Guest Post by: April Masini, acclaimed advice columnist
Amanda Bynes has some sort of undiagnosed mental illness and her growing behavioral disturbances are not so much a cry for attention as they are symptoms of some illness. Setting a fire on a stranger’s driveway today, is an escalating act — much worse than her less recent Twitter rants, court appearances in wigs and odd comments. Hurting people with words and wearing odd outfits is a different level of behavior than setting a fire on the property of someone you don’t even know.
Her parents have spoken out publicly, recently, with concern for her mental health, but having an adult committed or placed under a court’s conservatorship is not easy. She had to prove that she was a threat to herself and/or others — and today, she finally did that. The 5150 hold that police have placed her on for three days is an involuntary hold in a facility where she’ll be treated for mental illness and hopefully will get the help she needs.
This is very different behavior than Lamarr Odom lashing out at paparazzi shortly after the discovery and publication of his cheating scandal or even Kanye West doing the same very specific lashing out at paparrazi — and while the two men really shouldn’t be hurting anyone or breaking or stealing anyone’s property — this culmination of escalating behaviors on the part of Ms. Bynes, calls for a good medical diagnosis and treatment, not just a punishment.
Nicknamed “the new millennium’s Dear Abby” by the media, April Masini writes the critically acclaimed ‘Ask April’ advice column and answers reader’s questions on the free Ask April advice forum. Author of four books, including Date Out Of Your League (TurnKey Press, 0-9746763-0-6) and Think & Date Like A Man (iUniverse, 0-595-37466-2), April has been interviewed for over 2,700 articles and opinion pieces, radio and television shows, including those on FOX, ABC, CBS, MSN, Telemundo and Univision — New York Times, New York Daily News, Los Angeles Times, Chicago Tribune, Cosmopolitan, Maxim and USA Today. Her website can be found at www.AskApril.com.