To View A Heralded Holistic Wholeness Through A Fractured Prism
Professor Elyn Saks has won her fair share of accolades over her thirty-year career. One such laurel among the myriad many is the Pardes Humanitarian Prize in Mental Health which she won for her activism efforts. “The MacArthur Fellowship is my most prized,” she says when I inquire which one she holds most dear. The MacArthur “Genius Award” is highly coveted by all accounts, bestowed annually to an individual of wide renown who merits the most revered accomplishments in their field. These accomplishments must be impactful. She readily remembers that rousing day in 2009. “It was 7:30 in the morning. The phone rang. My husband answered it,” she begins. “They said it was the MacArthur Fellowship and I’d just won the Genius grant. They also said it wasn’t a prank.” She starts to laugh as she says, “And I thought, ‘How could anyone call someone at 7:30am to prank them about getting a Genius Award?’” She concludes by saying she was very happy. Her husband Will was jubilant and ecstatic. “Elyn! You won!” She then says she went on about her day. She was no Alexander the Great. She did not weep having no more lands left to conquer. She was fulfilled. That alone sufficed.
Achievements garnered, in spite of…
Prof. Saks has had an illustrious career capped with copious achievements. She boasts a fine education that includes stints at Vanderbilt, Oxford, and the Yale School of Law (one can be forgiven for using the descriptor “boasts.” The humble professor’s horn is seldom within reach). She has been published severally, including a bevy of journal articles and five books, one of which is her memoir The Center Cannot Hold: My Journey Through Madness. She is currently faculty at the University of Southern California’s (USC) Gould School of Law, where she is the Orrin B. Evans Professor of Law. Prof. Saks is one of the foremost authorities in the field of mental health law.
The MacArthur Genius Grant Winner
The Grande Generale Conquest
The Genius grant is a big deal. So much so that USC’s top brass, decidedly delighted, hosted a campus-wide reception honoring her. “They even gave me a tee shirt with mine and Einstein’s faces, bearing the caption: ‘Only one of these is a certified genius,’” Prof. Saks says laughing. And what to do with the largesse that came with the fellowship? Prof. Saks founded the Saks Institute for Mental Health Law, Policy, and Ethics in 2010, of which she is the faculty director. The institute is a think tank that facilitates cooperation between “scholars and policymakers” on topics of mental health at the communal, statutory, and national levels. “The Institute mostly spends time teaching interdisciplinary groups of scholars each year about [the intersection of] an issue of mental health or illness and something else, for instance immigration or decision making,” says Dr. Sonja Castañeda-Cudney, the institute’s program specialist who joined it in 2018.
Speaking of Prof. Saks, Dr. Castañeda-Cudney says, “She is inspirational and powerful and kind. And so generous. She has a beautiful heart and is so driven. She works seven days a week.” This marks the fifth year of their working together.
Prof. Saks’ voice and tone are of an even temper, a characteristic contralto. While sparsely given to musing and the slightest of sentiment in her responses, she is otherwise even keeled. She is a creature of habit, adherent to schedules and priorities. What is routine for her is serendipity for me. We’re holding this interview at 9:05am on a Saturday. Pondering the concept of composure, I inquire about the TED Talk she gave in June 2012. I ask if she was nervous. “Yes I was nervous!” she says with ardent admission. I watched her TED Talk. She did not appear the least bit nervous.
“They said it was the MacArthur Fellowship and I’d just won the Genius grant. They also said it wasn’t a prank.” She starts to laugh as she says, “And I thought, ‘How could anyone call someone at 7:30am to prank them about getting a Genius Award?’”
-Professor Elyn R. Saks-
Of TED Talks and Schizophrenia
One Woman’s Harrowing Tale
Prof. Saks’ TED Talk was titled: “A Tale of Mental Illness—From the Inside.” TED Talks are prestigious, making this another accolade. In it, Prof. Saks detailed her lifelong experience with chronic schizophrenia. Schizophrenia is a debilitating disease that is considered a disability by the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual for Mental Disorders states that “making educational progress and maintaining employment are frequently impaired” with this illness. She details her academic struggles while at Yale and at Oxford (despite her meritorious performance). In the talk, she describes her experience with the illness, both as student and professional. This includes the tumultuous times she was committed to psychiatric wards. A lot of individuals with schizophrenia are seldom able to maintain employment. They either hop between jobs or become unemployed altogether. Homelessness ensues. Prof. Saks is a success story. She the fractured prism that still yields a vision, that is still congruous with inbound and outbound light. Genuflected perhaps, bowed certainly. But defiantly unbroken.
Winning the Pardes Humanitarian Prize for Mental Health was a staunch recognition of her activism. I inquire what aspects of her mental health advocacy she is especially impassioned about. “The use of mechanical restraints in mental hospitals,” she responds with veiled vehemence. “I have been placed in restraints for 5-15 hours at a time. I dislocated my arm once because of forceful treatment.” Some states allow forceful treatment if a patient is “deemed” a threat to themselves or others. Decision making concerning a poised threat is highly subjective. Prof. Saks wrote a journal article, The Use of Mechanical Restraints in Mental Hospitals in 1986. 27 years later, the phenomenon remains a neglected hot topic.
Finis
I ask her about the road less traveled, the same one that preoccupied Robert Frost with such rampant regret. Was she content or would she have preferred getting off at a more opportune exit? “I wish I hadn’t spent 10 years of my life trying to get off my medications,” she says. “At the time I felt that I would feel better without the side effects, but it would be better if I’d gotten back on them sooner.” In her memoir, Prof. Saks mentions her multiple attempts at getting off antipsychotic medication. They reportedly caused some uncomfortable side effects. Her respite was short lived each time. The symptoms inevitably resurfaced with merciless savagery. However, seeing her current place in life and hearing the relative contentment in her voice, I can only surmise that the road she took did just fine.
I then ask who the most important person in her life is, personally and professionally. Expecting separate names, I’m pleasantly surprised when she says, “My husband Will, on both counts.” She says that while she may have achieved more in her career, her husband is the most accomplished of the two. She cites his skill in carpentry and baking among others. Her voice turns soft for the first time as she delves further, her fondness fragrant. On their first date, she was downcast because Will didn’t put his arm round her shoulder. But at date’s end he kissed her, which she thought was a much better move. She would say that he has seen her at her best and at her alarmingly worst. But there never was a prouder husband sitting in the front row of a TED Talk audience watching his wife, who had endured the worst that life could have dealt her, give a presentation about it that day.
