Creating Sustainability, Disarming Trauma and Loving One Another
I recently joined BHbusiness Mastering Essential Business Operations as a convener. The plan is to recruit 15-20 peer organizations to participate in a peer provider learning community. I decided to create an all peer - or at least a 95 percent peer - learner community with meaningful programs, innovation, and plenty of ideas that may not necessarily be easy to implement. How can we disarm trauma in the midst of creating sustainable communities? We must love ourselves a little harder, love our peers just a little bit stronger and bring our adversaries closer to our hearts.
The Lonely Way: Reflections from a Young Psychologist
Psychotherapy (Iâm still searching for a better term, since the word âtherapyâ involves thinking that there is sickness somewhere) is not about knowing everything. Itâs about humanity, doubts and uncertainty. Itâs about reaching out and reaching in, authenticity and honesty. Itâs the most demanding thing I have ever done, because Iâve fully involved myself in this work; I use my own feelings, scratch away at my existential issues and try to care as deeply as I can for people who choose to enter my office. Sometimes, I know exactly what helps and what doesnât. Sometimes, I have no idea. In a very odd way, itâs the most professional attitude I can think of. But it is also the lonely way.
Hello World! An American Nut Challenges Trump About Status of âBull Goose Loony.â We...
Europe is laughing at us. You, the whole world, laughs at us. With Trump and Sarah Palin dominating the news, and with gun-toting militants taking over an Oregon bird sanctuary, hell, we are laughing at ourselves! We do look crazy. The real question is, âWhat kind of nuts are we?â
Tunneling
Texas is big.
So are its politics, at the very heart of it all.
I fell into mental health by sheer virtue of my own shared...
My Peer Service Work
My work in peer service stems from the giving back to my community, yes, but itâs more than that. I do it because I canât do anything else. I love this work. I love consumer 1:1 contact and prefer to be in the background otherwise because I donât like attention.
Getting Involved in Prison Issues – Making Alliances With Mental Health Advocacy
In my recent Alternatives keynote I talked about mental health issues and our unjust prisons, including the shameful racism of the criminal justice system...
Media’s Failed Approach to Madness, Parts 1 & 2
This past year has been a terrible year for mental health in the news and other media. The most prevalent and widely publicized messaging has been heartily encouraged by national lobbying groups that "advocate" for expanded treatment of what they have deemed "severe diseases of the brain." Psychiatrists and proponents of the medical model are calling for what is basically a soft re-institutionalization of people deemed mentally ill, particularly those with diagnoses erroneously assumed to be âtreatable, but not curable.â This perspective is dangerous. It supports violence and abuse. It feeds fear and delusion.
It is not helpful.
Finding Human Life on Earth
Through the ISPS listserve, I read a blog this morning written by Thomas Insel, director of the NIMH. The way he described people I daily meet in work and in my own life created a rising pulse, so I decided to find out some more about his thoughts and practice. I am not saying that what I read on his blog is unknown to me, but still it made me wonder how on earth is it possible to invest so much money - and resources - in research which is so distant from practice, and so far away from humanistic and holistic ideas and theories.
Reflections on the Torture Parents and the Pedophile Olympic Doctor
Parents should be very cautious about entrusting their children to any institution â private boarding schools, ballet schools, training facilities away from home. We are all best off raising our adolescents subject to our oversight, rather than entrusting them to others. Those who should protect us from trauma are harming our children.
Start with a Solid Foundation
How are we going to do this? Thatâs the question we asked ourselves when a few likeminded bureaucrats sat down and said, our current...
Introduction: The Gene Illusion Continues
I am pleased to have the opportunity to be part of the Mad In America website. I plan to provide a critical perspective on genetic theories and research in psychiatry and psychology. I will highlight the numerous problems with widespread claims that studies of families, twins, and adoptees have provided indisputable evidence that psychiatric disorders and psychological traits have an important underlying genetic basis.
Recovery â From Personal Reform to Social Change
From Mad in Sweden. One of the most important contributions made by research on recovery, is understanding people diagnosed with âsevere mental health problemsâ, as not merely victims of an illness, but as agents in their own lives.
The Sandy Hook Advisory Commission and the Evidence of a âConvicted Offender”
Last week the Sandy Hook Advisory Commission threw another crumb to the masses, letting them know that, well, even though they canât get any of the records and documents they want, theyâll forge ahead and produce a report, making mental health recommendations, that has absolutely nothing to do with Adam Lanzaâs mental health history.
An Unplanned Path to Discovering My Truth
What began as a story of self-discovery, spiritual awakening, and healing written only for family and friends evolved into a memoir reflecting my path towards liberation that other people might find useful on their journey of awakening to the person they were born to be. A power greater than myself became a wind under my wings moving the creation of this memoir forward. The story was enhanced by the process of creative expression that deepened the intimate look at my experience of loss and grieving that were intertwined with my liberation journey.
Chapter Ten: A ‘Victim of Circumstance’
Upon arriving home at the end of sophomore year in college, which had been devoted to hyper-control and a carefully maintained, entirely black-and-white existence,...
The Pipeline
Iâm overwhelmed by the complicated multi-issue medical reform legislation being batted about. I feel hopeless that any such massive reform bill can survive the...
What To Do With Advocates Who Refuse To Learn About Drug Downsides
I get a lot of ideas from other advocates from online forums like the Alternatives Facebook discussion group,  where we have a gathering of about...
Civilians
If youâve ever driven your car in a blizzard, you realize that the biggest hazard isnât the snow or ice on the road; itâs mostly other drivers. You of course have your own vehicle (and welfare) to look out for, and itâs certainly stressful driving slowly, keeping traction on the slippery tarmac, maintaining concentration, watching out for black ice, and so on. But these variables remain somewhat under your control. Other drivers; not so much.
To Medicate Or Not To Medicate: That Is Not The Question
When a woman has a history of severe and relapsing mental illness, but is stable on her current treatment, and is planning a pregnancy or is postpartum, what is the best course of action for her and her baby?
Why âStabilizingâ People is Entirely the Wrong Idea
If human beings were meant to be entirely stable entities, then âstabilizingâ them would be an entirely good thing; a target for mental health treatment that all could agree on. But itâs way more complex than that: healthy humans are constantly moving and changing. They have a complex mix of stability and instability that is hard to pin down. All this relates to one of my favorite subjects, the intersection of creativity and madness.
84 Things I Could do Once Again When I Got Off Psychiatric Drugs
In order for an experience to create a life mission and strong sense of purpose, it has to affect you to the core. Though I was only on psychiatric drugs for a few years of my life (and the very lowest âclinicalâ doses available), they affected me so strongly and took away so much that I could never forget or simply leave that experience behind me. I share this list, not to torture people who are on them or struggling to get off, reminding them of how much is being taken away (or could be taken away), but rather to validate the desire that many won't have to take these substances, and will be supported in better ways.
Dare to Dream: Remembering Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr said that âof all the forms of inequality, injustice in healthcare is the most shocking and inhumane.â For those of us diagnosed with mental illnesses and our families and loved ones, we know all to well the effects of these inequalities from personal and first hand experiences. For those of us like me, we also know of the extreme health and mental health disparities that exist within our communities of color.
All About the Word: Language, Choice & That Damn Dress
That damn dress. Itâs everywhere. And, just as much as anyone, Iâve gotten sucked into staring at the computer screen for way too long from all dress different angles, and relentlessly reading all the articles that have popped up to explain the phenomenon involved. Essentially: having a word for something plays a substantial role in allowing one to see what that word represents. What do you see because of the words that you know? What are you missing?
A Network Meeting in North America
On a beautiful Vermont summer week-end, about 40 people â social workers, psychologists, psychiatrists, administrators, and people with lived experience among us â gathered together. Our purpose: To come together and model what many of us had experienced in Europe at the International Meetings for the Treatment of Psychosis.
Strange Gifts and the Search for Santa Claus
It used to be that the times when Santa Claus would show up were times when I was worrying about whether or not I had the right kind of medicine. I know when I see him that he is the medicine, and that he is showing me how to live.