He spent two decades fighting mental illness. Now David Barry is sharing his success, he tells Andrea Smith
With his impeccable appearance as he arrives to meet me straight from the Galway train, David Barry looks as if he has just stepped straight out of a particularly smart menswear shop window.
You could easily mistake him for a professor of psychiatry, as he has a warm, empathic manner and is engaging and insightful in conversation. There's a sense of passion about him, and a love for life that is made all the more meaningful when you consider what he has been through.
Having been diagnosed at 37 with bipolar disorder and depression, he spent seven and a half years in psychiatric units and had more than 100 sessions of electroconvulsive therapy (ECT), before undergoing high-risk, but ultimately successful, neurosurgery.
He's here to tell me about a concert that 12 members of the popular band De Danann are putting on this week to raise funds for his mental health initiative, Changing Minds. He loves music, and remembers the 18 months he spent as De Danann's tour manager with great fondness.
"I wasn't very good at the job, but I thoroughly enjoyed it," he says. "They were a great band, and listening to their music made the hairs on the back of my head stand up."
He didn't realise it then, but their music would ultimately help him when he was in the throes of what he describes as the "horrors of psychosis and manic depression".
While in a psychiatric unit, his brother Stan gave him a Walkman, and he found that listening to music introduced a certain tranquillity into his brain.
"It distracted me from thinking how useless and shameful I was," he says. "Depression is the most awful thing, because it makes you feel worthless, you lose concentration and you want to die all the time."
Now aged 66, David's life before the onset of his illness had been pretty normal. He grew up in Salthill and studied science at UCG, now NUI Galway. At 37, a traumatic event in his life was the catalyst for triggering his bipolar disorder, and for the next two decades he remained extremely ill.
His treatment was all medication-based, and at one stage he was on nine separate drugs, taking 38 tablets a days. They didn't seem to have any effect, he recalls, nor did the ECT treatments. At one stage he had 55 of them in a row, at the rate of three courses per week, until he put a stop to the ordeal.
"They just didn't work, but at that stage, the doctors were clutching at straws," he says. "Psychotherapy was not available back then, as it was frowned on by many psychiatrists. At one stage I was treated over in Newcastle, and, even through the veil of depression, I was receptive to the idea of it. I could see that it had the potential to achieve tremendous results."
In 1997, David had neurosurgery in Dundee, Scotland, which ultimately changed his life. He was only the seventh person in Ireland to have it, and it was performed after seven months of screening. The high-risk five-hour surgery involved boring six holes on each side of his head, into which probes with electric tips were inserted. Once the electrical current was switched on, several hundred brain cells in the frontal lobe were destroyed. This, he points out, was not the same thing as a lobotomy, and there was only a one-in-three chance of success.
"For people with bipolar disorder, that part of the brain doesn't function properly," he explains. "So the electricity blasts that area and gives it a right thump, to put it crudely. I was at the stage where I didn't want to wake up any more and just wanted to die. If it hadn't worked and I had gone into long-stay care, I wouldn't have survived. I would have committed suicide, without a doubt."
Immediately, as David woke up from surgery, he felt different, and, within two weeks, was feeling "as bright as a button". Three years later, his doctors took him off all psychiatric drugs, and he has remained off medication since 2000.
"I'm not a person of faith, but the only way I can describe my re-entry into society is miraculous," he smiles.
These days, he lives in Spiddal with his three beloved cats, Pixie, Cheech and Chong, and loves music, organic gardening and Guinness. He's an anti-war campaigner, an equality advocate, and follows a vegetarian diet that is practically vegan.
He's very close to his siblings and will be travelling to Perth, Australia in January on holiday with his brother Stan, as his sister Rosamund now lives there. While he is very happy with his life, his biggest regret is not being a father.
"I didn't have children, to my chagrin," he says. "When Rosamund's children were babies, I used to love looking after them."
After seeing other people suffering in psychiatric units, David made the decision that, if he ever came out, he would work to help others. Along with his friend, Anji O'Donnell, he now runs Changing Minds, a voluntary organisation aimed at bringing new hope to those suffering from psychiatric illnesses. It was initiated by Charlie Currie of Galway City Partnership, who has been a tremendous source of help and support.
David and Anji met in a psychiatric unit about 15 years ago and have been firm friends ever since. People with mental health problems find it easy to talk to them, because they can empathise, having been through the system themselves.
When he first interviews the people who come to Changing Minds, David asks them whether they take regular exercise, if they laugh a lot and what their diet is like. Laughter is beneficial to positive mental health, he says, as is owning a pet.
One of the services Changing Minds offers is skilled counselling. As there are huge waiting lists for psychotherapy through the HSE, it means that clients can get help more quickly.
"We do very good work and we're proud of it, but we're broke, which is why we're having the benefit concert," says David. "We'd love to have an office and a computer, as we use the office of Galway Peoples' Resource Centre after hours for the counselling. I love what I'm doing now, and, when we started Changing Minds, I thought that if I could save even one life, it would make my life worthwhile."
Changing Minds presents the old De Danann benefit concert at the Radisson Hotel in Galway on December 17. Featuring 12 members past and present, including Alec Finn, Johnny "Ringo" McDonagh, Eleanor Shanley and Jackie Daly. Tickets are 20/15 euro from Zhivago, Shop Street (091 509 960) and Canavan House, Nuns Island (091 704 764). For more information on Changing Minds, please visit www.changingminds.eu
