Transcript Insanity: What Happened to Bruce Hill-Tout? Generated by Otter and saved as is. Please report any difficulties, errors or omissions with this transcript through the contact form. Unknown You're listening to the rethreading madness podcast which airs live on Vancouver called Radio CFR Oh 100.5 FM. We are recorded and produced on the unseeded traditional territories of the Squamish Musqueam and slay tooth nations around Vancouver BC. I'm your host, Bernadine Fox, and this is the show that dares to change how we think about mental health. Welcome to our show. Unknown Today on rethreading madness, I'm talking with Director Wendy Hill to about her most recent documentary entitled insanity when he began as a writer, director on social issue films. Shattered Dreams was about one family's experience with schizophrenia produced out of the National Film Board. Here in Canada was nominated for a Gemini award and no place to go was a film about homelessness, which won international awards in San Francisco, and Columbus. Insanity. The film we're about to talk about follows on the heels of those two, but brings into extreme focus her own personal story about a brother Bruce, who developed schizophrenia and then disappeared in 1998. Insanity demonstrates that our treatment of people with mental health challenges is in fact, insanity. It is an ode to the brother she loved and lost. You You're listening to rethreading madness. I'm Bernadine Fox talking with Wendy Hill to Wendy. Tell us about your brother as a child. Who was is it younger? Is it your younger brother or your older brother? Wendy Hill-Tout Yeah, my brother was two years older so we were two years hard and very close because of it. You know, we grew up like normal siblings against fighting and playing together. And you know, he was he was a really great brother and I have two other brothers who were also interviewed in the film and both of them talk about how he was, you know, a good person and he was a role models him. Unknown And so is he the oldest? Wendy Hill-Tout Yes, Bruce was the oldest and second oldest and then I had two younger brothers. Unknown So could you give us some timeframe because of course mental health changes over the years. What timeframe are we talking about that he was a child? What like what era what year? Wendy Hill-Tout So he would have been born in 1952. And you know, growing up and through high school 60s 70s Right. Unknown Right. Yeah, a little bit older than me. Almost able to be a hippie. I would think I missed that completely. I wanted to be but was never quite old enough. Wendy Hill-Tout I was a hippie check myself. So you went from two liters to hippie check. Unknown Well, that must have pleased your parents. Wendy Hill-Tout And like mine was pretty left leaning and very, you know, always interested in the world. So we had a lot of dinners. He was also a social studies teacher so he spent you know a lot of time talking about issues and you know, people in the world so um, so I don't think he mind it too much because it was a really interesting was an amazing time to be around. The music was revolutionary. It was amazing. Yeah, the women's rights movement Unknown was fabulous. Yeah, right. People everywhere, Wendy Hill-Tout which was, you know, partly why I made this film because I wanted people with a mental illness to be seen as human beings Unknown and in 1952 Up until, oh my gosh, I can't even say when it started to change. That mental health was considered something very shameful if you if you had any kind of mental health challenges, even if you were depressed. You know, you never you know, people didn't talk about going to see a therapist you did not meant that you were taking any kind of antidepressant or something. Well, anxiety, women were given a lot of medications for anxiety, but certainly at that time, I know for me growing up that mental health was something that was considered to be bad. You know, if you had a mental health challenge, that was bad, you were considered crazy. Wendy Hill-Tout A lot of shame with it, you know, sadly, I think they're still getting better. There's still a stigma today and I still think people don't talk about it much. And you know, what I find is like, you know, we'll be traveling like with a camera person going to film somewhere on this film, and be in the airport and someone say, Oh, what are you filming? And you kind of chat with them and when you admit that there was an illness in your family or someone who had a mental illness, suddenly they change like, Oh, our son or our needs, or someone in their family, right? Because I think it touches so many families and you know, it's just a huge thing in society. And still, people keep it to themselves until they know they can be safe. Unknown Safe from what Wendy Hill-Tout I think say from judgment. And, you know, you know, even though it's getting better, I think people are still afraid to tell work, for example, Oh, yeah. They're afraid to lose their jobs. They're just afraid of what people will think of them. And it's really sad because we don't have that with other illnesses. They're not seen as a weakness. No, Unknown it's true. And I interviewed somebody who was in art school, when he developed schizophrenia. And he ended up hospitalized during that time and when he came back to school, all of his friends ghosted him, like walked past him wouldn't talk to him, you know, they pretended they didn't know him and, and to just be able to live sort of a normal life he had to geographically move to another province so that he could develop friends and, you know, be in school without it having been this horrible thing that happened. So Unknown that's tragic. I mean, I interviewed a woman. You know, we couldn't put everybody he interviewed in the film, but she was amazing. She's going to be at a screening in Toronto, on the q&a with me and she talked about her experience being in hospital and she said, when you have a mental illness, nobody comes to see you in the sideboard, right? No one brings you flowers. No one says it well, it's just very different, how you choose. It is Unknown and unfortunately the thing that you really need if you're in the psych ward, are people coming to see you so that people, the professionals, the nurses, the doctors, whoever see that you are connected to the community that you have people who are interested in your well being and what's happening to you and those are the things that help you get out from a psych ward. So it's a it's a one two punch, when they're not coming to see you and to the fact that they're not coming to see you means that you may end up staying in there a little bit longer, which is unfortunate. Unknown I'm happy to see that on this tour. For example, we met someone who has a peer program where they're sending peers into to, you know, just humanize it and talk to them and share their own stories. Unknown Mm hmm. Yep. Peer support. That's what you're talking about peer support. Yes, yes. Unknown Mainly hospital. Extreme. Peer support is extremely important. It is really important that they're doing it starting to do it. Some programs exist at the hospital level when people go into hospital. So Unknown yeah, it depends geographically where you are in the world. I know here in Vancouver, we had a very strong peer support programs that were being run out of different organizations that you could go to. So I actually facilitated an expressive arts group for the West Coast mental health network at that time. There was a gallery geshay That was doing a lot of peer support type work as well. For people who had mental health challenges, but were artists. There were other programs and all the funding sort of disappeared, all in one fell swoop and so all the peer support just kind of disappeared. I also interviewed Eugene LeBlanc, who's from New Brunswick, I don't know if you've met him he he does peer support in New Brunswick and he and a psychiatrist. He was working with data survey and they found that for 85% of the people who responded to the survey, they said that peer support was actually more healing for them than going to therapy. Unknown Wow, that's really interesting. No, I think it's so important. I wish I wish in a way I had spoken to my brother about his ill you know he'd come home from the hospital to be on a medication. There was a lot of confidentiality with the hospital so you never even knew what like you didn't really know as a family what was going on? Oh, it was hard to kind of be there too, but I wish I had talked to him more about it. But there was kind of a silence around it. Unknown Who do you think imposed the silence? Was it him or was it society at large? Or was it your parents or? Unknown Definitely not my parents? My parents were really supportive, right? I don't know I just I think I saw that's a society thing. I didn't realize how important it was to speak to him. And I was really happy to see like after he disappeared, I met up with one of his friends. Good met him. My brother was an artist and he ran a gallery at one time and then later developed a notice on his himself. But he was friends with my brother. And what I was really happy to see is that he had a support unit and friends that he would go visit and they'd have tea and they visit each other because I didn't know about them. You know, we were of course in the family. And we're friends with my brother but we didn't know about that outside group and I was very, very happy to see that and that came about to a group in Calgary that ran a program where they were kind of open during the day, you could go there and I don't know, play play games or whatever, or just hang out together. And he met a lot of friends there. And I think that's very special and very important for their healing as well. Unknown Absolutely. So these were people who also had schizophrenia Unknown or or mental illness of some kind of self help group. They have a different name now, but I think I think that was very important. You know, to him, he was on what was called Asian country supportive housing and that and three in its own little apartment, and it was just neat to see because I think those friends were very special in his life. Everyone, friends, everyone needs love. Everyone has the same hopes and desires. And you know, just because you have an illness, whether it's cancer or mental illness doesn't make you any different inside. Unknown No, and it's so odd that somehow people think that that's true, but then you look at the issue of racism. The same thing happens in racism. People think that somebody who has a different colored skin is different inside or how they think or how they live. And certainly that is true. The same kind of things happen in mental health that happens in racism. It's a it's a phobia of an enum and an ignorance around certain issues and the stigma that goes with that. The stigma is very profound that happens for mental health consumers. Unknown For sure, I mean, we need so much more education and has to start at a younger age, I think even in junior high school and for sure in high school because, you know, some of the symptoms come out, you know, in in, sometimes high school early 20s, late 20s. And it's so important for people with their their parents or family or friends to understand and recognize it because they've shown that people who get help earlier have better outcomes. Unknown Yes, there is a school in North Vancouver here who it's an elementary school that is teaching children about mental health issues right from kindergarten and grade one. So it's certainly age appropriate but they are starting them very young. And I don't know how long they've been going I'm not sure we have any stats or material or information on how well or what the impact is, but it is happening here in one school in a PC. Unknown That's great. My dad after my brother disappeared, he volunteered for quite a few years as a teacher to go out to schools to speak about it and they had usually like several people there. There would always be someone who, you know, had a mental illness that could speak about their own personal experience as well. And I think that was very empowering for them and for others, right? Yeah. Unknown How did your brother end up being diagnosed what what was the circumstances around that? was definitely Unknown many years later because I'd say he started to show some certain symptoms and is in high school. He'd always been quite outgoing, athletic. He was always really smart to well at school, and he started to be more of a loner. Just kind of hanging out in his room. He was painting at the time, too. He started painting so we just spent hours and hours alone. And, and you know, at one point, I think we all just thought, well, he was depressed. I remember. I kind of pushed him to go to art school because I thought, you know, if he had a job where he was going to school, I think he would feel better. about himself. He eventually kind of flunked out. I think he just he was dealing with his illness and with things he didn't talk to us about, like his, you know, delusions or just the things that were happening to him and I think he didn't talk to us about it or talk to maybe anyone about it. And I think that just even gave him a bigger slump when he failed. And I think sometimes those are the first symptoms. You know, it's like kind of boot them out, get a job, all of that. I caution people about that because if they have a mental they could have it's possible. They can also be early signs of mental illness. And you know, being depressed being alone, alone or losing jobs, not being social. All of those things can be early signs and and they need support and not to be just you know, turfed and I think we just, again, that's an education thing. We didn't know what we knew nothing as a family. And it was years before my brother actually got a real diagnosis he'd gone to Mexico. And I think with the girlfriends that a man who was from Germany, they traveled down to Mexico, but somehow they split up some somewhere down there and, and then he ended up in Florida. We didn't know where he was. In those days. There were no cell phones or anything. There was no there was not really contact. And he ended up living out of garbage cans in the street. And he was, I guess, living in the woods. And you know, I've always been appreciative that someone actually reported him and knew that he needed help. And I guess he was lucky there was a police officer who came and got him and took him to the hospital. Unfortunately, that can also turn out not well if they fight back or whatever, right. So you know, he did go to the hospital and he was diagnosed and you know, the doctor found my dad from Florida and he said, your son's in the hospital, and my dad said, you know, the hospital What's wrong with him? And he said, Your son has schizophrenia. And that was the first time ever that we'd heard that word. And we knew nothing about it as a family. We didn't know where to turn from him for help. We didn't even know where to get more information. And you know, we were lucky that we did find a family support group and through them learned a lot about the illness. And you know, the more you learn as a family, the more you can, I think, help your loved one too. Unknown Did he ever share with you folks what what his hallucinations were that was it that was keeping quiet because he was having hallucinations and he knew that and he didn't want to share those things or did they come and go? I mean, I Unknown think sometimes they're aware enough that whatever they're gonna say is gonna sound crazy. And my brother was pretty self aware. I mean, I remember my parents, my dad told a story to us that I only heard later, but that he had voices. And at one time, he went to my dad and he said, Dad, my voices are telling me to kill you and mom or whatever, right? And he said, but don't worry, voices. So there was so much awareness and humanity in him. And, you know, my first recollection, like I was an artist, he was an artist. He kind of think, well, you know, you're creative. You think differently. Again, not recognizing the symptoms, but I remember he would talk to me about there were ghosts in his apartment. Well, I mean, I believe in ghosts, like, I don't know, like, it's not so far fetched. So there were little things like that. That seems, you know, more normal, I guess. Right. I think where it really started to show with him. He would get quite paranoid so he thought people were watching him. You know, that's an that can be quite common. If you suffer from paranoia. Yeah. I mean, it's actually quite terrifying. I think that's something sometimes people where where there does need to be more education, and more education with the police and others because they're so afraid people are trying to kill them. My brother would get illusions of that all the time. And imagine what that's like, like, terrifying, scary enough when you're home alone and you think someone's brought me into the house. Well, imagine if you're living with day and night, the house that you're living in, it's not fun, it's not romantic. You know, it's not, you know, poetic to be having a mental illness. For someone like my brother could be with his particular kind of illness. It can be very terrifying. And I think, and I certainly talk to people who suffer from depression. And when, you know, people I knew someone quite well, whose man suffered from manic depression. And, you know, she described it I thought it was such an interesting description of it. It really made me understand a lot more she said, It's like going when you're manic, you just, you go and go and go and go until you can't go anymore. And then you crash. And you know, I think that can be a life of how to like maybe not make it part but the crashing part can be really huge. And I mean, I I have been fortunate enough my life you know, not to have a mental illness like my my brother, but I did suffer for several days with postpartum depression with my son, my for a couple of days, though not six months, like some of my friends might tell you. It was awful. I think I cried for two days. And you know, people call it a mental illness. It was not mental knows. It was in my body. It was like my blood was coursing, like it was just, you know, and I'm sure people with anxiety feel the same thing. It's so physical and feeling understand something about it. This was not in my head. It wasn't like Oh, snap out of it. Be positive, you can feel better. you know, when that happened to me, Fortunately, only for two days and then it just went away. It was really physical, and I couldn't control that I couldn't you know, think differently, to change that. Unknown the one of the things that I did before talking with you today is just go and look at what are the numbers of police shootings and around mental health and of course, we live in a country that, you know, has a long history of difficulties around mental health and wellness checks with police and certainly people being killed on them. And what it says here in Canada is that the experts are warning that there is a perfect storm as the number of shootings are increasing. I think they're up 25% This article says from 2021 into 2022, and of course now we're into 2023. So I would just wondered if you could talk a little bit about what you heard as you're doing this film about the police reactions to mental health. Unknown mean for sure. I think that police departments in North America are looking at this and really want to do something and they are concerned about education of their officers. I think what's happened is there's so many calls now like I you know, in Toronto alone, there are over 20,000 Mental Health calls a year. So, you know, they have done some great things in terms of putting together say a police officer and a mental health worker, social worker to go out and and those one thing that's kind of good and they get to know the community a bit. And so sometimes when they come back for someone who's in a crisis, they've met them before, they know that they know how to sort of calm down the situation and and I think the most important thing is they're educated and what it's like I know because my brother was paranoid. Probably his worst fear would be someone showing up in a uniform with a gun or whatever. To get him because he already believes they're out to kill them, not just police officer, the people so you I could see the flight you know, the flight Centrum fight or flight because that's a normal human reaction. But then you take someone who's terrified and paranoid. They're gonna they could possibly run or, you know, attack or whatever because they think they're going to be killed. Yes. And so that has to get out there. I think police officers have to be really educated on what it's like when someone's going through a mental health crisis, what they're thinking and you know, we also know that, sadly, people who are suicidal and the family calls or their friend or whatever, that they can end up getting shot to, I mean, they're trying to commit suicide, someone calls for help, and then they get shot by police. And, you know, there's stories where you know, just there's too many of these terrible stories. And one of the reasons I made this film was to help educate and, and just because it would, it was just like, it's got to stop. Like, it's just getting worse and worse and worse, and we as a society have to stand up and say, No, this isn't susceptible. We have to do more. We have to put more money into these kinds of teams that go around and into education everywhere. We can't just have two or three team teams in a huge city or one or one country. Unknown One of those one of the statements here it says insanity is about how we treat people. Insanity, meaning your film is about how we treat people who are dealing with mental illness. It's insane. And so maybe you could talk a little bit about I mean, you're talking about the police and how they're responding to it. Is there other parts of the system that you are saying are insane in terms of how they approach this issue? Unknown Well, it's our approach in general, like I don't know what this is, but we have this thing in our society about the best way to deal with mental illness is to lock people up. You know, think it is better now. It's not. We're still locking people up. We locked him up, you know, in the generations where we look at it, maybe horrified by them being in silence and everything else. But now like when you look at this statistics in all over North America, over 50% of the people who are in jail have a mental illness, that's our way of society dealing with it. And in the States, for women. It's closer to 75% of the of the women who are in jail, have a mental illness. And there's horrific stories with that. I mean, you can imagine in the states where the prisons are, you know, they're they're private, more privately owned, and there's some terrible conditions. I mean, here I think one of the worst things is that normally, what we've done in the past is put them into isolation. So you have people going into prison, who have a mental illness and they're being put into isolation for 150 to 150 days, which has been proven to be very bad for mental illness and even to cause psychiatric episodes. Unknown Amnesty International calls isolation, the worst form of torture. did a few years ago, so it is it is that bad. There's another place though, that people get locked up and that is in psych wards. And I don't know about where you live in Canada. I can talk about where I live in Canada and that's the BC Mental Health Act which is almost barbaric and that they can come on a wellness check and handcuff you and put them in the back in your vehicle and take you to a psych ward. They don't have to tell anybody they've done that nobody is informed where you've gone. They can put you on antipsychotics and Ativan and whatever else they want. To they can force treatment on you for up to three weeks before you're allowed to have a hearing and have somebody talk on your behalf or have a lawyer or or or and so by the time three weeks comes along after being on antipsychotics. You are no longer mentally competent. So that's our BC mental health system. And so prisons are one place people are locked up, but psych wards are another place and we have this idea that that only happens if you're a danger to yourself or others but that is not always the case. Here. Unknown I don't think we see that where I am. I think in my brother's day it was probably a little bit easier and that what I mean by easier was you don't have to wait at least an emergency belong. I mean, you can imagine trying to bring your brother or a family member to be where they don't think anything's wrong with them but then suicidal, or they're threatening others or they're, they're just like, you know, they think they're out and that they think they're Jesus Christ or they have these delusions of this thought and the other thing and they're living in hell you have to take them to set an emergency and they don't want to be there. It's a very, I mean, I come from conflict has the family point of view, which is it was incredibly well, first to go through as a family member months of kind of, we used to have discussions. What are we going to do with Bruce he's gone off his medication, he's not doing well he's really sick. And we don't know how to get him to the hospital or or get him treatment. So we went through an incredible amount of guilt and, and just, you know, time trying to try to see what to do, but certainly at that time, and it's too many places for sure. In the States. There was a 72 hour rule where after you finally went to two months of trying to get them help you got them in but they would only keep them for 72 hours and two hours is not long enough to get stable on any medication. You know, when you go on an antibiotic, you have to be on them for 10 days like it just doesn't do anything and by then you might not even hardly seen a doctor for a couple of days. This is not to say that I think that the whole hospital situation is a good one. I do think we should have places where people can go in crisis that are more home like they're already suffering and the more kind of home like and I don't know that everyone knows like hospitals are more sterile and stuff. I don't I don't. It would be nice. If we could do much more in the community and have more community services. That doesn't mean we don't need hospital beds for the most ill but you know, there should be places where if they do go in hospital, they can transition into the community and one of the things that happened was when they shut down all these islands of old and the 60s and stuff and this kind of great liberation, which was a good thing. I mean, everyone agrees to this. We don't want to go to the Cuckoo's Nest, right. Right. But what happened was they shut down facilities they promised money in the community, and then it didn't end up there. And we're still suffering from that. In fact, it's getting worse and worse every year because if you look at the money that's going into that there's less happy there's less there's less beds less psychiatrist less, less social workers in the field. There's there's just less happening more money being spent on jails, more money spent on you know, the whole judges and police and all of those kinds of systems and less on trying to create a system where there's they're not going into crisis in the first place. Why is it so many people are in crisis, we all see them in the street. We know they're not well, why why are they not getting help? There's so many reasons that that's happening, but one of them is the money is not going into upfront services, where you keep them out of crisis and where you know, there's some kind of continuity and and I guess, what I call a well rounded system that encompasses everything, it's a very compartmentalized service. So for example, if you're in jail and get any treatment, there's no way that unlikely to be anyone following up on you. And, and, you know, there just needs to be supports to help you know, and I think part of the reason that this whole thing has happened with you know, the, the whole I mean, it's such a controversial issue. The fourth thing of treatment, having seen my own brother when he's ill when he was ill, he just didn't even realize that he wouldn't realize you couldn't really talk to him. You could just talk yourself blue in the face until he was stabilized on the right medication and many of them had side effects and we need to put billions of dollars into creating better drugs I think and more helpful drugs that are more, I guess, customized to each individual person. There needs to be so much research done in that area. And then I think we'd see a lot more help for people because part of it is that really the medications haven't changed much in 40 years, some of them Unknown You're listening to the rethreading madness Unknown customized to each individual person. There needs to be so much research done in that area. And then I think we'd see a lot more help for people because part of it is that really the medications haven't changed much in 40 years. Some of them have less side effects, but they're also quite expensive. So, unfortunately, some people don't end up getting them because it costs to give them the ones that have less side effects now, so there is unfortunately we're just seeing the results of a really, really underfunded mental health system. Unknown Yeah, the other thing, there are people out there who are more critical of psychiatry and who, you know, point to the proliferation of giving people anti psychotics, even if they're not psychotic as a form of control. And so it makes me wonder as you're talking whether or not what you're describing is a system that's moving towards not helping people have better lives, but ensuring that people are controlled so that they're not causing problems. And those are two different outcomes in two different goals, certainly, and motivations in providing things and so I wonder sometimes whether what you're describing is really moving towards social control and making sure that they can control people as opposed to actually heal them. And we just needed a little, Unknown I mean, to me like that, it's kind of they said the same thing and COVID I remember, they said the counselors at city council wanted to control people. I just thought, you know, I think they have better things to do. So I don't know if I I don't think anyone out there wants to control people. What they do have is for sure we're seeing it in every city. We're seeing people who are quite ill who are in the streets and are you know, causing social disruption. But why are why are they why are they in that situation? It's really because of underfunding of Community Services and I'm talking about we need services in the community. We are so underfunded on them and it's a national health emergency and we will continue to see this and all of the resulting problems. Unless we actually do something Unknown isn't to rethreading madness. I'm pretty deep Fox and I'm chatting with Wendy Hill to about her documentary insanity about her brother. When did your brother disappeared? What happened? Where was the last scene? What do you know about? Unknown No, he was in Calgary. He had actually been doing quite well for quite a number of years with stable, stabilized you know, certainly over time with his illness, he deteriorated, deteriorated, but he was able to live a life and and, you know, we saw him when he had friends. You know, he was doing okay, and blood he went off his medication and kind of got worse. And I think what happened was a doctor, he got a new doctor, and they thought it was something else they decided it was a different illness because even it's hard. It's very hard again, they need a lot more research into medication and in order to really help people more specifically because sometimes it's really a long time before you get a diagnosis or a correct one. And so anyway, he was his medication was changed. We kept saying it's not working. He's not well at all. He became quite suicidal. It was really very sad. And I think we talked him into going to the hospital. We were so worried about him. And he went, but they couldn't at that time. They couldn't keep him more than 72 hours and I don't even know if he was on another medication by then or maybe the doctor thought this medication was fine. And so he decided to leave. And about two weeks after he left, he disappeared. We never saw him again. He called me that night. I was putting my two young children to bed giving them baths and stuff. And I said and he was really, really paranoid. He thought people were trying following him trying to kill him. He was really scared. And I said to him, Bruce, can I just call you back because I just get into kids to bed. I promise I'll call you back. And then what happened is, you know, just so busy with them and everything. I forgot I went to sleep and but it was weird because I must have, I don't know known something or whatever. Because I woke up at midnight. And I tried to call him he was always up late and he didn't answer the phone is rang and rang and rang. And it was weird that night because I had this image of him just running, terrified, like really, really delusional and just and just running. And weirdly, yeah, we never saw him again. He never came back to his apartment. He didn't he had a little bit of money, not lot in the bank. In his bank account. He never took it out. We just we never heard from him again. And, you know, basically, we lost him. And it was sad because that's where I think if there had been better services for him, my brother would still be with me. And there are many like my brother across Canada and out there and their families don't know where they are. And you know, again, I made this film because I I just felt it was wrong. It was so wrong that we as a society. Treat people with a mental illness this way and we don't help them. My mother had Alzheimer's. My mother was not in the street eating out of garbage cans. It was cared for. And you know, she I mean, you know, she she was she she was warm and she was safe. You know? And we're not always offering that service to other people. And I made this film because I also wanted to show people that when you see people on the street, you know, maybe they're yelling, they're, they're perhaps like my brother delusional or whatever. I wanted to put a human face on it because, you know, my brother was loved. He had a family. And, you know, he was a great human being. He just was someone who had an illness or no fault of his own. And I wanted to, to show a human side to it, that these that they're their people much beyond their illness, and that we as a society should care and that they deserve so much more than what we're giving them. Unknown Yeah, and I just want to turn sort of the lens around to you to use a film metaphor and say that that must be so hard for a family, a loving family who has clearly agreed whether you've said so consciously or not, but agree to care for and be available to this person to care for him and make sure as much as you could that he has what he has to spend the last 25 years not knowing where he is. Unknown Yes, I mean, I think for a lot of lot years, I thought he'd just walk in the door. Unknown Then whereas you never did. And at some point you just think, well, I can't be alive. anymore. It's too late. It's too many years. Unknown It's been since 1998. Unknown About that, yeah. Yeah. Unknown So in in your fear is then that you didn't just leave and disappear into the woods and he created a log house or whatever and is living there. He has passed away in your mind. Yes, Unknown my family's all come to that but you still help you know all of my brothers. My other two brothers, they talk about it too. Like you're, you're in like another city or you're in downtown Calgary where Unknown we live Unknown and you stop and you log in and go. Is that Bruce? Right? So I think you never lose that hope because for my family. There's never been closure. Unknown Did he have his in his wallet with him or his ID? Did he take any of that stuff with him? Unknown No, he didn't. But it doesn't surprise me in a way because he was so paranoid. He would be I think afraid if you think someone's after them. You don't want to use your name or have your ID. So that's kind of a sad thing to like. In fact, you know the weird story about Florida when they called my dad and said Your son's in the hospital. Here's a really strange story. I was out of the country and on the way back. I stopped in Florida because we had gotten a phone call from him in Naples, Florida, and then we didn't hear from him again. So I stopped in Naples to look for him. And I looked everywhere. You might sort of think of looking for someone who you know, is living in the streets and homeless, you know, around the Salvation Army. There was a bunch of woods around there. I sort of nerving the trek through the woods a bit by myself. Yes. I mean, I spent I forget how many days or maybe had about three days before I had to go back and I looked for him and I never I never found him in the last night before I left. I thought okay, everything I've done logically has not worked. I'm just gonna, I don't know follow my instinct. And see where I ended up. And weirdly, I ended up right outside the hospital in the Naples. Wow. And I sat in the car. I had to go where like my plane was gonna leave that night. I didn't how much time left and I thought but if I go in, and if I asked for him, he probably didn't use his own name because he Unknown so I never went in and then three days later my dad got a call and he was in that very hospital. Unknown That's wild when he said just gives me chills. Have you done the same thing this time? Unknown In terms of looking for him? Yeah. You know, here's the weird thing too. I have a friend who she was in a movie I did with Phyllis Diller and she played the psychic because she's in real life as I think she has said over the years she doesn't see that he's passed away because she doesn't see that his soul as past and she's said to me for a number of years, she thinks he's living by the water, like probably on NBC or whatever. And maybe he went back to Florida. I don't know. And I said to her, But why hasn't he called us and she said, he doesn't know who he is. Right? Unknown Yeah, and that was something I thought of as you're talking as if he got picked up without any ID and sent to a hospital. He could very well have ended up with AECT and that could have made his memory of who he is. Right? Unknown Yeah, I'm not sure he would have that because I think they give that more to people with depression and diagnosed with that but um, Unknown yeah, not anymore. Not and and I don't know about back then. But I do believe that yes. They think that it's at this point in time. AECT is given to many, many, many different kinds of people. So they kind of use it for everything. Unknown Yeah, I don't, I've never seen it with someone with my brother's illness and again, it's a very controversial issue, isn't it? And certainly, we all have the old horror memories of you know, I mean, we can't go back. Unknown We cannot No, no. No, we there was people through Unknown Yeah, I'm not sure he would have that because I think they give that more to people with depression and diagnosed with that, but um, Unknown yeah, not anymore. Not and and I don't know about back then but I do Unknown believe that yes, they think that it's at this point in time AECT is given to many, many, many different kinds of people. So they kind of use it for everything Unknown I've never seen it with with my brother's illness and, again, it's a very controversial issue isn't and certainly we all have the old horror memories of you know, I mean, we can't go back Unknown we cannot No, no, no. There was Unknown people through centuries with a mental illness have not been treated well by society and but we have no excuse anymore. We have no excuse and we need to do more for them. We need to help more. Absolutely. And, and we can do more. I think we need the political will. And the only way we're ever going to have the political will is by people speaking out by writing letters and saying, you know, we need to put more money into community services and helping people way further down the line. And, and because some of the kinds of things we've talked about, like the supports the help for families that you know, community supports, we we can we can do far more as a society and we need to take action to do that. Yeah. Unknown And you have a call for action that goes along with the documentary so I was hoping that maybe you could talk a little bit about where the film is going to be aired or not because you don't get screened, where's the film going to be screened in the next little while? Unknown Yeah, we were screening up across Canada and right now we're here mostly in southern Ontario screening in various locations there from Guelph to Hamilton Toronto, Windsor, but and you know, later in June in Edmonton and a few other places, and we'll continue to have screenings of Ross to across the country, but for sure, once it's been through the theatrical run, which I think is so important because we have Q and A's, often with some of these screenings, at least one or two in a city, and it's really important to bring the community together to to speak about this we need to talk about the issues more. So that's why I wanted to do with the article release was to bring the community together and and then after that, it will most likely be on TV and also on streaming services across Canada. So it will be available for people to see. Unknown Right. And you have an action campaign letter that you're sort of promoting out there. Can you tell folks a little bit about that? Unknown Yes, I mean, we're pushing for people to write in letters to say that that there's a mental health that mental health be declared an emergency in Canada, we have a very serious problem and we need to address it. So that's one of them and then also, really that we need to see more funding. If you look at some of the Western democratic countries in Europe, they're putting 10% of their health care budget, into mental illness and across the board, and we're spending about 7% here so we're so far behind what they're doing. You know, and I can say I was in Germany, at the festival in Berlin recently. And I know they exist there somewhere there, but I never saw a single homeless person in the streets. So they are doing more in terms of, you know, their, their help for for people who have a mental illness, and that certainly in those countries, and we need to start by just catching up to them, you know, going to that 10% and spending it on services and because right now all our money is going to, you know, increasing police increasing, you know, to the money that we're spending in the justice system, for example, in court cases and other things to the jails, which are incredibly expensive to keep a person in jail. And we're not spending the money where it's most needed. We're just reacting instead of acting at the front end. Right. Unknown What do you think would have helped your brother the most? Unknown You know, ironically, even though I know I know there's a movement to say that hospitalized people more I just wish they'd kept on their 10 days because we think that they'd done that and he managed to get on a medication that helped him that then he would have been well enough to make a decision for himself. He wouldn't have been afraid he wouldn't have. And I do believe in choice. But if he could have just had enough time to be stabilized before they let him go, I think he would still be with us. Right? Unknown Yeah, that makes sense. So in this action campaign, do you want people writing their MLAs or their MPs? Unknown Yes, they can go on to we have a website and sort of fairly easy to remember insanity doc doc meaning documentary. So insanity doc, and on there, it's very, very simple. You can just hit take action, and we have actually a system where if they go on to send a letter, it will tell them who their MLA or mp or is in their area. They want to write to specific people or they can go health minister or they can go they can just pick something out in goes to them. They don't have to figure out the address. And it goes in and I think the most effective thing that we can do as just ordinary people who who see what's happening and say okay, this has to stop. Let's do something is to write a letter, I think letters have a huge impact. And so we're hoping to get letters across the country. Just to say like we need to do more. Unknown Right and so that webpage again is insanity doc. So insanity the word and then D o c for documentary.com. All one word, insanity. doc.com. That's great. Is there anything else you want to tell us about this film? When do you before we end him? Unknown Well, go see it. I think it's a very moving film. I think certainly anybody who's had in their family will relate to it. We've had a number of people with a mental illness that have come out to the screenings as well. People from groups dealing with homelessness, and other groups and I think a wide cross section I guess I would say and I just think it really speaks to humanizing people who deserve to be cared about that many people in our society don't even know what to do. And I kind of walked by them on the street and, you know, we just need to treat them with more kindness and respect. Unknown Absolutely dignity. Everyone deserves dignity. Yeah. Yes. Well, thank you, Wendy. This has been a wonderful conversation. Thank you for coming and chatting with me. Unknown Okay, thank you so much. rethreading madness Unknown is now aired on Vancouver called Radio CFR Oh 100.5 FM on Tuesdays at 5pm. And then on CJ u m, one a 1.5 FM in Winnipeg on Mondays at 9am. And we follow that up on CK Xu in Lethbridge at 8.3 FM on Wednesdays at 1pm. You can also find us on the mental health radio network and wherever you download your podcasts. My thanks to Wendy Hill too for chatting with me today but don't forget her call for action that you can find on the website. Insanity doc.com. MUSIC Today was by Sheree alrik And as always, my thanks goes out to you for joining us today. Stay safe out there Unknown I'm Bernadine box and you've just listened to rethreading madness the podcast that dares to change how we think about mental health. We air live on Vancouver call radio CFR 100.5 FM, every Tuesday at 5pm or online at core radio.org. If you have questions or feedback about this program or want to share your story or have something to say to us, we want to hear from you. You can reach us by email rethreading madness at coop radio.org If you enjoyed this show, subscribe so you don't miss the next episode.