When Daniel Frey was diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia at the age of 22, he was just coming into his own as a student and an athlete at Lehman College in the Bronx. He was hospitalized twice at Montefiore Hospital before he met his mentor.
Daniel's father, Jacob, saw a TV program called "Four Stories." A man named Kenneth Steele revealed that he had overcome 30 years of hospitalizations due to schizophrenia by using Risperdal, the same drug Daniel was taking. Daniel's father called Ken Steele and Ken called Daniel in the hospital.
Ken told him that with his education at Bronx High School of Science and English major at Lehman, he was the perfect person to help Ken with his many projects, including Awakenings support groups, the Voter Empowerment Project, and New York City Voices, the consumer journal of mental health advocacy. Ken told Daniel to stay on his meds and Daniel would avoid the torture Ken had been through.
Ken was right. Working with him and the other volunteers at Voices, taking his medicine, and seeing his doctors regularly, Daniel stayed out of the hospital. Said Daniel about life with Ken, "The phone rang off the hook." Ken Steele was a magnet for the troubled and hopeful everywhere. And Daniel was the guy who tied together the loose ends. "I learned the value of work," he responded. "I also learned that helping others was a way of helping yourself." He became Managing Editor, finished college with straight A's, and moved into his own apartment.
But when Ken Steele died suddenly at 51, Daniel "panicked. My life revolved around Ken. I was only happy hanging onto his coattails. I had no independent existence. I panicked for a month or two. Then at Ken's memorial, there was such an outpouring of love for him. People approached me and pledged their support. Isaac Brown [Advocacy Director of the Baltic Street Mental Health Board] and Peter Ashenden [Executive Director of the Mental Health Empowerment Project]."
Daniel continued, "I didn't know what to do but somehow I completed a couple of issues of the newspaper. I learned to coordinate the whole paper-15,000 copies, the layout editor, the printer. It was hectic. Then my Dad died in March 2002. It was a shock; he was only 62. But, in a way, Ken's death prepared me."
He added, "I also took over Awakenings support groups. We were venting our depression, anxiety, and negativity…occasionally our successes. I might have been the facilitator, but I was having as much difficulty as anyone else."
"I dated, hung out with friends, stayed in touch with my family, and gained mutual support through self-help groups. Ken's death forced me to become my own person. I haven't seen his ghost but I know he always meant this for me. He showed me how rewarding the mentor relationship is for both parties. He spread the message of hope; that recovery is possible."
Daniel continued, "For life to change, it takes a lot of time and patience and setbacks. Like my life. City Voices is a symbol of hope. Working there is my main treatment. In Awakenings, we all have a diagnosis. No one is better. We are bonded by our struggles to maintain ourselves in a world where people refuse to acknowledge the mentally ill."
Those bonds include acting as a mentor for adolescents on an inpatient psychiatric unit at Mt. Sinai and being a peer advocate for older adults, a program run by the Baltic Street Mental Health Board. He has also spoken often about recovery to groups of consumers and providers around the country.
But most of all Daniel carries on the tradition of Ken Steele by encouraging consumers to express themselves in New York City Voices. As Editor-in-Chief, he offers the volunteer staff and writers advice and support with their efforts to recover their identities on the page.
Not only has Daniel "gotten a life" but he is "giving it back" to the family and friends, consumers and providers who gave Daniel his identity as a loved and loving human being.