Special Treatment Revoked For Pretty, Pink, Privileged Princess, oh noez!
The post about my sister in law going mental spawned a lot of interesting comments. Thanks, guys!
Since research is what I do, I found this article: New Mothers Vulnerable to Mental Illness. A snippet:
New moms face increased risks for a variety of mental problems, not just postpartum depression, according to one of the largest studies of psychiatric illness after childbirth.
New dads aren't as vulnerable, probably because they don't experience the same physical and social changes associated with having a baby, the researchers and other experts said.
The study, based on medical records of 2.3 million people over a 30-year period in Denmark, found that the first three months after women have their first baby is riskiest, especially the first few weeks. That's when the tremendous responsibility of caring for a newborn hits home.
During the first 10 to 19 days, new mothers were seven times more likely to be hospitalized with some form of mental illness than women with older infants. Compared to women with no children, new mothers were four times more likely to be hospitalized with mental problems.
New mothers also were more likely than other women to get outpatient psychiatric treatment.
However, new fathers did not have a higher risk of mental problems when compared with fathers of older infants and men without children.
The prevalence of mental disorders was about 1 per 1,000 births for women and just .37 per 1,000 births for men.
Mental problems included postpartum depression, but also bipolar disorder, with altering periods of depression and mania; schizophrenia and similar disorders; and adjustment disorders, which can include debilitating anxiety.
Egads!
Anyway, I hope that her issues aren't going to be serious. Maybe it is just stress.
In other "news," I talked about the Paris Hilton gossip a few days earlier (June 5th, if memory serves), and expressed my disdain that Some People get special treatment. Sounds like the judge agreed with me / everyone else with a functioning brain, because Paris Hilton is going back to the pokey. Huzzah!
Now I have to go scrub myself down, because I'm annoyed that this is considered "news."
From CNN.com:
LOS ANGELES, California (AP) -- Screaming and crying, Paris Hilton was escorted out of a courtroom and back to jail Friday after a judge ruled that she must serve out her entire 45-day sentence behind bars rather than in her Hollywood Hills home.
"It's not right!" shouted the weeping Hilton, who violated her probation in a reckless driving case. "Mom!" she called out to her mother in the audience.
Hilton, who was brought to court in handcuffs in a sheriff's car, came into the courtroom disheveled and weeping, hair askew, sans makeup, wearing a gray fuzzy sweatshirt over slacks.
She cried throughout the hearing, her body shook constantly and she dabbed at her eyes. Several times she turned to her parents, seated behind her in the courtroom, and mouthed, "I love you."
Superior Court Judge Michael T. Sauer was calm but apparently irked by the morning's developments. He said he had left the courthouse Thursday night having signed an order for Hilton to appear for the hearing.
When he got in his car early Friday, he said, he heard a radio report that he had approved Hilton's participation in the hearing by telephone, but he had not.
"I at no time condoned the actions of the sheriff and at no time told him I approved the actions," he said of the decision to release Hilton from jail after three days.
"At no time did I approve the defendant being released from custody to her home on Kings Road," Sauer said.
Assistant City Attorney Dan F. Jeffries argued that Hilton should be returned to jail, and said that was purely the judge's decision to make. "Her release after only three days erodes confidence in the judicial system," Jeffries said.
Hilton's attorney, Richard Hutton, implored the judge to order a hearing in his chambers at which he would hear testimony about Hilton's medical condition before making a decision.
The judge did not respond to that suggestion.
Another of her attorneys, Steve Levine, said, "The sheriff has determined that because of her medical situation, this (jail) is a dangerous place for her."
"The court's role here is to let the Sheriff's Department run the jail," he said.
A former district attorney, Robert Philibosian, also represented Hilton. He said that the law supports the sheriff in making an independent decision on her custodial situation.
The judge interrupted several times to say that he had received a call last Wednesday from an undersheriff informing him that Hilton had a medical condition and that he would submit papers to the judge to consider. He said the papers never arrived.
Every few minutes, the judge would interrupt proceedings and state the time on the clock and note that the papers still had not arrived.
He also noted that he had heard that a private psychiatrist visited Hilton in jail and he wondered if that person played a role in deciding her medical needs.
The frenzy over Hilton's jail status began early Thursday when sheriff's officials released Hilton because of an undisclosed medical condition and sent her home under house arrest. She had been in jail since late Sunday.
Hilton was fitted with an electronic monitoring ankle bracelet and was expected to finish her 45-day sentence for a reckless driving probation violation at her four-bedroom, three-bath home.
The decision by Sheriff Lee Baca to move Hilton chafed prosecutors and Judge Sauer, who spelled out during sentencing that Hilton was not allowed to serve house detention.
California Attorney General Jerry Brown criticized the Sheriff's Department for letting Hilton out of jail, saying he believed she should serve out her sentence.
"It does hold up the system to ridicule when the powerful and the famous get special treatment," Brown told The Associated Press in an interview before testifying at a congressional hearing in Washington.
"I'm sure there's a lot of people who've seen their family members go to jail and have various ailments, physical and psychological, that didn't get them released," he said. "I'd say it's time for a course correction."
The Los Angeles County jail system is so overcrowded that attorneys and jail officials have said it is not unusual for nonviolent offenders like Hilton to be released after serving as little as 10 percent of their sentences.
Hilton's path to jail began September 7, when she failed a sobriety test after police saw her weaving down a street in her Mercedes-Benz on what she said was a late-night run to a hamburger stand.
She pleaded no contest to reckless driving and was sentenced to 36 months' probation, alcohol education and $1,500 in fines.
In the months that followed she was stopped twice by officers who discovered her driving on a suspended license. The second stop landed her in Sauer's courtroom, where he sentenced her to jail.
"Screaming and crying"? Claiming "it's not fair!" to be treated exactly like anyone else who repeatedly breaks the law and endangers others?
Shut up, Paris.
Seriously: would you expect special treatment if you repeatedly broke the law and endangered others by being an impaired driver?
Also, what medical condition? Is she on anti-depressants like 85% of the Americsan population? Concerned that she might go into cocaine withdrawal? Just plain depressed because she's in, um, jail? (Hello, jail isn't supposed to make you feel warm and fuzzy and happy!)
I think my favourite part of this whole non-news news story were the quotes from Paris' equally spoilt but less interesting aunt, who rejoiced repeatedly and publicly that Paris was able to initially squirm out of jail after only being in there for three days.
Omigawd, she's going to miss some waxings and stuff! Her hair is going to have roots showing when she gets out!! Without regular facials and mani/pedis, she's going to get zits and chipped nails!
She didn't even want to take the time out from her busy schedule to show up in person in court. Being tried by telephone?! Are you kidding me?
Oh noez, jail time for you! This is clearly cruel and unusual punishment.
And yet...was her brief stint in jail a terrible ordeal? Not really.
Also from CNN.com:
The "Simple Life" star will be housed in the "special needs" unit of the 13-year-old jail, separate from most of its 2,200 inmates. The unit contains 12 two-person cells reserved for police officers, public officials, celebrities and other high-profile inmates.
Like other inmates in that unit, Hilton will take her meals in her cell and will be allowed outside the 12-foot-by-8-foot space for at least an hour each day to shower, watch TV in the day room, participate in outdoor recreation or talk on the telephone. No cell phones or BlackBerrys are permitted in the facility, even for visitors.
The jail, a two-story concrete building next to train tracks and beneath a bustling freeway, has been an all-female facility since March 2006. It's located in an industrial area about five miles southeast of downtown Los Angeles.
"I did have a choice to go to a pay jail," Hilton said Sunday, without giving details. "But I declined because I feel like the media portrays me in a way that I'm not and that's why I wanted to go to county, to show that I can do it and I'm going to be treated like everyone else. I'm going to do the time, I'm going to do it the right way."
When she was sentenced May 4, Superior Court Judge Michael T. Sauer ruled that she would not be allowed any work release, furloughs or use of an alternative jail or electronic monitoring in lieu of jail.
Sometimes stars are allowed to do their time in a jail of their choosing. In such cases they pay a daily room-and-board fee to the smaller jails, which afford them more privacy and comfort.
Cop-slapping actress Zsa Zsa Gabor, for example, served three days behind bars in 1990 at the El Segundo jail near the Los Angeles International Airport. She paid $85 a day.
On Saturday, about 15 photographers, reporters and television crews staked out the entrances to the jail waiting for the celebutante's arrival. Authorities had also cordoned off a grassy area outside the facility for the media. She had until Tuesday to report.
On Sunday, about a dozen photographers and television crews were at the Lynwood facility when she arrived in an unmarked SUV. Video captured by celebrity news site TMZ.com showed Hilton inside the vehicle with her mother, Kathy.
Hilton's publicist, Elliot Mintz, said he spoke with Kathy Hilton after she returned from the jail.
"She told me it was very emotional," Mintz said. "She also said that she feels this will be a time when Paris will be able to think and reflect and to spend time alone to learn from the experience because in Paris' life she's never alone -- there's always a constant chatter around her."
Officers arrested Hilton in Hollywood on September 7. In January, she pleaded no contest to the reckless-driving charge and was sentenced to 36 months' probation, alcohol education and $1,500 in fines.
She was pulled over by California Highway Patrol on January 15. Officers informed Hilton she was driving on a suspended license and she signed a document acknowledging she was not to drive. She then was pulled over by sheriff's deputies on February 27, at which time she was charged with violating her probation.
It only took three days for Paris to realize that County lockup wasn't a party.
At least she won't be alone in jail, whether she has a cellmate or not. Hope she enjoys the "constant chatter" in jail!
Duh, Barbie.
The world would probably be a better place if we stopped treating celebrities like special children who are too delicate to take responsibility for their own bad choices and crappy decisions.
Also, I know not to watch the news tonight, lest I vomit after they spend a half hour kissing Hilton's heinie and acting like it is the most important thing going on in the world.
I apologize for even bringing it up in my blog, but since I ranted about it a few days ago (the post about actually agreeing with Rev. Al Sharpton for once in my life, gads!), along with celebrity politicians, it seemed reasonable to update and mention that the issue I ranted about (Paris being released after three days) has changed.
Oh, and: Shut up, Paris.
It needed to be said, so I said it twice.
Maybe she will actually read a book or meditate or something.