Sometimes, I felt as though substance abuse and crime were a million miles away, or part of another world. Growing up, I was not aware of anyone I knew abusing drugs.

I did not become mentally ill because I drank alcohol, or used prescription or illegal drugs. But despite the fact that I never made these life-altering bad choices, I still developed schizophrenia. Unfortunately, those of us afflicted by schizophrenia cannot choose to not be mentally ill. We cannot choose to not be paranoid, or ignore the voices and delusions long enough to work. We can’t just snap out of it.

When I was younger, the solution to the problem of homelessness seemed simple and clear. It looked like homeless people just needed to find an easy job, and that they should look to friends or family or a church for help while seeking employment. It appeared to be so easy. I thought that if homeless people went to jail briefly, it was fair, because they weren’t trying hard enough.

But when I became homeless, it was not simple, and it was not easy. My homelessness was a direct result of untreated schizophrenia, and I badly needed medical intervention.

Even while I was living outside, I could never foresee that someday I would find myself jailed. But because of disorderly behavior resulting from mental illness, it still happened.

While I was in jail, I needed the kind of treatment that is readily available in hospitals, including medication, talk therapy, and a doctor’s encouragement. Unfortunately, no treatment was available to me in jail. Prisoners lived in extremely crowded conditions. There were long periods of darkness, with little natural light. These conditions made my mental illness worse.

Looking back, I always imagined that jails were miserable. But spending several days in terribly crowded conditions was much worse than I could have ever anticipated. Through it all, I still felt innocent and misunderstood.

Conditions in jails lower a prisoner’s quality of life. Psychiatric hospitals, on the other hand, aim to give patients the highest possible quality of life.

I am often surprised that the mentally ill who commit petty crimes in their homelessness are not better connected to services that can provide them with treatment, so that they can rebuild their lives. Perhaps the reason is money. A hospital can cost over a thousand dollars a day. But when patients begin treatment earlier, outpatient care may be possible, which is far cheaper than hospitalizations and incarcerations.

Effective psychiatric treatment can keep the mentally ill out of situations (like homelessness) where they may be arrested for petty crimes. In my experience, trying to follow the law while homeless was like walking a tight rope. My mental illness led to circumstances and choices that were out of my control.

There will always be people who are mentally ill. If there is no safety net to provide these people housing, there will always be people who are homeless. When laws criminalize the homeless, there will always be innocent people who are punished. I am proof that innocent and misunderstood people can develop illness that leads them to live on the streets, rejecting all help.

No one should underestimate the cruelty that exists in American jails and prisons. Jails should be for people who have clearly violated society’s trust. People who are sick, like I was, and need treatment, not jail time.

Image taken from pixabay.com.