The thought may begin in the back of Bert Yancey's mind.
He's talking to the Deseret News by telephone. And it occurs to him that the call is being taped. Then he leaps to the conclusion that it's going to be piped into the White House for the president to hear so he can decide if he wants Yancey to speak there next week."That's irrational, but if I'm in an episode I believe it very strongly," Yancey said. "I can be walking along and decide that I should capture the heat of the Gulf Stream to save energy in Florida. Suddenly I believe I'm doing it. Or I'm curing cancer with money from Howard Hughes. The ideas are grandiose."
Yancey is not in an "episode," at the moment, however, so the thought occurs only in the abstract, as a way to explain his illness to the reporter.
He has manic-depressive illness. Over the past 30 years, it has changed his life, resulting in long hospitalizations, retirement from his career as a professional golfer and a divorce.
But those three decades have also held some victories: Medication has stabilized his condition, he's back on the links and he's touring the country to play golf with the Senior Professional Golfers Association Tour. And he takes every opportunity to tell people that life doesn't end when you become ill.
Yancey will speak at 7:30 p.m. Monday, Aug. 20, at the Western Institute of Neuropsychiatry, 501 Chipeta Way in Research Park, Salt Lake City. Donations will be accepted to benefit UPLIFT, a non-profit self-help support group and chapter of the National Depressive and Manic Depressive Association.
When he was in West Point, Yancey had what was diagnosed as a "nervous breakdown." He spent nine months in a hospital. His treatment included a "padded cell and shock treatments, so I don't remember everything about it." He got a medical discharge from the Army and joined the golf tour. He had a 13-year remission from the illness.
In 1974, during an outing in Japan, he became ill again. He decided he was messianic, sent into Asia to save the people there from communism. He fantasized that Arnold Palmer was covering the costs of his conversion mission.
In 1975, he confounded viewers at the Westchester Classic by flashing a cigarette package at the TV cameras. He thought it was a code directed to Howard Hughes, who would respond by giving him the money to cure cancer.
He was diagnosed a few days later. The next decade was a battle to stabilize his condition with medication. He found he was one of 20 percent of people who don't respond to Lithium, the medicine of choice for manic-depressive illness. Tegretol, commonly used to treat epilepsy, has helped control the episodes.
"They haven't stopped, but it's very controlled. I can isolate and control the episodes, usually without going to the hospital. That's as opposed to nine months in a closed ward. This illness, if uncontrolled, affects behavior to the point that people recognize you are in a mood change. You can understand it better if you think of it like an epileptic seizure that goes on for two weeks or one month."
Yancey, in Salt Lake City for the Showdown at Jeremy Ranch, said he and his illness have a truce. "I find I can perform by adapting to it, by being healthy and having a good diet. I don't have to sit on the couch and eat peanut butter and jelly while life goes on outside."