Welcome to Patty Duke?s newly redesigned website!

As before, you can use the same favorites and web page to access the website but now we have a new look, feel, and new technology on the back end of the system.

There are a few very exciting components to the new website redesign for users:

1. New forum section to facilitate community interaction on the website

2. Ability to comment on blog entries and forum entries directly on the site

3. No more automatic emails every time someone posts, read online and post away, but people can now be members without concern about their email boxes ?filling up?.

And for us volunteer webmasters:

1. One streamlined database of all newsletter recipients (yay!)

2. Less maintenance time for entry and removal of members ? that?s all automated now!

These emails from the website will now be sent occasionally, as originally envisioned, as we are able to communicate more efficiently through one website, as opposed to the three that we were using before. We were losing too many community members who didn?t know how to turn off the email functionality, so now they can participate at their leisure. If you do not wish to receive any emails, there is an unsubscribe feature at the bottom of this email.

We hope you?ll continue to participate, and also to send a link to your friends and family. The more people that are involved with Patty?s online community the better. The interactions and friendships that have grown as a result of the web and blog have been rewarding for all involved.

Thanks and take care!

Mike the Webmaster

mikek@pattyduke.net

Story and photo copyright The Boston Globe, 2006

Nothing to hide - The Boston Globe: "For nearly a decade, state Senator Robert A. Antonioni was willing to do almost anything to hide the fact that he was depressed. Now, he is speaking out about it, to residents in his Central Massachusetts district, to television reporters, and next week on the airwaves, in a public service announcement in which he declares, ''I have a mental illness.'"

(ed. note: this story might require a free registration if you don't have one already, but it's well worth it for access to the Globe)

Polk Inmate's Death Part of Bigger Issue | theledger.com: "Hundreds of inmates in the Polk County jail system -- almost one in five -- are on medicine for mental disorders. The Special Needs Unit, or SNU, can house 30 men and 16 women, a fraction of the 400-plus on medication.

And the number who take psychotropic medications isn't a true picture of those with mental illnesses. Others aren't on medication for a variety of reasons.

As many as three-fourths of people arrested who have mental illnesses aren't on their medications when they come to the jail, said Derek Zimmerman, mental-health liaison for the jail."

This blurb is included in a larger story about Senator Bob Graham's post-elective work. Many people of prominence have been directly affected by Bipolar Disorder (or Manic Depression) in one way or another. The trick is to learn from the lessons and try to do good things where you can.

Gainesville.com | The Gainesville Sun | Gainesville, Fla.: "Bob and William Graham are the surviving siblings. Phil Graham graduated from UF in 1936 and went on to law school at Harvard. He ended up in Washington, D.C., where he became publisher and owner of the Washington Post, the husband of Post publisher Katharine Graham and a force in national politics.

Phil Graham suffered from manic depression, and after a particularly troubled period, shot himself to death in August 1963. He was 49 and Bob Graham was 26.

'That was a tragic and very sad period,' Graham said. 'He'd been ill for some time."

Patty Duke was on hand this week at a press conference in Washington, DC to announce the publication of NAMI's most important report on the state of mental health affairs in our country. The report is comprehensive, detailed, and damning.

There is much work to be done still, and this report makes that clear. Download the entire report, read the executive summary, or check in directly to see how your state fared.