10/14/2026
AN UPDATE TO THE SUNDAY RAMBLING UPDATE:
We want to give you an update on the man we wrote about in Sunday Ramblings because so many of you reached out with ideas, resources and genuine concern. Those conversations helped.
Yesterday, through one of those connections, we were able to work with a family doctor who found a behavioral health bed for him. We finally had exactly what we had been trying to find since Friday.
Sadly, by the time we located him, he was no longer willing to go.
On Friday, when this all began, he wanted help. He was willing to receive care, and all of us around him were trying to help him get there. We brought him to the hospital, shared his history, explained that we knew his baseline and that what we were seeing was far beyond it. He was severely delusional, clearly unable to care for himself in the way he normally could, and he was willing to be there. Still, after the hospital assessment, we were informed that he did not meet criteria for the next level of care.
Three days later, after continuing to live inside his delusions without the stabilization he needed, we found him again and told him we had a bed waiting. This time he did not want to talk to us. He was more frightened, more unstable and much further away from trusting that we were trying to help him.
We worked with our service partners to keep an eye on him and made a plan to continue trying. Before we had another chance, his crisis escalated today at the Idaho State Capitol. He arrived barely clothed beneath a trench coat and threw a bag of f***s at the Governor’s Office. Capitol security called police, the crisis team responded, and this time they saw the depth of his distress and got him to the hospital, where he is now on a mental health hold. There may also be criminal consequences because of what happened at the Capitol.
We are relieved he is finally receiving care, but we are also sad that this is what it took to get him there. Idaho Health and Welfare helped. Senator Melissa Wintrow helped. A family doctor helped us find a bed. Our day shelter partners, the other emergency shelter system and our staff were all communicating and trying to keep this man safe while also keeping our community safe.
He was asking for help. We were asking for help. The people who knew him were saying clearly that he had deteriorated far beyond his normal baseline. That was the moment when treatment might have happened before police, before crisis response, before potential criminal charges and before three more days of suffering.
Clearly this is more complicated then just getting them through the hospital door. How do we make sure the people writing our laws, setting the criteria and funding our mental health system create a process that is clear enough to be understood and applied consistently? If someone is severely delusional, unable to care for themselves, far outside of their known baseline and willing to receive treatment, how do we make sure everyone involved in that assessment understands all of the ways that person may qualify for care?
So many of the comments after Sunday Ramblings asked the same thing we were asking: how could this man be assessed and still not meet criteria? That is worth understanding, not so we can point fingers at one person, but because one assessment can change everything that happens next. What the people, who know that person, are seeing matters. Their willingness to receive treatment matters. The criteria needs to be clear enough that those things are considered carefully and consistently, no matter who happens to be doing the assessment that day.
Don't we want to build a mental health system that catches people before a crisis becomes something bigger? Our lawmakers, hospitals, behavioral health providers and community partners need to be working from the same understanding of when someone needs that next level of care. We owe that clarity to the person in crisis, to the people trying to help them and to the community around them.
So many people have cared about this man over the past few days, including many of you who read Sunday Ramblings and immediately started trying to help us find another path. We are grateful for that. This is how we fill these gaps, by paying attention to what worked, being honest about what did not and continuing to work together until the handoffs work better than they did this time.
Today it was a bag of f***s thrown at a government office. That is disturbing and there may be consequences for it, but we are incredibly grateful that it was not another life lost.
Look at what those three days cost him, what they cost our community in emergency response, and what they can teach us about building a system that responds while someone is still willing to say yes to help.
