There is power, I believe, in recognizing reality, even if one does not have the power to change it. There's a saying that "you can't change the wind, but you can adjust your sails."

This is the rationalization I shall adopt in making the observation below, knowing full well that there is no perfect world in which certain unbalances can ever be redressed.

Today's observation is this: that those who need help will be punished, and those who don't, won't. And as Roxie Hart noted, "That's showbiz, kid."

I've been babbling a bit of late on the subject of free speech versus censorship versus discretion. One of the many reasons this suite of topics is ever-present on my mind these days is because I've found myself so often refraining from talking here (on this website) about what is uppermost on my mind. Discretion always demands that one consider carefully before making a potentially adverse observation about a former employer (and one would never, ever comment on a current employer in any but the most glowing of terms), or expressing too many concerns about the demands on one's time, or openly disagreeing with the prevailing decisions within the political party of which one is an active member, or about the interesting choices that various friends are making in their business or love lives.

A friend of mine, when faced with a similar dilemma of not feeling able to speak freely on a public blog, chose to go the "subscription" route. He sends out his weekly missives via a private listserv, over which he controls membership. This has given him the freedom to say what he wants to, knowing he is among like-minded (or even respectfully disagreeing, but nonetheless supportive) friends.

I have long admired the candor with which he addresses topics in his journal that we might feel free to talk about on a one-on-one basis, but would tend not to broadcast to the world. Like when he admitted that depression was setting in even though everything seemed to be going well. Like the trials and joys of relocating for the sake of a job.

The fact is, one is generally not well advised to talk openly about being depressed. [Sidenote here: I began writing this missive shortly after having come out of a rather profound stretch of unhappiness, but was not at the time, nor am I now, feeling blue. I find it safer not to bring up such topics if I'm feeling down, at least in public, just as I don't comment on being out of town until I've returned.] This could lead co-workers or bosses or friends to be wary of trusting you. Likewise, one should not be too glib about how one's employer, generally speaking, *has* to put up with your eccentric choices because, hey, you *are* the best person for the job by a far sight. It may be true [although, I'm not sure it ever has been so in my own case], and all parties might agree that it's true, but you still don't necessarily want to be glib about it in public.

But it's the depression thing that has resonated the most. I've known a great many people who have suffered from various kinds of depression and/or mood swings, but they have always had to be careful about how and with whom they broach the subject. The irony of it being that, in many cases, they'd feel better if they could just *talk* about it.

...to someone other than a $150 per hour pair of ears. (Or however much therapists charge these days.)

This brings me to the topic of today's missive: how those who need help and ask for it must be punished, and those who need help but struggle silently with their burdens get to punish themselves. Blessed are the needy, for they shall be punished.

I love irony. If that hasn't become obvious to anyone reading these pages for more than a few entries, let me state it here now: I love irony. And so, I embrace the notion that the very systems we have set up to help us (medical insurance, for example, or financial credit and loans) are actually designed to punish us when we need the help they are designed to provide.

When do you get the big credit card offers? When you don't need to borrow money, of course. If you need to borrow money, you are de facto a bad risk. When I apply for mortgage re-fies (re-fi's? re-fis? REE-fies?), and if my income is high enough, they don't need to see proof that my income is high enough.

Huh?

But if my income is below a certain level, the lender wants to see my most recent pay stubs and bank statements. So, the more I need the money, the more I have to prove I need it. If I don't need to borrow it, the more they want to lend it to me.

Go ahead, go see a doctor and ask to be tested for Fragile X or some other genetic disease. See if you can ever get appropriate health insurance (or life insurance) after that.

True story: I have a friend who's mother is suffering from some mental and physical deterioration that is known to be passed down genetically. The disease usually manifests itself sometime in late middle-age, if I understand correctly, and things from that point only get worse, never improve. No, I don't recall the name of this ailment, but it sounds most unfortunate. And my friend dares not get tested to see if he/she has it. Sure, this would enable him/her to make preparations now, if need be, for what the future may hold in store. But if he/she gets tested, and it turns out that he/she has the disease lying in wait, then it becomes a "preexisting condition" and switching to a better health insurance plan will never be an option again. Nor would be increasing his/her health insurance coverage. Ergo, the health insurance programs would punish him/her for trying to determine the current (and possibly future) state of his/her health.

I've been told by non-married-yet-non-celibate friends of mine that the prudent course of action for them is to occasionally get tested for particular STDs, especially AIDS, but that they don't dare do this through their health coverage because doing so automatically results in premiums going up and/or coverage being cancelled altogether. The system encourages risky behavior when that is exactly the opposite of what it should encourage.

And as for mental health... ignore the fact that, as with AIDs tests, you don't want to raise that red flag on your health insurance. *Especially* employer-provided health insurance. But, here's another true story: someone I know was feeling down and went to see a licensed therapist about it. The psychologist (or psychiatrist or social worker or whatever they were) told the person right up front something along the lines of "if you tell me that you feel self-destructive or that you might be destructive to others, I'm required to inform the state." How's that for encouraging an open dialog?

It's like: "If you need help with feelings so bad and so desperate that you might even consider hurting yourself, don't come to a professional about it, because then it will go on your Permanent Record... and we might have to lock you up." Who goes to see a professional for just a mild case of the blues? (Outside of New York City, I mean.)

These are but a few examples, but there are many, many systems that are set up to punish the people who need them the most. I know that these are not the intended consequences of these systems. I understand that these are the unfortunate side-effects of regrettably necessary policies.

We do this on a personal level, as well. It's not just big systems and big institutions that short circuit themselves with this kind of irony. But that's a topic for another day.

In the meantime, let the healthy have health insurance, the mentally stable have therapists, and the wealthy have big loans. Let the Eskimos have refrigerators and the Southern Californians have fires. As for those who need: the beatings will continue until morale improves.