By Philip Sean Curran
For more than 30 years, NAMI Mercer has had a mission of helping those with mental illness and their families, a mission that friends of the organization came to support on Nov. 6.
At the annual Night out with NAMI fundraiser, guests arrived at Stuart Country Day School in Princeton for a mid-afternoon concert of the work of Scott Joplin followed by a cocktail reception and dinner, with the event having a Ragtime-era theme.
Coleen Burrus, a member of NAMI’s board of directors and a co-chairwoman of the fundraiser, came dressed in a full-length black gown with a peplum. This was the 15th annual Night out with NAMI, one of two fundraisers the 32-year-old organization hots each year.
As with past events, the guest pianist, Dr. Richard Kogan, a Harvard-trained psychiatrist who graduated from the Juilliard School of Music Pre-College, played music written by someone who had suffered from mental illness in his life. In a pre-performance interview, Dr. Kogan said that in Mr. Joplin’s case, he died in a psychiatric hospital and suffered from dementia due to syphilis. He noted how composers such as Beethoven and Tchaikovsky also suffered from mental illness as well.
”… Many of the great artists — writers, artists, musicians — have used their suffering to fuel artistry,” Dr. Kogan said.
While the fundraiser was intended to be a fun day out, members of the organization touched on the seriousness of their work — with large numbers of people living with some form of mental illness. A big part of NAMI’s mission is to end the stigma of mental illness.
”So everybody is walking around us probably suffering with something, and they’re not talking about it,” said NAMI board of director Karen Marquis. “I think anti-stigma message is still very much part of our mission.”
”I think when you’re willing to talk about it, then other people will say, ‘Oh yeah, my mom or my brother,’” said Ms. Burrus, who has a family member with a mental illness.
”There’s a lot of effective treatment in the world of mental health,” Dr. Kogan said, “but there are people who are not accessing it because of stigma associated with mental illness.”
The fundraiser was expected to raise $80,000 to support the nonprofit, headquartered in Lawrenceville. NAMI Mercer, a chapter of the national organization based in Arlington, Virginia, offers programs to help people with mental illness and their families, both educational and social.
”Over 70 percent of the people who call us are actually the family members and they’re saying like, ‘This is happening in my family. What do I do?’” Ms. Marquis said. “It’s really important to provide the support for the family so that the family stays a strong unit. Because with a good strong family support system, the individual who’s dealing with the mental illness is going to fare better.”
Another component of the organization is to serve as a watchdog at Trenton Psychiatric Hospital to monitor the care given there, and to advocate for government policies to help people with mental illness.
”NAMI Mercer, it’s an incredible organization,” said board president Joyce Campbell. “People feel very isolated, because there’s a lot of stigma. And I think when people come to NAMI Mercer, they’re really kind of embraced, so that that isolation kind of fades away.”
At the fundraiser, the organization honored one of its board members, Madeline Monheit, with its pillar award. She had overcome depression, something she is open about discussing.
”And I realized when I recovered, that I had been ill all my life. It wasn’t only these four major depressive episodes. I had been mildly depressed my whole life,” she said. “And suddenly, I was normal. And I could see what a wonderful world it was. And I could experience joy and all of that.”
Ms. Monheit said being part of NAMI provides a feeling of satisfaction of “trying to help other people.”
”It allow me to spend my time with people that are caring,” she said.
