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Program reaches out
to county’s mentally ill
BY ANGELA MOORE
ASSISTANT CITY EDITOR
Mental illness hit Martha Bethea head
on years ago when her daughter was
diagnosed with manic depression, an ill
ness of emotional highs and lows.
Though Bethea’s daughter’s case is
considered mild, she said her daughter’s
experience made her more aware of the
isolation mentally ill people face.
"People think of it as a character flaw,
not an illness," Bethea said. “It’s not a
matter of pulling yourself up by your
bootstraps.”
So when Bethea saw an article about
Compeer, a program designed to help the
mentally ill by providing friendship and
companionship, she was eager to get
involved. A year later, she is a friend to a
woman who has been schizophrenic for
more than 30 years and tells Bethea she is
her first friend since she became ill.
Compeer is a 23-year-old national pro
gram that came to Orange County last
September through the Mental Health
Association in Orange County. Since
then, director Rosemary Hutchinson has
enlisted the help of 17 county residents of
all ages in providing companionship to
people with mental illnesses ranging from
depression to paranoid schizophrenia.
Volunteers are matched with a men
tally ill person around their age,
Hutchinson said. The volunteers range
in age from a UNC freshman to retirees.
Volunteers serve as friends to people
with mental illnesses for at least one hour
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per week for one year.
Hutchinson said volunteers and their
companions “get cups of coffee, take
walks, talk, go to art exhibits, pet stores,
the cinema or just sit in their houses as
they get to know each other.
“Through the simple premise of
friendship, people are changing lives,”
Hutchinson said.
Chapel Hill resident Phyllis Dye
learned of Compeer last spring through a
brochure.
“I liked what it said about reaching
out to people who need friendship,” Dye
said.
In June, Dye met Dana, 44, a para
noid schizophrenic who is beginning to
get out on her own. “It has progressed to
a great friendship,” Dye said. “I admire
her. She makes me appreciate my good
health. She has to have drugs just to
straggle to live normally.”
Dye said she and her friend Dana,
schizophrenic since she was 16, often go
shopping, on short trips or out for frozen
yogurt, and talk on the phone every day.
“At times, she can still get hallucina
tions, and she hears voices,” Dye said.
“Now, she’ll call me and talk about it.”
Hutchinson said that Compeer had
was making a big difference in people’s
lives. However, 16 mentally ill people
remain on the waiting list for Compeer
volunteers, she said, most of them be
tween 30 and 40 years old. Volunteers of
similar ages areneeded, Hutchinson said.
Hutchinson said volunteers of any age
or background should apply to help.
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Doctors debate treatment for failing Mother Teresa
■ The 86-year-old nun’s
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THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
CALCUTTA, India —Mother Teresa
was in critical condition Sunday. She
was weakened by lung and kidney prob
lems that slowed her recovery from sur
gery to clear blocked coronary arteries.
The 86-year-old nun remains “con
scious and cheerful,” Calcutta’s B.M.
Birla Heart Research Center said in a
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statement. Doctors reprogrammed a
pacemaker implanted in 1989 but her
worsening condition postponed planned
treatment for her irregular heartbeat.
At her Missionaries of Charity home,
the West Bengal state minister led Catho
lic nuns and Hindus, Muslims, Sikhs and
Buddhists in prayers for her recovery.
The 1979 Nobel Peace Prize winner
suffered a mild heart attack on Nov. 22
and has been hospitalized ever since. It is
her fourth hospitalization this year a'one
the second for heart problems. Two
others were for injuries from falls.
Doctors performed an angioplasty
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Friday to remove blockages from two
arteries. The procedure went so well that
doctors thought they would be able to
begin drag treatment Sunday for an ir
regular heartbeat —and Mother Teresa
thought they would be able to end treat
ment entirely.
“You’re done,” she told doctors Sat
urday after the angioplasty and gestured
at the tubes and cables connecting her to
medication drips, oxygen and monitors.
“Pull all these out —I look like a Christ
mas tree.” She awoke instable condition
Sunday, but weakened in the afternoon.
Doctors responded by reprogramming
Monday, December 2,1996
her pacemaker to bolster her heartbeat so
that her kidneys would function better,
chief heart surgeon Debi Shetty said.
Her urine output has been low, prob
ably because of dehydration, Shetty said.
Mother Teresa suffered a chest infec
tion and pneumonia last August.
The lung and kidney problems “con
tinue to be a major concern which could
complicate her condition and recovery,”
the heart center’s statement said.
Doctors postponed the drag treatment
for her irregular heartbeat because of a
slight risk it could worsen the other prob
lems.
5