doi/pdf/10.1056/NEJMe1211160" target="_blank" style="color: rgb(102, 102, 153); text-decoration: underline; ">an editorial accompanying the journal report</a>, Dr. Thomas J. Smith and Dr. Dan L. Longo pointed out that "people have an optimistic bias." Despite a grim prognosis, this bias prompts patients to believe treatment can cure them.</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1em; font-size: 1.4em; line-height: 1.5em; ">"Even with repeated discussions, about one-third of patients are not able to say they have a disease from which they will die in a year or so," Dr. Smith, an oncologist and director of palliative care at Johns Hopkins Sidney Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Center, said in an interview.</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1em; font-size: 1.4em; line-height: 1.5em; ">"Our job is not to force them into acceptance but to encourage them to plan for the worst while hoping for the best," Dr. Smith said. "Such patients have better outcomes — less depression and less distress, and they're more likely to die comfortably at home."</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1em; font-size: 1.4em; line-height: 1.5em; ">Cultural and racial factors, and most likely religious beliefs, influence acceptance of the futility of continued treatment, Dr. Weeks said. In her study, nonwhite and Hispanic patients were more likely than whites to believe that chemotherapy could cure them. But surprisingly, patients' educational level, degree of disability and participation in decision-making were not associated with inaccurate beliefs about chemotherapy.</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1em; font-size: 1.4em; line-height: 1.5em; ">What can make a huge difference, Dr. Smith said, is how and how often doctors discuss options with patients and describe the potential of continued treatment. He and Dr. Longo suggested that practitioners master "the conversation known as 'ask, tell, ask,' which consists of asking patients what they want to know about their prognosis, telling them what they want to know, and then asking, 'What do you now understand about your situation?' "</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1em; font-size: 1.4em; line-height: 1.5em; ">Among the questions Dr. Smith said doctors should be asking are, "How much do you want to know about your cancer? What do you know about your cancer? Who would you like to include in discussions about your care? Would you like me to write down the important points? What is important to you? What are you hoping for? Who are your other doctors so that I can communicate with them?"</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1em; font-size: 1.4em; line-height: 1.5em; "><strong>Continuing Discussion</strong></p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1em; font-size: 1.4em; line-height: 1.5em; ">Finally, he said, rather than asking the patient "do you have any questions?" the doctor should ask, "Now that we have discussed this, what is your understanding of your situation?" And rather than having this conversation only once, Dr. Smith said, "It should be repeated at every transition point."</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1em; font-size: 1.4em; line-height: 1.5em; ">He and Dr. Longo also recommend that oncologists state the patient's prognosis at the first visit, appoint someone in the office to discuss advance directives, schedule a hospice-information visit, and offer to discuss prognosis and coping at each transition.</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1em; font-size: 1.4em; line-height: 1.5em; ">Using this approach, practitioners in the <a title="US Oncology Network" href="http://www.usoncology.com/" target="_blank" style="color: rgb(102, 102, 153); text-decoration: underline; ">US Oncology Network</a>, a group of community-based oncology physicians, have doubled the time patients spend in hospice, decreased costs, alleviated patients' symptoms, reduced stress on caregivers and often lengthened survival, Dr. Smith said. <a title="link to article" href="http://www.jpsmjournal.com/article/S0885-3924%2806%2900724-X/abstract" target="_blank" style="color: rgb(102, 102, 153); text-decoration: underline; ">Various studies</a> <a title="link to article" href="http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S009082581000404X" target="_blank" style="color: rgb(102, 102, 153); text-decoration: underline; ">have shown</a> that cancer patients in hospice live weeks to months longer than comparable patients not in hospice care.</p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 1em; font-size: 1.4em; line-height: 1.5em; ">When doctors fail to give direct, clear information, Dr. Smith suggests that patients ask, "What is my prognosis, really? What are my options? Can I meet with the palliative care and hospice teams?"</p><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font-size: 1.4em; line-height: 1.5em; ">He noted, "This is the hardest conversation for doctors to have. A lot of doctors wait for someone to bring it up." If the patient does not, then a family member can initiate the needed discussion.</div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font-size: 1.4em; line-height: 1.5em; "><div style="text-align: left; line-height: normal; font-size: medium; "><footer class="postMeta" style="display: block; clear: both; padding-top: 15px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 21px; padding-left: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; "><div class="postRelated module wrap" style="color: black; font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px; margin-bottom: 12px; clear: both; display: block; border-top-width: 1px; border-top-style: solid; border-top-color: rgb(204, 204, 204); padding-top: 10px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 0px; padding-left: 0px; position: static; z-index: auto; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium; "><a href="http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/11/19/when-treating-cancer-is-not-an-option/?src=recg">http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/11/19/when-treating-cancer-is-not-an-option/?src=recg</a></span><div class="relatedArticlesModule column lastColumn" style="float: left; display: inline; overflow-x: visible; overflow-y: visible; margin-right: 0px !important; width: 427px; color: rgb(51, 51, 51); font-family: georgia, 'times new roman', times, serif; font-size: 10px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 15px; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); "></div></div></footer></div></div></div><footer class="postMeta" style="display: block; clear: both; padding-top: 15px; padding-right: 0px; padding-bottom: 21px; padding-left: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; "></footer></div><div style="font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 14px; color: black; text-align: left; "><br class="webkit-block-placeholder"></div>

When Treating Cancer Is Not an Option - NYTimes.com

When my husband learned he had advanced lung  cancer , he didn't even want to speak to an oncologist about chemotherapy . He saw no poin...

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Eat to Live, Live to Eat

<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">Hola y’all! Since I’m busy corrupting the simple and decent people of Omaha, NE this week, I will use old memes as fodder on the days that it's my turn to post. IKNOWRIGHT!? So very exciting!<br /><br /></div><br /><b>How do you like your eggs?</b> Scrambled or over-easy<br /><br /><b>How do you take your coffee/tea:</b> When I do drink coffee I like cream and sugar. Or some Jameson’s Irish Whiskey or some Baily's Irish Cream<br /><br /><b>Favorite breakfast foods:</b> Bacon, eggs and hash browns<br /><br /><b>Peanut butter: smooth or crunchy?</b> Smooooooooooth<br /><br /><b>What kind of dressing on your salad?</b> I prefer French, but I can live with Italian or a balsamic vinaigrette<br /><br /><b>Coke or Pepsi? </b>Pepsi! <br /><br /><b>You're feeling lazy. What do you make? </b>Maybe just a hamburger patty and some fries or one of those frozen breaded chicken patties on a bun and some fries. Or maybe a frozen pizza. <br /><br /><br /><b>You're feeling really lazy. What kind of pizza do you order? </b>Being a simple kind of guy, I normally just get a pepperoni pizza with extra sauce on thin crust from Pizza Hut <br /><br /><b>You feel like cooking. What do you make? </b>Lots of different chicken meals, sometimes with pasta, sometimes with rice and maybe even meatloaf and sometimes pork. <br /><br /><b>Do any foods bring back good memories?</b> Mostly stuff like prime rib or really good steaks we would have at “family” gatherings at my dad’s house on holidays. Or big holiday meals with my REAL family. <br /><br /><br /><b>Do any foods remind you of someone?</b> When I have red beans and rice I think of my sister cause she makes GREAT red beans and rice. Oh and an awesome pork stew.<br /><br /><br /><b>Is there a food you refuse to eat?</b> When I was a kid there were, but now, I think I'd try most things. Well, not rodents.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEglBSAT4OZesCjP_kPx6k7ArKHXW1u4muDrEIrYaY8uxQ1yhdQ751_9qfHL9xbv4nEelCHk7xJQZ54emPdBwMv3H3Rzkp_Y8UMUx_nbMGQ18v5aF_hmjaPL1qihXPq4H1TYiIE4UQ73FN8/s1600/Kate+Upton+Nude+Eating.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEglBSAT4OZesCjP_kPx6k7ArKHXW1u4muDrEIrYaY8uxQ1yhdQ751_9qfHL9xbv4nEelCHk7xJQZ54emPdBwMv3H3Rzkp_Y8UMUx_nbMGQ18v5aF_hmjaPL1qihXPq4H1TYiIE4UQ73FN8/s400/Kate+Upton+Nude+Eating.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><b>What was your favorite food as a child?</b> Burgers<br /><br /><b>Is there a food that you hated as a child but now love?</b> Probably green veggies. Although I will not eat that nasty green pile of sludge that comes out of a can that they try to pass off as spinach. I like my spinach fresh and in a salad, thank you.<br /><br /><b>Is there a food that you loved as a child but now hate?</b> Can't think of any.<br /><br /><b>Favorite fruit or vegetable: </b>Veggie: Actually I love mixed vegetables with the green beans, corn peas, carrots and little lima beans. Fruit: Grapes<br /><br /><b>Favorite junk food:</b> Doritos Nacho Cheese Chips<br /><br /><b>Favorite between meal snack:</b> I love those peanut butter crackers or just saltines<br /><br /><b>Do you have any weird food habits: </b>You mean as in do I get freaky with food? I love strawberries and bananas and cereal, but I HATE strawberries or bananas IN my cereal. I love maple syrup over my sausage, but HATE maple sausage. And, as you probably know, I’m not a fan of handling foods so I wear food safe gloves. <br /><br /><b>You're on a diet. What food(s) do you fill up on?</b> Veggies and Chicken<br /><br /><b>You're off your diet. Now what would you like?</b> Great big old BBQ pork sandwich from Bodacious BBQ.<br /><br /><b>How spicy do you order Indian/Thai, etc? </b>Spicy foods tend to cause me problems, but I do love Indian food. Normally if I’m at an Indian Restaurant and they give us the choice of how spicy we want our food, I go with “not too spicy” just to save myself the trouble. <br /><br /><b>Can I get you a drink?</b> Scotch or Cabo Wabo Tequilla or Woodford Reserve Bourbon<br /><br /><b>Red wine or white? </b>Yes please. I love wine and will drink both reds and whites at any time. <br /><br /><b>We only have beer: </b>German or Belgian please. Or just good old Coors Light.<br /><br /><b>Favorite dessert? </b>A big warm brownie with an even bigger scoop of vanilla ice cream and some chocolate syrup poured over it.<br /><br /><b>The perfect nightcap? </b>In the winter time some hot chocolate is always good. <br /><br /><br />Okay, that was fascinating wasn’t it kids? Yeah, I thought so. <br /><br />Jayman<br /><a href="mailto:Jayman3768@gmail.com">Jayman3768@gmail.com</a><br /><a href="http://www.twitter.com/jayman_iws" target="_blank">@Jayman_IWS</a><br /><br />Also, on Sunday we had a great time just shooting the breeze on the <a href="http://www.blogtalkradio.com/im-with-stupid" target="_blank">I’m With Stupid Podcast</a>. Originally the idea was to give out advice to folks for dealing with the holidays, but we didn’t really get around to doing much of that. But, it was still a fun time of just talking about whatever came up. So, you should totally check it out! <br /><br /><object classid="clsid:D27CDB6E-AE6D-11cf-96B8-444553540000" codebase="http://download.adobe.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=9,0,0,0" height="105" id="143577" name="143577" width="210"><param name="movie" value="http://www.blogtalkradio.com/btrplayer.swf?file=http://www.blogtalkradio.com%2Fplaylist.aspx%3Fshow_id%3D4032719&autostart=false&bufferlength=5&volume=80&corner=rounded&callback=http://www.blogtalkradio.com/flashplayercallback.aspx" /><param name="quality" value="high" /><param name="wmode" value="transparent" /><param name="menu" value="false" /><param name="allowScriptAccess" value="always" /><embed src="http://www.blogtalkradio.com/btrplayer.swf" flashvars="file=http://www.blogtalkradio.com%2Fplaylist.aspx%3Fshow_id%3D4032719&autostart=false&shuffle=false&callback=http://www.blogtalkradio.com/FlashPlayerCallback.aspx&width=210&height=105&volume=80&corner=rounded" width="210" height="105" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" pluginspage="http://www.macromedia.com/go/getflashplayer" quality="high" wmode="transparent" menu="false" name="143577" id="143577" allowScriptAccess="always"></embed></object><br /><div style="font-size: 10px; text-align: center; width: 220px;">Listen to <a href="http://www.blogtalkradio.com/">internet radio</a> with <a href="http://www.blogtalkradio.com/im-with-stupid">Im With Stupid</a> on Blog Talk Radio</div><br /><br /></div>

Eat to Live, Live to Eat

Hola y’all! Since I’m busy corrupting the simple and decent people of Omaha, NE this week, I will use old memes as fodder on the days that i...

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HAMAS’ PROPAGANDA WAR

<b><br /></b><br /><span style="color: red;"><span style="font-size: x-large;"><b>MANUFACTURING BLOOD LIB<span style="font-size: x-large;">EL</span> </b></span></span> <br /><div class="navi-top-alignment"></div><div class="postwrap"><div class="post-28477 post type-post status-publish format-standard hentry category-hamas-islam-fundamentalists category-israel category-israelipalestinian-conflict category-media-bias-media category-palestinian-terrorism-israelipalestinian-conflict category-pro-palestinianism-israelipalestinian-conflict category-rob-harris tag-blood-libel tag-hamas tag-israel tag-israeli-palestinian-conflict tag-media-bias tag-muhammad-al-dura tag-operation-amud-anan tag-palestinian-terrorism tag-pro-palestinianism tag-propaganda-war tag-rob-harris tag-social-media" id="post-28477"><div class="post-content"><br /><div style="text-align: left;"></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="color: #233f55; font-weight: bold; letter-spacing: 0.04em;">I</span>ntensive propaganda campaigns led by Palestinian terrorist groups are perhaps the most predictable occurrence when it comes to any minor or major conflict involving Israel. Typically, the strategy is to exaggerate death tolls, and conflate the killing of terrorist combatants with that of innocent civilians, in an effort to turn the issue on its head when Israel engages in morally legitimate acts of self-defence.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">The display of highly emotive imagery is central to the strategy, and the most tasteless element must surely be the use of children. Children on both sides suffer, and conflict would of course cause fear to children, if not suffering. Nonetheless, these stories are often faked, and any apparent suffering paraded to the point of frenzy, a phenomenon that is intensifying with the use of social media sites like Twitter.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">The recent violence between Hamas and Israel, leading to Operation Pillar of Cloud, has proven no exception. Almost immediately, Hamas began misrepresenting <a href="http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Peace/2012/11/14/Hamas-Fakes-Casualties-on-Twitter" target="_blank">images of children that had been injured or killed</a> in Syria as Palestinian dead. Notably, one of Hamas’ own supporters called out some of the fakery in a Tweet.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">Similarly, a <a href="http://bdsgb.wordpress.com/2012/11/14/keep-faking-dead-kid-photo-from-gaza-is-actually-syrian/" target="_blank">heartrending image of a dead two year-old child</a> killed by the Syrian armed forces has also been passed off as another Palestinian casualty in the recent Israeli air strikes.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="wp-caption aligncenter" id="attachment_28481" style="text-align: justify; width: 388px;"><div class="wp-caption-text"><br /></div></div><div style="font-weight: bold; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">The strategy: Jew-as-child-killer</span></div><div style="font-weight: bold; text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">There are many examples of forged Palestinian propaganda, most of which get no media attention, other than the <a href="http://www.crethiplethi.com/the-muhammad-al-dura-hoax-and-other-myths-revived/israel/2011/">case of Mohammad Al-Dura</a>, a death proven to be falsified, and made in collusion with elements of the French media, a fact journalists at Haaretz and the Guardian have poured doubt upon.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">In June Hamas <a href="http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/157150" target="_blank">claimed</a> that an Israeli air strike killed a child. However, no strike appeared to have been conducted in the area in question, and the <a href="http://elderofziyon.blogspot.ie/2012/06/un-confirms-that-arabs-lied-about-dead.html" target="_blank">UN confirmed</a> another cause. In March, AFP retracted <a href="http://news.yahoo.com/story-removed-gaza-power-cuts-193131038.html" target="_blank">a faked Hamas story</a> concerning a child supposedly dying due to electricity shortages.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">Such propaganda is heavily promoted internationally by pro-Palestinian groups, which can often come to resemble proxies, and indeed many pro-Palestinians are also very keen to take the initiative for themselves. Examples this year include <a href="http://www.theblaze.com/stories/u-n-media-employee-tweets-bloody-photo-of-palestinian-child-from-2006-but-attributes-it-to-current-airstrikes/" target="_blank">an image of a young girl purportedly killed in an Israeli air strike</a> but the girl in question was actually a casualty of an accident six years earlier, which was knowingly peddled on Twitter by no less than a member of the UN.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">This content goes viral within a very short time, so viewed by millions of users. The fakery does not need to be of a good standard to be believed either. Overtly falsified incidents, such as <a href="http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/world_now/2012/02/viral-photo-of-israeli-soldier-appears-fake.html" target="_blank">a staged event</a> where a child is seen under a supposed IDF soldier’s boot, have found similar success on the Internet.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="font-weight: bold; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">Pallywood becomes Hammywood – Al Dura style</span></div><div style="font-weight: bold; text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">It has been <a href="http://anneinpt.wordpress.com/2012/11/13/uk-media-coverage-of-the-rocket-fire-onto-the-south-of-israel/" target="_blank">noted</a> that many news outlets minimised or failed to report that the present conflict was very much initiated by Hamas. Indeed, the strategy of delaying the reporting of news stories concerning the conflict until Israel strikes back, whereby headlines lead with Israel’s actions, seems to have almost become editorial policy at the majority of mainstream news institutions, due to the <a href="http://blog.camera.org/archives/2012/11/post_104.html" target="_blank">astonishing frequency</a> of such occurrences.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">The BBC, a major international news outlet, <a href="http://www.anorak.co.uk/339538/news/israel-watch-bbc-broadcasts-fake-hamas-injury-as-fact.html/" target="_blank">broadcast content</a> on their prime news bulletins that was clearly falsified. This occurred only a day after Operation Pillar of Cloud had commenced.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span class="youtube"></span></span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">A man in a tan-brown jacket, and black top featuring small print, is carried away by a crowd, circa 2:14 in the clip. The same man is seen walking around a short time later (circa 2:44). Both shots happened in the seemingly chaotic aftermath of a strike. Two alternatives can be posited. Either the scene was largely faked or a gravely injured man was up and walking again unassisted in a matter of minutes.</span><br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen" frameborder="0" height="266" mozallowfullscreen="mozallowfullscreen" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/qwkdJJ001W8?feature=player_embedded" webkitallowfullscreen="webkitallowfullscreen" width="320"></iframe></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;"> <span style="font-size: small;">BBC fake Hamas attack</span></span></div></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">The footage is in fact redolent of old unedited Pallywood material, in which <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t_B1H-1opys" target="_blank">youths and men are seen falling</a> as if just shot by the IDF only to get up again.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="font-weight: bold; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">Consequences</span></div><div style="font-weight: bold; text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">The Palestinian movement, both at home and abroad, has engaged in an intensive campaign to delegitimise its enemy for decades. We see its consequences every time we see news of the conflict in newspapers, on TV sets, radios, computers, and increasingly even <span style="font-size: large;">on </span>phones.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">Obviously such material further incites hatred in a region where there is already more than enough to go around. The examples cited in this article are just occasions when Hamas have been caught out, and it should be noted that the success of this material necessitates most being passed off as genuine.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">Knowledge in the hands of <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YKeAVBYAbn0" target="_blank">would-be genocidists</a> is a tool of war, and ought to be treated as such. However, elements within the media are complicit.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">The focus on children taps into the anti-Semitic canard of the Jew as child killer, as exemplified by Carlos Latuff’s <a href="http://jcpa.org/article/anti-semitic-cartoons-on-progressive-blogs/" target="_blank">illustrations</a> — a motif prolifically adopted by mainstream pro-Palestinianism. It is a tool to engineer anti-Semitic blood libel.</span></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">At this time of conflict, it should be affirmed that the many who defend Hamas do so at the expense of the Palestinians themselves! Those claiming Hamas are elected representatives conveniently forget that they imposed an <a href="http://carnegieendowment.org/2012/06/11/gaza-five-years-on-hamas-settles-in/birb#" target="_blank">effective dictatorship</a> on the electorate by repeatedly delaying elections. We are constantly told Hamas are pragmatists, sheep in the clothing of wolves, but with the present fracas Hamas have essentially started an unwinnable war over the killing of a leading terrorist. It shows where their priorities truly lie.</span><br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen" frameborder="0" height="266" mozallowfullscreen="mozallowfullscreen" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/9Fic15V8ChE?feature=player_embedded" webkitallowfullscreen="webkitallowfullscreen" width="320"></iframe></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;"> <span style="font-size: x-small;">Hamas MP: The Jews were brought to Palestina for the "Great Massacre </span></span></div></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><a href="http://www.fas.org/irp/world/para/docs/880818a.htm" target="_blank">Article Seven</a> of Hamas’ Charter also gives a hint</span></div><div class="indent" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">The Day of Judgment will not come about until Moslems fight Jews and kill them. Then, the Jews will hide behind rocks and trees, and the rocks and trees will cry out: ‘O Moslem, there is a Jew hiding behind me, come and kill him.’</span></div><div class="indent" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;">Similarly the words of Hamas’ leaders attest to extremism, some of whom believe Allah brought the Jews to Palestine for the purpose of “The Great Massacre” to be instigated by the Palestinian nation:</span><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:WordDocument> <w:View>Normal</w:View> <w:Zoom>0</w:Zoom> <w:TrackMoves/> <w:TrackFormatting/> <w:PunctuationKerning/> <w:ValidateAgainstSchemas/> <w:SaveIfXMLInvalid>false</w:SaveIfXMLInvalid> <w:IgnoreMixedContent>false</w:IgnoreMixedContent> <w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText>false</w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText> <w:DoNotPromoteQF/> <w:LidThemeOther>EN-US</w:LidThemeOther> <w:LidThemeAsian>X-NONE</w:LidThemeAsian> <w:LidThemeComplexScript>X-NONE</w:LidThemeComplexScript> 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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="39" QFormat="true" Name="TOC Heading"/> </w:LatentStyles></xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 10]><style> /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Normale Tabelle"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-qformat:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:11.0pt; font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif"; mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-fareast; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;} </style><![endif]--> <br /><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal;"><b><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif";">HAMAS.</span></span></b></div></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span class="youtube"></span></span></div><div class="indent" style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="indent" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: small;"><i><b>Rob Harris</b> contributes articles to several websites on contentious political issues (not to be confused with the popular English novelist (1957-) of the same name). He blogs at <a href="http://eirael.blogspot.com/" target="_blank">eirael.blogspot.com</a>. He lives in Ireland. For all the exclusive blog entries by Rob Harris, go <a href="http://www.crethiplethi.com/category/guest-writers/rob-harris/">here</a>.</i></span></div></div></div></div>

HAMAS’ PROPAGANDA WAR

MANUFACTURING BLOOD LIB EL   I ntensive propaganda campaigns led by Palestinian terrorist groups are perhaps the most pre...

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Using a Learnist board to curate information about the iPad Summit in Boston

<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh7JEa3HCsLPQVep79qHy4_oCcbBsK3J5vEwdsHvzqdpyfESKSoIKJCToQmDy3VQbb4kFUam_JXLwwfHViHWyVjrqbUj2HXMAj3LQAdSNsjATiLWEzc4jA7AEnvTS00bQ4ZCOzRCmiEft8/s1600/learnist2.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh7JEa3HCsLPQVep79qHy4_oCcbBsK3J5vEwdsHvzqdpyfESKSoIKJCToQmDy3VQbb4kFUam_JXLwwfHViHWyVjrqbUj2HXMAj3LQAdSNsjATiLWEzc4jA7AEnvTS00bQ4ZCOzRCmiEft8/s1600/learnist2.JPG" /></a></div><i>submitted by Fiona Beal</i> <br /><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">For a while now I have been wanting to learn how to use Learnist for curating. I have tried (and LOVE using) Pinterest and Scoopit and today it was Learnist's turn. </span><em style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-style: normal; line-height: 16px;">Learnist</em><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 16px;"> makes it very easy to share what you know by curating the web. You can use videos, blogs, books, docs, images or anything on the web to explain </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 16px;">. In my first attempt I used blogposts and a Google Docs presentation. Perhaps in my next Learnist I'll get more adventurous!</span><br /><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><b>A Learnist board about the use of tablets</b></span><br /><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Since I am very interested in the use of  tablets in the classroom I thought a worthy topic would be to find out more about the recent iPad Summit which was held at Harvard in Boston earlier this month. I did an Internet search of relevant posts and was delighted with what I found.  So please take a look at my embedded Learnist. In one of our following Schoolnet blogposts I'll relate how to create a board using this great curation tool - Learnist.  </span><br /><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Simply click on the heading in this image to be taken to the completed Learnist board called 'Ipad Summit posts'.  </span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div><br /><iframe frameborder="0" height="456px" scrolling="no" src="http://learni.st/users/36830/boards/7817-ipad-summit-posts/embed?o=v" width="300px"></iframe></div>

Learnist Web tools Using a Learnist board to curate information about the iPad Summit in Boston

submitted by Fiona Beal For a while now I have been wanting to learn how to use Learnist for curating. I have tried (and LOVE using) Pinter...

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Photo Shoot

<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;">Today we had a photo shoot in our house for a UK Interiors Magazine.  It started this morning at about 10am when the photographer, <a href="http://www.reportage.ie/">Barbara Egan</a>, and stylist, Penny Crawford-Collins, arrived.  The stylist was very happy with the house and said she would need to add very few props as we had a very "strong look".  The shoot only took about 5 hours - again the stylist said this was very speedy as normally most houses need serious decluttering but ours thankfully didn't. </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;">Here's a few photos from the shoot.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;">A little rearrangement of a shelf by Penny the Stylist</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9qvQsFAQ1h3DfG5krmeOhPwTByBRUTR4Gricmh97fz9Cph5hlXCW3yXLhoMZUr-ICrzu2swn-y6nXqSKnBWvmFH0EV4NnVbkfmYUnqKRSSr8IoueXkTqCJe__CyWrWrUdry1BsPh3kQ97/s1600/IMG_2466%5B1%5D.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9qvQsFAQ1h3DfG5krmeOhPwTByBRUTR4Gricmh97fz9Cph5hlXCW3yXLhoMZUr-ICrzu2swn-y6nXqSKnBWvmFH0EV4NnVbkfmYUnqKRSSr8IoueXkTqCJe__CyWrWrUdry1BsPh3kQ97/s320/IMG_2466%5B1%5D.JPG" width="239" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-size: large;">Lamp being set up in the hallway (our habitat rug was removed from the hall as the stylist felt it didn't match the fabulous rugs that were loaned by <a href="http://www.rugart.ie/">RugArt</a></span><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiYrL58uHjmI_VKske3kwu_SN_WwEOz8Hq6sW7gErz4CObI-nZhYvTRywJbvQOgoRKj48YBHHz9bbjxAeEh_ZQgp56ZS5KPB3MQWOM67P-7upiAr0HckAPUQqzmRi_vZbql9IcBuhA5ZlQF/s1600/IMG_2468%5B2%5D.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiYrL58uHjmI_VKske3kwu_SN_WwEOz8Hq6sW7gErz4CObI-nZhYvTRywJbvQOgoRKj48YBHHz9bbjxAeEh_ZQgp56ZS5KPB3MQWOM67P-7upiAr0HckAPUQqzmRi_vZbql9IcBuhA5ZlQF/s320/IMG_2468%5B2%5D.JPG" width="239" /></a></div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-size: large;">The stylist added accents of orange to the kitchen.  Oranges were arranged on a platter and my orange Le Creuset pot was set up on the induction hob.</span><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFacYzWiymHqyZGC27P90nvU_mp3wTHmmN5cSyjmbn_28EchfGDlJS1hC2Nd7V_rDTNsBgNrwIT7nJTGtkLUJYQNoYlrjSuM_Sb9eDs-3Lh4OpIIHAPg_pNHWubykKbzn2HUM7y1koE8Xi/s1600/IMG_2470%5B1%5D.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFacYzWiymHqyZGC27P90nvU_mp3wTHmmN5cSyjmbn_28EchfGDlJS1hC2Nd7V_rDTNsBgNrwIT7nJTGtkLUJYQNoYlrjSuM_Sb9eDs-3Lh4OpIIHAPg_pNHWubykKbzn2HUM7y1koE8Xi/s320/IMG_2470%5B1%5D.JPG" width="239" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;">Here's Barbara the photographer taking a picture of the conversation pit</span><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjKcGJduIAe8GFl4lfH66XfrjgwG-WWCgolJElkmZlSBlMos0VQ1SwGmCaJ-P9oHWmLDu6bYSRAMeFRva-8CpLAXzqyjs9ckoGFIbXEE5eUxmzgOrLK_UL61B1L8V_KNiOoc0nY17KWnowJ/s1600/IMG_2474%5B1%5D.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjKcGJduIAe8GFl4lfH66XfrjgwG-WWCgolJElkmZlSBlMos0VQ1SwGmCaJ-P9oHWmLDu6bYSRAMeFRva-8CpLAXzqyjs9ckoGFIbXEE5eUxmzgOrLK_UL61B1L8V_KNiOoc0nY17KWnowJ/s320/IMG_2474%5B1%5D.JPG" width="239" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;">Not a whole lot was changed in the master bedroom.  The stylist added these cushions and brought a few items from the guest room in to this bedroom</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhcQafdRwZeKm_PvWQN94645fwolPhfysmoX-ZfYT9lRQOBb9a8Q1Sm-3Z448YL6goqsBMSJ9oSnD1LT45i2pdkNWYfJUBftzJ0TpsmFZ8eT6Z3tdu212UByg2_4l3d8uxTEcu6hv-A-uEo/s1600/IMG_2479%5B1%5D.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhcQafdRwZeKm_PvWQN94645fwolPhfysmoX-ZfYT9lRQOBb9a8Q1Sm-3Z448YL6goqsBMSJ9oSnD1LT45i2pdkNWYfJUBftzJ0TpsmFZ8eT6Z3tdu212UByg2_4l3d8uxTEcu6hv-A-uEo/s320/IMG_2479%5B1%5D.JPG" width="239" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEglLJ-CjtFHiKCu3kUoxDI5HshYgm8CH-3_vqiB0ciBpFTIstzi6KgzoMKsJ8IKBp1_62hjsWcvh6Xj9aiGPcJqH2QrFmEiqfaMAwfIqgO8iM2Ld9gU0Y7A3iN7pN2CcDSeuarGLBhpZXty/s1600/IMG_2476%5B1%5D.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEglLJ-CjtFHiKCu3kUoxDI5HshYgm8CH-3_vqiB0ciBpFTIstzi6KgzoMKsJ8IKBp1_62hjsWcvh6Xj9aiGPcJqH2QrFmEiqfaMAwfIqgO8iM2Ld9gU0Y7A3iN7pN2CcDSeuarGLBhpZXty/s320/IMG_2476%5B1%5D.JPG" width="239" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiu9R9DR7dY6zgi_8HqtqOkOActtg-im3_W73piuQNumPJd9W1xnHuUhKo5yAk91XrnR_djWDzhtY1NLPS25LgKxf87LMemERK-Oxylq9p1mJpUrMsOHMSiE-rhDGwQrWaP8pt7JPn7a6m5/s1600/IMG_2490%5B1%5D.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiu9R9DR7dY6zgi_8HqtqOkOActtg-im3_W73piuQNumPJd9W1xnHuUhKo5yAk91XrnR_djWDzhtY1NLPS25LgKxf87LMemERK-Oxylq9p1mJpUrMsOHMSiE-rhDGwQrWaP8pt7JPn7a6m5/s320/IMG_2490%5B1%5D.JPG" width="239" /></a></div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-size: large;">Here is the back of the house being photographed.  Isn't the <a href="http://www.kubekitchens.ie/designer-furniture">Calligaris</a> chair amazing?!!</span><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjS39ZoxPKg4FZqwijIruC2qSv3SRsrqQTXHVfk9DZv-tTKRtbCbnWVfr6HC6Ls7iaEeVGHOinvmRPnEu0N0guaE_Ck16k10RkGoW3j4Eb1u4uW9boqICcHTBLMLAgQv3oFcA2xmsYR9uB4/s1600/IMG_2512%5B1%5D.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjS39ZoxPKg4FZqwijIruC2qSv3SRsrqQTXHVfk9DZv-tTKRtbCbnWVfr6HC6Ls7iaEeVGHOinvmRPnEu0N0guaE_Ck16k10RkGoW3j4Eb1u4uW9boqICcHTBLMLAgQv3oFcA2xmsYR9uB4/s320/IMG_2512%5B1%5D.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span><span style="font-size: large;">Here is my own attempt at staging!!  I set up this little tray of cocktails (Cosmo's) and nibblies - it was used in the picture of the hot tub.</span><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEisUcpTV-HRmZJ7jLi2dCg9jBWFDWbgfTOH9iPzn4if1KNQA_aghthrR5Dkcq25U-BiWnH6ybLOW39ZQWz1h-fCZEVYMRkIM3isJfLKzHYZ4rE97svvCxYwWJseSmiXwo8znCNZ-w4CBhnZ/s1600/IMG_2483%5B1%5D.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEisUcpTV-HRmZJ7jLi2dCg9jBWFDWbgfTOH9iPzn4if1KNQA_aghthrR5Dkcq25U-BiWnH6ybLOW39ZQWz1h-fCZEVYMRkIM3isJfLKzHYZ4rE97svvCxYwWJseSmiXwo8znCNZ-w4CBhnZ/s320/IMG_2483%5B1%5D.JPG" width="239" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-size: large;">Look to the left of the picture - it's my cocktail tray!</span><br /><span style="font-size: large;">The stylist added the lovely bright cushions which make you nearly forget that it is November and that there was frost this morning!  <a href="http://www.shadowlight.ie/">Shadowlight</a> gave us the lamp to the right of the picture for the shoot.</span><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh3jwuAeJp3qHeo4rucsHWKhjTrZQEfX-oa6cCfP5kVLCibEjFEdivxTDfxPszZrEkZHsZGlYyAvsMAauSRsUqNEu6RBheZa4e8X1rTfdkur5BsnSoUX3OcE8EMiuomRaCDUs7fKk54mqoV/s1600/IMG_2513%5B1%5D.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh3jwuAeJp3qHeo4rucsHWKhjTrZQEfX-oa6cCfP5kVLCibEjFEdivxTDfxPszZrEkZHsZGlYyAvsMAauSRsUqNEu6RBheZa4e8X1rTfdkur5BsnSoUX3OcE8EMiuomRaCDUs7fKk54mqoV/s320/IMG_2513%5B1%5D.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;">Ciaran and I were photographed along with the dog once the house was all done. Due to the fact that it will be possibly Summer before the photos are featured in the magazine I was advised that I should not wear winter clothes i.e no woolly jumpers or boots.  I was told to wear pale colours - no black, navy or brown.  I wore a cream floaty blouse with tan trousers and a pair of ballet pumps while Ciaran wore a pink shirt with dark chinos.  We were photographed in various poses such as relaxing watching TV, chatting on the couch and then Ciaran coming in the door with the dog and me greeting them from the couch.    </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;">We enjoyed the whole experience and are looking forward to seeing the photos in the magazine! </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><span style="font-size: large; text-align: center;">As far as we know the photos won't be published until the middle of 2013 but I will keep you updated!!</span><br /><span style="font-size: large; text-align: center;"><br /></span><span style="font-size: large; text-align: center;">Here's a few more pictures to give you a taste of the day.  Enjoy!</span><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjkhuUz-soOrp4fKORIZ8y7Pn9n8w5xTxsSP1oVTMlJpXoXxojRE-Kyr31W8eonHOpV16guBukYavf3yxgz-WQogyRaFiyPRWvX8cvFiZfq7Qu8aRpu-sR_YlAdgnACCa0uMVrmeREgHmtT/s1600/IMG_2508%5B1%5D.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjkhuUz-soOrp4fKORIZ8y7Pn9n8w5xTxsSP1oVTMlJpXoXxojRE-Kyr31W8eonHOpV16guBukYavf3yxgz-WQogyRaFiyPRWvX8cvFiZfq7Qu8aRpu-sR_YlAdgnACCa0uMVrmeREgHmtT/s320/IMG_2508%5B1%5D.JPG" width="239" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVKbMoNH3ijwiVqnVhnggh8d5DGIWdmDqfoiWV7eQ-D03LdA2-LbZWhPDNFsJKN1Iqt4R1nxGVBDVW25WgHYDRo-uF1Yh7xARGfgbIhKYuvTut_W84NOYy_EVa7hjmORf6PVgkLzEbGtNs/s1600/IMG_2509%5B1%5D.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVKbMoNH3ijwiVqnVhnggh8d5DGIWdmDqfoiWV7eQ-D03LdA2-LbZWhPDNFsJKN1Iqt4R1nxGVBDVW25WgHYDRo-uF1Yh7xARGfgbIhKYuvTut_W84NOYy_EVa7hjmORf6PVgkLzEbGtNs/s320/IMG_2509%5B1%5D.JPG" width="239" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEitw5WFpMndBRaGCrIQC-FTtJMuoz5ADJEMgWPJeglNDyQPw7BSArenfSmtyglo-W0autzMBWz3XpoWwwnH7_cxybXNjT7_mWB6y-LJMNLv0nasm1UxU4hOM8bePBVEHBSSeYaVaAQczzWd/s1600/IMG_2511%5B2%5D.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEitw5WFpMndBRaGCrIQC-FTtJMuoz5ADJEMgWPJeglNDyQPw7BSArenfSmtyglo-W0autzMBWz3XpoWwwnH7_cxybXNjT7_mWB6y-LJMNLv0nasm1UxU4hOM8bePBVEHBSSeYaVaAQczzWd/s320/IMG_2511%5B2%5D.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><span style="font-size: large; text-align: center;"><br /></span><span style="font-size: large; text-align: center;">You can checkout more pictures <a href="https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.453266344709707.90420.122333021136376&type=1">here</a>!</span>

Photo Shoot

Today we had a photo shoot in our house for a UK Interiors Magazine.  It started this morning at about 10am when the photographer, Barbara E...

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