long overdue post about Adam Lanza and mental health

I am Adam Lanza's mother

I think the horrible day at Sandy Brook Elementary School was one of the worst mass shootings in history.  The entire thing, from beginning to end, is not understandable.

What has come out of it, has been an increased debate in gun control and mumblings about access to mental health care being easier.

I am in support of both those things.  I don't believe guns should be as accessible as they are.  There is certainly no reason for a regular person to own an automatic or semi-automatic weapon.

And mental health.  I'm still seeing a therapist.  I'm lucky, I guess.  I have health insurance and they cover me to see her.  Not everyone is that lucky.  I know if it wasn't covered, I could probably look up to find therapists that were low cost, or no cost, but really, that would be a lot of work.  I've started to look before, and the process was so time consuming that I gave up.

Now that I have health insurance, I looked at their website for therapists, found one, called her, and got an appointment.  I feel like I mesh with her, so I keep going.

I struggle, frequently with MS, my mother's death and general feeling poorly about myself.  She would tell you depression, but after working with teenage girls, that word just annoys me now.  I feel like its overused by society, but her use of it is clinical, so I guess it's ok.

Anyway, the thought of people talking about therapy, and making it less taboo, well, I think that's great.  Very few people know I go to therapy.   I worry about what they would think of it - some would be ok with it, others might judge me for it.  With the topic of mental health making headlines is good - to get the topic out there, it always worries me.

What if now, after this conversation, it becomes the norm to think of therapy as for people who will become potential shooters.  What if it seems like it's not just for the normal person who is struggling with something, but for people who are about to go off the deep end?  In my thinking, Adam Lanza must have been stable at some point.  What was it that made it do what he did?  Could therapy and/or medication have prevented it?

I don't know.