Was the Orlando Shooter Bipolar

Did the Orlando shooter have bipolar disorder?

I’ve heard this question tossed around since his ex-wife told the media that she “saw his bipolar.” When mass shootings occur we want to know why. We want an answer to what caused the horrific event and what could prevent it.

One camp of Americans demands gun control measures while another camp says that we need to focus on mental illness. And I’ve noticed that no where in the discussion do we really talk about mental illness. What is mental illness and better yet what is the difference between mental illness and psychological distress. You may think the two are the same, but they aren’t.

I have a mental illness. In 2005, I enterered the University of Kansas Medical Center’s emergency room in a state of mania with psychosis. I asked the triage nurse for a paper where I scribbled “Jesus loves Karl Rove.”

My diagnosis came easy for the residents. I had experienced a six month depression and then became manic after a couple months on an antidepressant. It was a text book case they told me. And I was treated with a textbook drug.

I’ve been in therapy ever since and I can tell you that much of what I talk about in therapy has little to with my illness and everything to do with psychological damage from my past, or psychological damage from an unhealthy way of thinking.

Growing up with a theology that said I was born depraved, deserving of death and hell did a doozy on me. It took years to find a place of self acceptance from the damage of a faith that at its core tells us God loves us unconditionally.

I share this to say that we all have psychological issues in which we are dealing. Certainly, so do perpetrators of mass crimes. But I don’t hear that as part of the conversation. I don’t hear us a society saying what psychological issues cause someone to become so violent? What predispositions does a person have to have to get to this point? And how can we cultivate a society that promotes a safe, welcoming culture to help prevent this behavior?

Maybe all of these mass shooters have antisocial personality disorder. That fits the bill way more than bipolar. I don’t know. If that’s the case I think we need to look at the early signs of this condition—domestic violence, lawlessness, lack of remorse. We need have tough discussion about to treat people with this condition and I believe part of that discussion includes whether they should have fire arms. It’s a slippery slope, I know, saying someone with a mental illness shouldn’t have fire arms.

The truth is, I don’t have the answers. I doubt any of us on the internet do. I’m a firm believer in gun control. A firm believer.

But I also think we need to look into the psychological states of these shooters and ask ourselves if there is anything we as a society can do on that front to help prevent these occurrences.  I know there are experts doing just that. But I think the psychological distress is something we should bring into the larger discussion, especially as we discuss mental illness.

Did the Orlando shooter have bipolar disorder? We really don’t know. But we do know that he had psychological distress.