From The British Psychological Society: BBC Horizon’s recent documentary “Why Did I Go Mad?” has been monumental in changing the biomedical paradigm of mental illness. Featuring voice-hearers Jacqui Dillon and Rachel Waddingham, the documentary presents psychosis as a reaction to trauma.
Brilliant review by Lucy Johnstone! My thoughts exactly. I am immensely grateful to (and in awe of) Jacqui and Rachel for taking part- their openness and strength of spirit shone through and had a profound effect on me, in spite of Horizon’s brand of irritating ‘Pure Science, Sheer Drama’ voiceover and shoe-horned in visual effects.
With regard to the Dopamine Hypothesis: I was taught this laughably simplistic theory as a Pharmacology undergraduate in the 1980s, and it didn’t smell right even then. I can’t believe that the brightest in the field are still trotting it out with such conviction. I found it telling that David was on enough drugs to down an elephant, and yet his hallucinations were as vivid and distressing as ever. So much for the ‘anti-psychotic’ properties of the latest state-of-the-art pharmaceuticals that medicine has to offer.
Lucy ends her review with: “I believe that we will look back on this programme as the moment when the biomedical public narrative finally started to change.”
I really want to believe that too. Here’s hoping…
