After appearing in good spirits at Medai Day yesterday, all is apparently not well with Delonte West. West was not at practice this morning, the first team workout for the Cavaliers of camp. Brian Windhorst has confirmed that West's absence was unexcused, though the Cavaliers are not commenting at this time.
During his media availability yesterday, West intimated that he was again struggling with bi-polar disorder and depression, though he appeared to be ready to focus on basketball, even while dealing with an arrest earlier this month on gun-possession charges -
"I'm back taking my meds and everything," he said. "I'm focused on basketball. I'm dealing with some issues. I get highs and get lows. But all the last year I've been consistent being in a nice . . . routine. I was in a routine that I got out of this summer. I got away from it."
"But just coming back here, driving into Cleveland, it was like getting a breath of fresh air."
Now, with this latest misstep, you have to wonder how patient the Cavaliers will be with West, or what West's mental state really is.
Surely there will be more to come. The most important thing for Delonte West right now is to get his life in order. Here's hoping that happens.
0 recs | 18 comments
I hope he’s o.k.
49er16 - September 29, 2009
DAMN IT
We do NOT need this right now! I’ve always been supportive of West, even with the recent nutjob gun charges, but this is just down right selfish and possibly detrimental to the team.
Max_in_Missouri - September 29, 2009
As a person who has worked in the mental health field, its obvious that you don’t have a good understanding of bi-polar disorder. I seriously doubt that Delonte is doing this for selfish reasons. He was careless when it came to his medications, as patients often are. They feel better, feel like they’ve moved “past” their problems and stop taking their medications, because they don’t feel like they need them anymore. Then something like this happens. Hopefully, they realize from that point on that they need to maintain structure in their lives to be successful, but it doesn’t always happen right away. I seriously doubt there is any selfishness in these actions, they are much more signs of a downward spiral continuing. I’m much more concerned for Delonte right now than I am upset about him missing practice.
Fundamentals - September 29, 2009
Problem
starts when you medicate people instead of holding them personally responsible for their actions. Meds are never the answer they only prevent the person from becoming well or a whole person. The sooner people stop making excuses the sooner they will stop doing stupid things.
E5 - September 29, 2009
+1
Accountability? Psh, not likely.
Apparently everyone is a victim and needs to have fistfulls of pills shoved in every orifice of their body every hour, on the hour.
And Fundamentals, if West was “careless” about taking his meds and it can potentially be very detrimental to team chemistry, then yes, that is quite selfish. But really, if someone is THAT dependent their meds to function normally, it should be priority number 1. Afterall, this guy has a history, it’s not like we didn’t have to put up with this crap last year. Have him pay a guy with a watch $100,000 a year to follow him around and hand him pills and a waterbottle at the appropriate times. Hell, have the Cavs pay a guy to do that! Make excuses all you want, but this is selfish and completely unprofessional behavior by Delonte.
Max_in_Missouri - September 30, 2009
That is so easy to say from the sidelines, isn’t it? It was a selfish action because he should just concede to being on medication for the rest of his lifetime. I maybe had three or four people in my five years I worked as a counselor who went on meds and didn’t try to experiment with them on their own. Whether it was trying to lessen the doses, increase the doses, or stop the doses altogether. Maybe three or four, and that is going off of their reports, not what I honestly think happened.
Nobody wants to be dependent on medication for anything in their lives. To avoid that, people experiment. They talk themselves into the fact that they have been so good for so long, that it couldn’t be the medication. They were just going through a funk earlier and their back now. The medication isn’t really necessary. So, they stop taking it. Then, when the spiral hits, its really tough to get to a clarity that allows them to realize they need it. The highs become higher. The lows become deeper. There is a lot less time in the middle ground. It typically takes a huge situation to come up, typically involving someone or something that they care deeply about, for them to realize what the difference has been. I pray this is that moment for Delonte. The timing would actually seem to show how much he cared about basketball, not the other way around. At a guess, based off of nothing more than conjecture and experience, I would say he has been off his meds for about 10-12 weeks right now. That would mean that he stayed on the medication during the entire season last year. That shows some dedication to me, to basketball and to the Cavs.
Further, I doubt that him missing the first practice will be the end of this. Assuming he started back up on a regular med routine, it can easily take two weeks for the levels of medication to be at proper levels to have the desired effect.
Fundamentals - September 30, 2009
Well said, right from the Tom Cruise handbook of Scientology. I’ll agree that meds are over-prescribed in this country. You can’t go to a doctor anymore without being handed a pill for whatever you went in for. However, to write them off entirely and to equate mental illness to mental toughness is downright idiotic. Accountability is a great, great thing. But in and of itself will do next to nothing for a person with a serious case of bipolar disorder.
Fundamentals - September 30, 2009
My point
is that if someone had held Delonte accountable earlier (i.e Childhood/when these problems first surfaced) then he could have been able to stay of meds but at this point it is fullish to think he can maintain with out them.
E5 - September 30, 2009
Do you “hold accountable” someone who has cancer? Heart disease? Do you think that Delonte West enjoys mental illness?
jdudas - September 30, 2009
Depression is not cancer!
It’s not even close! To make that comparison is a slap in the face to people with cancer
Max_in_Missouri - October 1, 2009
You’re out of your element Donny..
hans - October 1, 2009
It’s a totally appropriate comparison, Max. Just as one does not do anything to earn cancer, one does nothing to earn mental illness. It’s a physiological condition that is frequently just as debilitating as is a more well-recognized (and less stigmatized) disease like cancer.
jdudas - October 2, 2009
Oh come on, that’s just stupid. Let’s not be such a liberal pillowbiting apologist. Cancer has real side effects (ask many members of my family), its not just a messed up perception in one’s mind. It’s completely different. I mean honestly, if someone is a drunk or a drug addict, would you give them the same leeway? Addiction is a “disease” after all, so is everything an addict does excused? You didn’t see this bullshit tolerated years ago before every 1 in 6 people was “depressed” or whatever its fashionable to call it this week
Julie H - October 3, 2009
Fundamentals, i urge you to simply ignore the other reply to your post, knowing that posters history of posting.
I currently work in the field, and agree with what you have said. There is still a level of responsibility here and consequences for his actions in the sense that he should have never d/c his meds (if that is in fact what he did, and not simply had his meds changes by his psychiatrist only to see regression). Hopefully this is a learning experience for Delonte, one where he accepts his role in managing his meds and that this is his responsibility. That being said, I wouldn’t be too upset about this missed practice (or anything else that has been going on) until he does in fact continue his medication tx and of course for the alloted time that is needed for the meds to achieve functional levels in his system (weeks, month).
hans - September 29, 2009
Here, here. I’m disappointed but not surprised by those who think that this is an issue of “personal responsibility.” Clearly these are people who have no experience being around others who suffer with mental illness.
There remains tremendous stigma in this country that is attached to mental illness and my sense is that many people who suffer from it desperately want to ditch the meds because to do so would mean, to them, that are now better and can be “normal.” Blaming them for this desire is simultaneously ignorant and cruel.
jdudas - September 30, 2009
While on a personal level i hope he is ok and deals with his issues. But on a team level i’m just thinking we could have traded him a couple months ago and got something out of it, but now it looks like we’ve got drama on our hands that could impact us on court. Lucly we got some depth over the off season.
CavsLebronFan - September 30, 2009
That's all I'm trying to say
Vilify me all you want (apparently I’m the only one who is NOT an expert on bipolar disorder), but I’m just saying the timing is all wrong and if Delonte wanted to “experiment with drugs”, he should have done so before training camp!!!
Maybe Jay-Z or Donnie Walsh tried to talk him out of taking his meds so things would fall apart in Cleveland this season and the Nets or Knicks would have a better chance of signing LeBron next year?
(I was joking about the last part. Please don’t report me to a psychologist for being paranoid dillusional…..or whatever my diagnosis is, I’ll let the experts like Fundamentals make that call)
Max_in_Missouri - September 30, 2009
LOL
That’s totally inappropriate but still hilarious! Maybe Delonte caught the HOVA disease and it causes him to act erratically
Rest assured, you’re going to be “vilified” by the others though lol
Julie H - October 3, 2009
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