Millstone family battles stigma of mental illness BY JENNIFER KOHLHEPP Staff Writer MILLSTONE - When Pradeep Shah told family and friends that he has diabetes, they showed compassion and offered him scads of health tips and diet advice. The receptionwas not the samewhen he told them about his son's illness. His son, Arjun, 19, has mental illness. He started showing symptoms at the age of 8 but went undiagnosed for most of his youth. While the Shahs struggled to find answers for their son whom they clearly saw as having some sort of disorder, family, friends, community members and even educators treatedArjun as if he weren't exerting himself enough and as if he were just another disciplinary problem. Even after Arjun has been properly diagnosed with bipolar disorder, people in the family's life still have a hard time realizing that he suffers froman illness like diabetes, hepatitis or cancer. "Mental illness is a disorder of the brain and not of the heart,mind and soul,"Arjun's mother, Shrabanee, said. "People need to be aware that mental illness is an illness." In an effort to erase stigma, discrimination and negative attitudes against those living with mental illness, the Shahs, in cooperation with the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) Greater Monmouth and theMillstone TownshipAlliance to PreventAlcoholism and DrugAbuse, will present "Mental Illness - Acceptance Not Stigma" at 7 p.m. onMay 8 in themunicipal courtroom at 240Millstone Road. "Ifwe can change one person'smind that would be great," Pradeep said. The program will feature a short film aboutmental illness,Millstone residents discussing howthey have been affected bymental illness and a quick presentation byNAMI Greater Monmouth with Helene Kalkay, president of NAMI GreaterMonmouth. The Shahsmission as boardmembers of NAMI GreaterMonmouth is two-fold. They want to help youths better understandmental illness and theywant to help community members and educators locate resources to help thembetter deal with people who have mental illness. "Members of the younger generation develop their ideas from their surroundings," Shrabanee said. "When they hear mental illness, they think Columbine and Virginia Tech." She said many youths don't realize that most individuals with mental illness lead normal, healthy lives. The Shahs also want educators and youth leaders to learn to listen to parents of children with mental illness. She said her son often received detentions and suspensions for acting up. "When there's all that finger-pointing and blame, children get more aggressive," she said. "They think, 'I don't care if no one cares about me.'" She said living in the community shouldn't have been a battle when the family was already fighting a battle at home. "Don't let them stand out in left field when they could be playing first base," Shrabanee said. "It's not about losing a game, but about giving an individual a chance. With mental illness, self-esteem is a very big factor." Pradeep said, "One of the biggest problems kids withmental illness have is thinking that something is wrong with them because people have destroyed their self-esteem. It's not good for anything and it impacts them severely." The Shahs want to be a shoulder to lean on and a source of information for other people like themselves. "There is help and hope out there," Shrabanee said. "You are not alone. It's time people talked aboutmental illness. It's time to accept it." Kalkay said the biggest obstacle for society to overcome is the individual's refusal to learn anything about mental illness. She said NAMI is a grassroots organization run by volunteer support to eradicatemental illness and improve the quality of life of those affected by mental illness. Kalkay said NAMI's goal is to help one person at a time. Some of those people were the Shahs. When doctors were trying unsuccessfully to findmedications and a diagnosis for their son, the Shahs wanted to give up on everything. "You're angry at everyone and yourself," Shrabanee said. "You're looking for someone or something to blame." The family took a class at NAMI and learned not to blame themselves for their child's mental illness. They learned that mental illness doesn't discriminate and affects all cultures and classes of people. The family also learned that getting the proper diagnosis is vital and found resources toward that goal. Shrabanee said, "The education we got fromNAMIwere the answerswewere looking for. NAMI has taught us a great deal about mental illness and literally opened doors for us to see the light at the end of the tunnel." Kalkay said that above all NAMI offers hope and the realization that people are not alone in their fight against mental illness. "We're never recovered," Shrabanee said. "We're always in recovery." The forum is NAMI's first townshipwide foruminMonmouth County. Shah also runs a teens and young adults support group through NAMI every third Tuesday of the month in the Colts Neck Baptist Church. Because different cultures view mental illness differently, NAMI also offers support groups for various ethnic groups. For more information about the forum or NAMI and its services, contact Shrabanee Shah at onthego77@att.net or at (609) 259-7139.