Sometimes people with a mental illness can only hold it together for so long before giving in to the demons. This country as a whole does a terrible job of dealing with and treating mental illnesses. And as a people, we're incredibly lacking in empathy for not only those suffering from mental illnesses, but also to the friends and families that have to deal with this on a daily basis.
I have empathy for a kid from Liberty City that exists in nothing but violence and poverty, who
not only does not have access to mental health services, but sees nothing but dysfunction every day.
My empathy for those on the absolute upper crust of society that work in organizations that
do nothing other than want to help their multi million dollar investments physical and mental
health, since not doing so could well mean their jobs is pretty much nill.
Could Bess be suffering from some mental illness? Sure. It's possible, but since there is literally
nothing in a person's behavior that can't be traced to some "mental illness" or another, the only
reason is the person looking for cause isn't trying hard enough.
Sometimes, the answer just is; "I started doing X because I thought I could handle it. Gradually
it got control of me, and I refused to seek help for it because I thought it would make me look
weak (or whatever). That's my fault, and my own bad choices."
It appears to me that not only had Bess gone through a rough beginning of life, he, like
many others of his talent level, got chance, after chance handed to them through no
virtue other than being able to catch, run, throw. The same person without that talent
would've been tossed on society's scrap heap and left to his own devices long, long ago.
His (documented) issues started cropping up about a year ago. I've seen people
spiral in much, much shorter periods of time.
It's not hard at all for me to believe that Bess reverted to his default position. Yes, I hope he
does get the help he needs, but my empathy is pretty much nil.
