On the Road: Dancing with the Stars

The top researchers are out in force. Gary Sachs of Harvard, until recently head of the NIMH-underwritten STEP-BD bipolar clinical trials, congratulates me on an award I received a few months ago. I, in turn, congratulate John Rush of the University of Texas and head of the NIMH STAR*D clinical trials for the award he will be receiving from NAMI that night.

Raymond DePaulo, chair of the department of psychiatry at Johns Hopkins, greets me, as does Thomas Insel, Director of the NIMH. Kay Jamison pops in the door and we say a quick hi to each other. I talk to Richard Nakamura, deputy director of the NIMH, and get a chance to tell him how the research they are doing there is benefiting me in my recovery right now. I also add that I wish they had more money to fund research.

The same amount as cancer, he replies with great conviction. Dr Nakamura has family members with bipolar. Mental illness research receives a bare fraction of the funds that cancer and heart disease and AIDs and other illnesses get. And bipolar research receives mere crumbs next to schizophrenia. Many young researchers, unable to get grant money, are leaving the field, Dr Rush will tell the gathering upon receiving his award later in the evening.

Virtually everyone in the room will tell you the same thing. It's the best of times and the worst of times. The brain science and gene studies and other findings hold out great hope. The lack of money and the broken health care system, on the other hand, is a cause of considerable despair.

It's all about money. It's all about putting in the time. My guess is that nobody in the room wants to be there. These are very busy people, away from their work and away from their families. These individuals have better things to do than walk around sampling the finger food. All the researchers in the room have devoted their time to NAMI. They speak, they educate, they advise, they do ask the doctor sessions. NAMI, in turn, has lobbied very hard on their behalf for more research dollars. NAMI needs money. We all need money. It's all about the money and putting in the time.

Outside, in the main hall, I encounter fellow journalist Pete Early and his wife Patti. I met Pete last year at a NAMI convention, and we quickly hit it off. I can relax with a professional colleague. There are precious few of us working mental health.

Pete is the author of "Crazy! A Father's Search Through America's Mental Health Madness," which made the short list for this year's Pulitzer Prize for general nonfiction. Pete's college graduate son, Mike, suffered a psychotic episode that got him on the wrong side of the law. As well as recounting their family ordeal, Pete also reported on the appalling conditions that people with severe mental illness face in the criminal justice system and in receiving basic services.

I sit down to dinner at the HealthCentral table. I am at ease in the company of people I work with, but now I feel a soreness in my throat. Is it from talking too much? The air conditioning? Or am I coming down with a cold? I know what fatigue does to my immune system. I have been on the road too long and I have one more day to go. I feel my lower jaw beginning to flare with pain, and discreetly pop a couple of Tylenols.