Back in the '80's I saw Sinéad O'Connor's music video "Nothing Compares 2U" on MTV. Her unique and beautiful voice, accompanied by the loveliest eyes I've ever seen, were mesmerizing. Listening to her sing words that she filled with such vulnerability and sweetness, seeing those two sad little tears timidly slip down her perfect skin, those were the reasons that nearly the entire video is only of her face. She was delicate yet powerful, beautiful yet unpretentious.


Sadly, that was followed by her infamous Saturday Night Live faux pas...


I was as stunned as everyone else watching, but only because her "song" was not enjoyable and the dead silence that surrounded her was so uncomfortable to witness. I'm not Catholic, so when she tore up a photo of the pope I wasn't offended in the least, merely puzzled. (Of course, now it makes perfect sense.) But the Christianity-mongering portion of the population -- they were offended to the very core of their beings. The mindless, dogmatic vitriol that was flung at Ms O'Connor reminded me of a similar reaction to John Lennon's inadvertently offensive "Bigger than Jesus" remark that compared the popularity of the Beatles to that of some people's Lord & Savior. Jesus fans were not amused.


Back to Sinéad O'Connor as we know her today: still very talented, aging in the way that women do and people wish they wouldn't, and troubled in a way that ought to be kept a wee bit more private. We all know she's going through a tough time, although I'm not sure the media is too blame so much as her own judgment. Regardless, these personal traumas can cause a person to make other questionable choices. As mentioned on MSNBC, after overdosing on pills the week before, O'Connor reached out to her Twitter followers: "Does anyone know a psychiatrist in Dublin or Wicklow who could urgently see me today please? I'm really unwell and in danger. I desperately need to get back on meds today." Surely she knows that anti-depressants do not work instantly. Need something to help you calm the fuck down NOW, those meds actually exist. Given her age and mental health record, I'm pretty sure Sinéad already has some in her medicine cabinet...

There are several things about this that amuse and concern me. That Sinéad has made suicide attempts is something that she and her family should take seriously. It is heart-breaking and tragic when a person is unable to escape a deep and overwhelming sense of despair and sees death as the only means of relief. Not all suicides are truly intentional. Sometimes it is the sad and accidental consequence of seeing oneself as a victim and trying to prove it to everyone else. Regardless, both are mental health troubles that require professional help.

That being said, the fact that O'Connor went to Twitter for help finding a psychiatrist does amuse me. That's not so much a cry for help as a plea to have her phone taken away. Don't get me wrong, I suffer from plenty of self-induced anxiety and the mental anguish brought on by an improperly wired brain and I do rely on (I hope) properly prescribed medication, however, I do not blab about it on Twitter. Blogs are bad enough, but Twitter, in the hands of a mentally unstable person who feels compelled to prominently display her demons, one without boundaries or even a basic sense of self-preservation, will ALWAYS be a source of humiliation and regret, not only for herself, but for family and friends as well. Lucky for her, Sinéad's family must not follow her on Twitter (getting to experience the crazy firsthand), so they have no idea when she psycho-twitters things like, "Anyway...If any1 knows how I can kill myself...Without my kids finding out I did it deliberately pls tell me asa f--kin p." I'm certain that as she typed this SOS, and even after she flung it into the Sea of Voyeurism, she knew in her heart that it was a useless, narcissistic, and stupid tweet for attention by a crazy person without a firm grip on her reality balloon. I know that our American celebrities make batshit crazy seem glamorous and fun, but it isn't a good idea to have batshit crazy people as ones role models. People will only feel sorry for you after you're dead and what good is that.

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John Lennon quote: "Christianity will go. It will vanish and shrink. I needn't argue about that; I'm right and I will be proved right. We're more popular than Jesus now. I don't know which will go first, rock 'n' roll or Christianity. Jesus was all right but his disciples were thick and ordinary. It's them twisting it that ruins it for me."