A Senator’s Strength

Recently, the news broke that Senator John Fetterman (D-PA) was checking himself into the hospital to seek treatment for severe depression. Frankly, I don’t care what you think about the Senator’s politics, because this post isn’t about that. It is about the bravery to seek help.

It is no secret that the political world is dog-eat-dog, with anything and everything seemingly becoming fair game to be used as fodder by political opponents. Unfortunately, some tried to use this as a way to knock down the Senator, saying that he wasn’t fit to serve.

Let me say this loud and clear, living with mental illness should be taken seriously, but it doesn’t mean you can seek ambitious achievements, such as being elected to the U.S. Senate. It is shameful that such stigma still exists but it does, both in the political world and in the legal one.

Again, politics is not our concern in this post. Stigma is, specifically working to end stigma. Because over the past week I heard people saying that Senator Fetterman shouldn’t remain in office with his condition. Some of those same people defend mental health questions on bar applications, saying that people with severe mental illness shouldn’t be practicing law. And that just is not the case.

In the worst of my depressions, I can still think analytically about a legal problem I am presented with. In some cases, forcing myself to engage such a problem might help pull me out of the hole, even though I realize that might not be true for everyone. My point simply is that mental illness impacts everyone differently. Many people can continue to have rewarding lives and careers and knee-jerk reactions like some of the ones John Fetterman experienced serve no one’s interest. Rather such reactions, whether in the political arena or the legal one, threaten to fuel a stigma that causes far too many individuals to die rather than seek help.

So yea, this post isn’t praising the Senator’s politics. Rather, it is the bravery we commend, bravery we hope inspires others to continue pushing back against the stigma of mental illness.