Tehachapi News

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Laurence J. Peter once said “Competence, like truth, beauty and contact lenses, is in the eye of the beholder.”

Tehachapi's College Community Services (CCS)/Family Learning Center (Center) has discovered that art, too, is in the eye of the beholder and encourages its clients, via various methodologies (be it painting, stained glass, jewelry, hat creation or something else), to express themselves artistically as part of their recovery process.

And, to exhibit its clients' art efforts, the Center hosted its Second Annual Art Show on May 7. The show was titled, Inspiration From Recovery, Living the Dream.

“Art allows freedom of expression of what's locked inside,” shared Jeanne, known as Starr Rae in Tehachapi's art community.

She is proud of the fact that she's been regaining her mental health since 1987 and attributes some of her advances to painting.

“Painting, it's the first time I found hope and the freedom to be a normal person,” she said. “I've thrown away all of my early work because to me it looked like what a third grader would paint,” she laughed. “But now I'm happy with what I'm painting.”

Clients at the Center choose their own projects and are instructed to “go with their emotions for the day,” said Patricia Guterez, Case Aide. “We go with what supplies we have on hand, and sometimes a canvas is merely a piece of butcher paper because that's all we have.” 

But it's evident from the artwork displayed at this year's show, “what's on hand” doesn't seem to interfere in the least with client creativity.

Mental health issues include anxiety disorders, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD, ADD), autism spectrum disorder, bipolar disorder (manic-depressive illness), borderline personality disorder, depression, eating disorders, generalized anxiety disorders, obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), panic disorder, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), social phobias and schizophrenia. Some disorders are only mildly debilitating, others, however, may take years and even a lifetime to overcome.

Major mental disorders cost the nation at least $193 billion annually in lost earnings alone, according to a new study funded by the National Institutes of Health's National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH). The study was published in the May 2008 issue of the American Journal of Psychiatry.

“Lost earning potential, costs associated with treating coexisting conditions, Social Security payments, homelessness and incarceration are just some of the indirect costs associated with mental illnesses that have been difficult to quantify,” said NIMH Director Thomas R. Insel, M.D. “This study shows us that just one source of these indirect costs is staggeringly high.”

Direct costs associated with mental disorders like medication, clinic visits, and hospitalization are relatively easy to quantify, but they reveal only a small portion of the economic burden these illnesses place on society. Indirect costs like lost earnings likely account for enormous expenses, but they are very difficult to define and estimate, according to the NIMH article.

The Family Learning Center staff is confident that there will be a Third Annual Art Show next year.