I was now learning, making life better for people with serious mental illness is not as simple as shaming others into providing housing, more doctors, better medications. If the change is going to be real and sustained, you can’t just badger people into being better, more loving and accepting. You have to find a way to get them to see those who suffer as their brothers and sisters in need of our embrace, not strangers to be shunned. It’s what Danny was trying to tell me in the letter he sent me the week before he died. Only love and understanding can conquer this disease.
