News stories from Counterpoint
In the News
• The Vermont Truth and Reconciliation Commission held its first public meeting on Sept. 5, shortly after hiring an executive director, Faith Yacubian. The legislature has instructed the Commission to “begin the process of dismantling institutional, structural, and...
Suicide Attempt Survivor Shares Story
According to California’s Bridge Rail Foundation, more than 1,700 people have leapt to their death off the Golden Gate Bridge since its opening in 1937, making it “the world’s deadliest structure.” Fewer than 35 jumpers have survived the fall. One of them is Kevin...
VPS Adds Board Members
At its annual meeting at the Rutland Free Library, the membership of Vermont Psychiatric Survivors elected Keith Molinari, Rodney Nicklaw, and William J. Collins to its board of directors. VPS publishes Counterpoint. Molinari, Nicklaw, and Collins had served as...
Healthcare Committee Expects Busy Session
Vermont lawmakers will reconvene in Montpelier for the second half of the legislative biennium on Jan. 3, 2024. As usual, the House Committee on Health Care and the Senate Committee on Health and Welfare will examine bills that address mental health. Rep. Lori...
Bennington Students Recommend Tea and Dreaming
A pair of sophomores at Bennington College had an idea for a new student organization this fall. They called it the Lucid Dream and Tea Club. Researchers have investigated lucid dreams’ effects on mental well-being for years. Some have concluded that they can ease...
Witnesses Bring Lived Experience of Homelessness to Legislature
Passed during June’s veto session, Act 81 is the law that codified Vermont’s transition plan for the last beneficiaries of its pandemic-era General Assistance Emergency Housing program. When the House Human Services and Senate Health and Welfare committees met for an...
Counterpoint Articles Archives
Arts and commentary from Counterpoint
Readers Say No to Emergency Department Arrests
Twenty-two of 24 respondents (91.7%) voted no on the summer Counterpoint poll: “If you threaten emergency department staff while in a mental health crisis, should you be arrested for a crime?” The question related to legislation introduced in Montpelier in January...
Documentary Advocates Against Restraint and Seclusion in Schools
According to the national advocacy group Lives in the Balance, Vermont’s public schools use restraint and/or seclusion upon 587 children each year. Kids with disabilities comprise the vast majority of cases. Recently, Lives in the Balance released a free documentary,...
Editorial: Legislators Should Do Useful Things
Watching the General Assembly’s last-minute scramble in June to figure out how not to kick 2,000 homeless Vermonters out of the motels sheltering them, I thought about all the time that legislators had spent during the winter and spring deliberating over bills that...
Exhibition Spotlights Homeless Vermonters’ Stories
Vermont Folklife’s research for In our voices, in our communities, a timely traveling exhibition of portraiture and storytelling with a focus on homelessness, began more than two years ago. When it finally debuted in Burlington this spring, one day after the passage...
Louise Wahl Writing Contest Winners and Runners-Up
WINNER: “We still can have board meetings” by Eryn Sheehan, Burlington I want the parts of meTo convene over tea.The way when I was little,I would invite beings ILooked up to to sit with me andTalk over snacks andThe very real pot of teaThat would brew. A place...
It’s Time to Say Farewell
Commentary by Anne Donahue Almost 25 years. That’s how long it’s been since I took on the job as editor of Counterpoint. This is my final issue; I’m retiring this month. The changes over that time in the psychiatric survivor world have been a kaleidoscope of the good...
Address Causes of Violence First
Testimony on S. 36 by Heidi Henkel I support the goal for health care workers in emergency rooms to have good workplace safety and not get injured or work under the threat of possible injury. I doubt that arresting people who threaten or commit violence in the ER, and...
‘You Could Be a Light’
Essay by Adam A. Meyers My name is Adam A. Meyers and I was a police officer in Wisconsin for 21 years. On Friday, April 8, 2016, at 5:15 p.m., I was involved in a critical incident when I used deadly force against someone who armed themselves with a hatchet inside a...
Tips To Fight Panic Attacks
Commentary by Stan Popovich As a published author of a managing fear book, I struggled with fear and anxiety for over 20 years. I am sharing my thoughts here on how to deal with a panic attack. A person can experience a panic attack when they least expect it. This can...
Editorial: When Help Hurts
The good intention to help others sometimes flies smack-dab into causing harm instead. How does one balance the good intent of creating a safe physical space for people in crisis against the damage of a space so sanitized and dehumanizing that those same people are at...