The senator has experienced mental health problems while receiving backlash from his own political party.
In Pennsylvania U.S. Senator John Fetterman’s new memoir, “Unfettered”, the senator tells the story of his struggles with his mental health while serving as a public official.
In the memoir, Fetterman discusses nearly dropping out of his campaign for U.S. Senate and his hospitalization for depression during his first few months in office.
Senator Fetterman has experienced harsh criticism from his own party. He has been outspoken against actions taken by Democrats and has voted with Republicans on multiple accounts. Most recently, he supported the Republican-led effort to reopen the government and broke with his party on leveraging the shutdown for an extension on expiring health care subsidies.
Fetterman also reveals in the memoir that he and Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro no longer speak after a years-long feud between the pair.
One of the chapters in Fetterman’s book is titled “The Shapiro Affair.” Fetterman details his relationship with Shapiro, which was once a civil one.
On the Board of Pardons, Fetterman writes that he and Shapiro disagreed on several occasions.
Fetterman threatened to run against Shapiro in the 2022 gubernatorial primary over one of those disagreements, but decided to run for U.S. Senate.
“I sincerely wish him the best,” Fetterman writes. “He is a credit to the state and may one day be a credit to the country. I remember fondly the days when we were nobodies trying to climb the ladder. Even if we no longer speak.”
On his mental health struggles, Fetterman refers to the “beginning of the end” as the first day of his campaign for U.S. Senate.
While serving as mayor of Braddock, Fetterman chased down a jogger after hearing gunshots near his home. He believed the man might have been involved, and the man was Black and unarmed. He was released after police arrived on the scene, but the allegations of racism have followed Fetterman throughout his career.
“There is no doubt that these accusations marked the beginning of the critical depression and suicidal thoughts that would have me checking in to Walter Reed as an inpatient,” writes Fetterman in the memoir.
Following a stroke and the general election, Fetterman’s mental health continued to decline.
“I dreaded the light coming up in the morning. I stayed in bed as long as I could, then moved to the couch, where I spent hours staring out the window, looking for something, anything, I could no longer see. My only balm was the darkness. Once, as I lay in bed, I asked myself, What would you do if there were a pill on the nightstand you could take and not wake up? I would have taken it,” he writes.
Fetterman writes that he has room to improve in all aspects of being a senator, and that he needs to “do better.”
“I am still finding my way, and one of my greatest strengths, taking charge of an issue by myself and pushing through change – as I did in Braddock and with the Board of Pardons – does not lend itself to the Senate. I am not collegial, and as a senator, you need to be to get anything real done… Loners in the Senate remain exactly that – loners.”
