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THIRTY years ago, I was given a diagnosis of schizophrenia. My prognosis was “grave”: I would never live independently, hold a job, find a loving partner, get married. My home would be a board-and-care facility, my days spent watching TV in a day room with other people debilitated by mental illness. I would work at menial jobs when my symptoms were quiet. Following my last psychiatric hospitalization at the age of 28, I was encouraged by a doctor to work as a cashier making change. If I could handle that, I was told, we would reassess my ability to hold a more demanding position, perhaps even something full-time.
To read full article click here. Having spent 13 years in and out of the psychiatric system, Ron’s own route to recovery has given him many insights into the difficult issues facing today’s mental health services.
Ron Coleman was been active in the field of mental health since 1991. When undergoing his ow recovery from mental illness, Ron used his experiences to develop his ideas for recovery-centred treatment of others. Since then, he has gone on to write numerous books and papers on the subject, he was influential in the development of the Hearing Voices Network in the UK and was the first national co-ordinator. To read the full article click here. This is a 5 hour video series (five 45-60 minute segments) put together by Doug Turkington MD from England on Cognitive Behavioral Therapy Informed Care for Psychosis for Families and Caregivers. This program was created by Dr. Turkington at the request of NAMI (National Alliance on Mental Illness) in Marin County, California.
To watch full set of videos, click here. Having experienced psychosis herself, a psychologist wants us to rethink how we understand and treat this complex condition.
Conversations in Critical Psychiatry is an interview series that explores critical and philosophical perspectives in psychiatry and engages with prominent commentators within and outside the profession who have made meaningful criticisms of the status quo. To read the full article click here. In what will be among the largest and boldest urban police reform experiment in decades San Francisco is creating and preparing to deploy teams of professionals from the fire and health departments — not police — to respond to most calls for people in a psychiatric, behavioral or substance abuse crisis.
To read the full article click here. Tanya Luhrmann is a Watkins University Professor in the Anthropology Department at Stanford. Her work explores how cultural contexts shape the experience of mental distress, particularly voice-hearing and the symptoms associated with psychosis. She also turns the lens on the practice of Western psychiatry itself, investigating how the field represents the mind and how these representations influence our collective understanding of reality.
To read the full article click here. I write about my daughter Annie’s voices with her permission. They are her private experience and I can never completely understand what it must be like to live with them, but she has entrusted me to try and “do some good” with them, maybe help shed light on and humanize this very stigmatizing topic or perhaps provide a modicum of succor to other families. She is a young woman now, twenty-two as of this writing, living her life and grappling with many of the same things as others her age; however, the voices have not budged. Objectively, I am fascinated by the way her mind works, why the voices came to be, how they behave, how she lives with them; subjectively, I am inspired by untold sympathy for my daughter and am in awe of her courage and strength.
For the full article click here. Recently there have been spirited discussions among consumers about what we want to propose as a basic change in the mental health system. Several of us have proposed that legislation be passed to ensure that every state and every community have reliable funding for consumer-run support and advocacy groups similar to the independent living centers for people with other disabilities. I liked the idea, but then I started to worry that those centers would be marginalized or co-opted as long as the mental health system remains narrowly medical. I have concluded, and have preliminary support from other leaders, that as consumers, we need to redesign the whole system and society from the bottom up, based on our lived experiences with mental health issues. I believe that only by having a vision of a truly recovery-transformed system and society, will we ever see lasting and genuine change.
Click here to view full article The 2020 Southwest First Episode Psychosis (FEP) Conference, hosted by the South Southwest Mental Health Technology Transfer Center, will provide invaluable professional development for mental health professionals serving individuals with early psychosis or clinical high risk for psychosis.
The virtual three-day agenda will include nationally-recognized plenary speakers, insightful young adults and family members, and opportunities to learn from and network with similar providers from across the nation. Click here to see more and register |
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