Mental Health Consumer One

By Sarah Owens and Michael Livingston

Ken & Friends Accept City's 2017 Recovery Month Proclamation

It's nearing the end of August, and National Recovery Month is around the corner.  But, it just won't be the same without Ken Hetsel, who passed away in June.

Ken's was a story of faith, hope and love that will be remembered.  He gave of himself as easily as he shared stories about recovery and giving back on his FB page.  Stories like the one about Michelle Sheppard, and the one about Thomas Edison's mother.  It didn't matter if a story was not entirely factual, it was true enough for Ken if it touched the heart.

Typical Ken Hetsel Post

When a person dies, his virtues grow and his flaws diminish.  To hear Ken eulogized, you'd think he'd been just a kindly, community-minded grandfather.  But, in reality, Ken struggled, both personally and on behalf of others in recovery.  And, while it might be true he never said an unkind word about anyone, he was not uncritical, and he did not miss much.

For example, he didn't like it that the state hospital would accept "Angel Tree" gifts for patients, but wouldn't allow him to contact them, even by phone or a note, to let them know he cared.  He didn't like it that the Marion Soil and Water Conservation District gave a wealthy couple $6,000 to construct a rain catchment system in their back yard.  He didn't like it when a certain non-profit used homeless housing funds to build "a nonprofits base", and he believed "the state system is only to get federal funds[,] no matter what it costs the citizens."

It frustrated Ken that the City didn't do more to help people.  In a 2017 survey about the City's strategic plan, he wrote,  

The [C]ity of Salem is a machine. You only know how to make bricks.  [Y]ou want to help everyone by giving them more bricks. How many bricks do [sic] a homeless drowning woman need?

Everyone has a different need.  [A] homeless man needs a place to shit.  You close all the public restrooms and make it illegal to pee in public.  A car[-]less family needs to get their groceries home on Saturday night when the buses do not run and you make it illegal to use a shopping cart out of the store lot.  If someone is cold you give them shelter.  If someone is hungry you should feed them. If someone is in jail or prison you should visit them.  You should not sweep Cascade Gateway Park and ticket the poor mobile home society for being (trespassing) in the park after hours.  You should not require people to show up in court weeks later when you know they are unable to do it thereby making the[m] a criminal.

A Tennessee native, Ken cared a lot about preserving natural resources.  But, he was that rare person who thought about, and cared as much about, serving the unhoused living along streams and rivers as he did watershed conservation and sustaining natural areas.  He exhorted the Salem Homeless Coalition to bring pressure on the City to end systemic oppression of "motor homers" and others living in its parks.

I was at the SEM[C]A Neighborhood Association meeting at Paradise Island [Park] this morning and the police reported that they had raided the motor homers in Cascade Gateway Park and given them all tickets for trespassing after hours.  We (the housed) need to tell the city leaders that this is unacceptable. We need to tell the city leaders that locking restrooms is unacceptable.  We own this city and we need to run this city. WE NEED TO GO TO THIS STRA[TEG]Y MEETING AND CHANGE SALEM'S ATTITUDE AND VISION !!!

Ken's Last Public Comment to the Council (~1:52)

The last time Ken was at City Council was September 25, 2017.  A bunch of folks had shown up to speak in favor of the Age Friendly  Initiative, and against the proposed sit-lie ordinance, so it was pretty late in the evening when his turn came.  He wore the same tie-dyed shirt he'd worn the month before to receive the National Recovery Month Proclamation.  He removed his hat. He spoke without notes.

As always, he spoke softly.  "We had a beautiful time at Open Streets.  Thank you, Mayor and Chris Hoy for riding your bicycles", he began.  He said he'd attended the strategic planning open house, and thanked Assistant City Manager for letting him take the "excess" cookies to the Recovery Outreach Community Center, and for the National Recovery Month Proclamation.  He told them "Hands Across the Bridge was beautiful", that they'd had 500 to 600 people attend.  He paused briefly, and then continued, "Do not adopt the NESCA-Lansing Neighborhood Plan, because it doesn't address the storm water infrastructure", which he said was collapsing.  He paused again, and said, "Homeless", as if he'd reached that item on an agenda.  

"The damn bathroom out here's closed." 

Ken calmly told the Council his NAMI group had organized a lease on a four bedroom, two bathroom house which would become a shelter for homeless women.  He'd agreed to use $1,000 of his "teeth money, for new teeth" toward the security/utilities deposit.  "We can start housing people tomorrow, there's no reason to wait", he said.  He began speaking more quickly, as if bothered by the thought of people having to wait.  Or, perhaps he felt rushed by the blinking yellow light, signalling he had only a minute left to speak.  "The parkades", he asked rhetorically,

If I rent a parkade space, why can't I let somebody sleep in it at night, and be out of the rain?...Why can't we open the bathrooms?  The damn bathroom out here's closed at night...The SCAN neighborhood mans Fairmount Park, and keeps it open and supplied with toilet paper.  Why can't neighbors adopt a toilet, or put a porta-potty out, so people with dignity can go to the bathroom?  Why can't--

Ken looked down, saw his light was red, and with a quiet, "Sorry, thank you", he turned and left the podium.

Ken was acutely aware that social isolation is both a cause, and a consequence, of depression.  But he had the audacity to believe people could heal themselves and each other through something one  might call peer-supported social networking, but Ken would call parties and community meetings and taking care of each other.  It wasn't that he didn't believe in modern medicine, but he was often frustrated by its emphasis on uniform rules and standards over people's needs as human beings, the "Angel Tree" rule being an example.  He was also skeptical about the value of "evidence-based" practices over lived experience, which some call the "heart and soul of change."  As Ken put it,

The machine wants evidence based practices and there are not many evidence based peer practices because the machine wants to keep control. How we the peers do our own evidence based practices study? What NWSDS did was hired PSU to do the study and got someone to publish it in a monthly magazine. Wala EVIDENCE BASED. 

Ken had two gmail addresses which he seemed to use interchangeably.  One was "salemneighborshelpingneighbors", the other was "mentalhealthconsumer1."  He asked us once if we knew why he chose to go by "mentalhealthconsumer1", and of course we didn't.  He said wryly it was because in 10 years, his mental health had not cost the state one penny to maintain.  He'd done it himself, his own way.  As we got to know him, we learned more about "his way."  How he grounded himself by caring for others and for his community, whether that was by letting a homeless woman park her car in his driveway at night, or by making people smile to see Santa at a CANDO meeting, and how hard he still worked at recovery.

Thanks for your soft words of encouragement.  They help.  I have the disclaimer that I am a broken vessel. I had a mental health moment twenty years ago.  I quit taking meds ten years ago and I am trying to RECOVER what I have lost and what I never had. I make mistakes.  I am in my manic phase where I have excessive energy.  A time will come where I become DEPRESSED and have little or no energy.  I tell my friends that if they do not see me, "I am home in bed under the sheets."  My mind has been putting these plans [for the women's shelter] together for the past eight years.  I feel after leaning on the wall things are at the "Tipping Point" or things are starting to move in the way we think is correct.

Mania is a lot like skipping.  You skipped as a kid.  It was fun.  Try it in your mind's eye. Walk, jump, hop, skip, walk, repeat.  We covered a lot of ground.  Look back to where we were when we started.  Did you feel the wind in your hair?  I did.  We only touched the ground five steps in one hundred feet.  Wow!  It is good to miss a turn we can go around the block or Miss a meeting we can review the minutes or catch it next time.   It is OK to make mistakes as a mental health consumer and PEER.               [Ken Hetsel, 9/22/17]

Ken at the Marion County Board of Commissioners Meeting, November 29, 2017

This coming Monday, the Mayor will ask the City to join him in observing National Recovery Month 2018.