To be a mental patient is to be stigmatized, ostracized, socialized, patronized, psychiatrized.

To be a mental patient is to have everyone controlling your life but you. You're watched by your shrink, your social worker, your friends, your family. And then you're diagnosed as paranoid.

To be a mental patient is to live on $82 a month in food stamps, which won't let you buy Kleenex to dry your tears. And to watch your shrink come back to his office from lunch, driving a Mercedes Benz.

To be a mental patient is to act glad when you're sad and calm when you're mad.

To be a mental patient is to participate in stupid groups that call themselves therapy. Music isn't music, it's therapy; volleyball isn't a sport, it's therapy; sewing is therapy; washing dishes is therapy. Even the air you breathe is therapy, and that's called the "milieu."

To be a mental patient is not to die-even if you want to-and not cry, and not hurt, and not be scared, and not be angry, and not be vulnerable, and not laugh too loud -because, if you do, you only prove that you're a mental patient even if you are not.