I Know A Cry For Help When I See One, And This Amanda Bynes Arrest Is A Cry For Help

I think it’s safe to say something has been “off” regarding Amanda Bynes for awhile. From the obvious, like admitting having an eating disorder all over Twitter, to the straight-up bizarre like not bringing ID to the airport and instead telling the pilot to Google her, I think this girl needs help. Well, after this happened last night, it looks like she might finally get it.

From NBC:

The doorman at Bynes’ building on West 47th Street called police to report she was smoking marijuana in the lobby, sources said. When officers arrived, Bynes had returned to her apartment on the 36th floor.

Officers observed a bong inside Bynes’ apartment as she opened the door,  the sources said. That’s when she allegedly grabbed it and tossed it out of the window.

Smoking in the lobby? Blatantly tossing a bong out a window? I don’t know about you, but to me, it doesn’t sound like she was trying to have a chill night eating Munch-O’s and playing World of Warcraft. In fact, this sounds similar to something I would have done when I needed help but didn’t know how (or who) to ask for it.

Granted, my cry for help didn’t involve drugs (okay, I’ll tell you: I ditched high school and drove alone to the city one day, which sounds so lame writing it out, but for a quiet, seventeen year-old Christian girl with a 3.8 GPA this was the equivalent of a “normal” teen going on a three day bender). My parents punished me, and tried to get to the bottom of my odd behavior, but I wasn’t officially diagnosed with depression until the end of the year, after I’d started cutting. Then, my parents were extremely supportive of me, paying for the help I needed and offering their own counsel and love.

Amanda Bynes doesn’t have that kind of support system. Her parents are weirdly absent from the whole situation, and I’m not sure if she has any close friends who have tried to help her. However, something must have been mentioned about her mental health last night, because:

She was taken to Roosevelt Hospital to undergo a psychiatric evaluation, then to a Midtown police station to be processed, according to the sources. She was expected to spend the night in Manhattan central booking and appear in court Friday.

I’ve never been a former child star, so I have no experience with that particular world of stress. But I know exactly what it feels like to have a mental illness and feel like nobody gives a shit. I hope this Amanda Bynes arrest will lead to her recovery, or at least assure her that people have noticed she’s suffering. Maybe this will even pave the way for other troubled celebs to finally seek help for mental illness.

(photo: Twitter)