Why Isnât There a Popular Hashtag for Involuntary Commitment?
As uses of psychiatric force expand, can social media be better used to focus critical attention?
Suicide Hotlines and the Impact of Non-Consensual Interventions
Those struggling with suicidal thoughts may stay silent instead of reaching out to suicide hotlines because they fear non-consensual intervention and the harmful impact of police involvement.
Life Inside America’s Psychiatric Facilities During the Pandemic: Eyewitness Accounts
Insiders paint a picture of chaos and fear in public and private psychiatric hospitals across the country. "Now that she has been discharged, Sevigny is getting the truth out, just as the nurse asked her to do. She also plans to continue to organizing in her state, with and on behalf of those who continue to be subjected to dangerous conditions in the name of care."
Making Music, Healing Souls
The healing power of communal singing is at the heart of two organizations in England and Ireland: Sing Your Heart Out and 49 North Street.
A New York City Psychiatric Hospital Patient Said Staffers Illegally Restrained and Drugged Her;...
âNo one is watching these hospitals,â Miranda warned. âNo one is listening. Our rights are being violated left and right. They can do whatever they want.â
Bedlam: Public Media, Power, and the Fight for Narrative Justice
A new mental health documentary awakens longstanding tensions around voice, representation, and the power to define problems and solutions.
âNot Fragileâ: Survivor-Led Mutual Aid Projects Flourish in a Time of Crisis
During the current pandemic, the practice of mutual aidâdefined broadly as the ways that people join together to meet one anotherâs needs for survival and relationshipâhas become mainstream. Yet, often missing from major media coverage of mutual aid is any acknowledgment of its roots in movements led by marginalized people, including Black and Brown people, disabled people, mad people, and psychiatric survivors.
A New Paradigm for Testing Psychiatric Drugs Is Needed
This paper reviews the problems with the usual double-blind, placebo-controlled trials on which drug approvals are based, and advocates for a stricter form of testing psychiatric drugs with patient-relevant outcomes, real comparators, long-term outcomes, and assessment of harms.
Screening for Bipolar: Have You Ever Been âUnusually Happy” for More than a Week?
A new questionnaire funded by AbbVie conflates antidepressant side effects with bipolar disorder and doesnât actually meet the criteria for being considered âscreening.â
Inner Fire: Where Seekers Have a Choice
A Vermont residential community program helps people taper or stay off medications with holistic care embedded in a pastoral setting.
Mutual Support in an Age of Social Distancing
Connection, whether one-on-one or in groups, is at the heart of peer support. In a time when social distancing and stay-at-home orders proliferate, the Western Massachusetts Recovery Learning Community/Wildflower Alliance (WMRLC) is finding creative ways to adapt to rapidly changing circumstances dictated by the novel coronavirus.
Voting While âMentally Illâ: A Legacy of Discrimination
Legal and practical barriers to voting disenfranchise people judged "mentally incompetent." The centuries-old, unclear laws and regulations also disproportionately affect people of color.
An Open Letter to VA Secretary Robert Wilkie: A Plan for Deprescribing Veteran Suicides
Through my research and experiences, I've found that what the Veterans Administration has been doing to fight the veteran suicide epidemic isn't working and appears to be unintentionally exacerbating it. These problems are fixable. But I need your help.
The Lessons of Music: Nurturing Mental Health in Cultures Around the Globe
Music is an ancient and omnipresent tool for wellness, a carrier of peace for individuals, and a bonding agent for communities throughout history and the world.
In Andrewâs Honor: Attorney Elizabeth Richâs Fight Against Unjust Commitments
Anyone detained and then formally committed under Wisconsinâs civil mental health laws can initially be held and forcibly drugged for six long months. Yet, for years, not a single person has been able to appeal the six-month commitments in court.
From Compliance to Activism: A Mother’s Journey
Through years of turmoil and confusion, Cindi Fisherâs enduring love for her involuntarily committed son gradually changed her from compliant mom to mental health civil rights activist. Thatâs when authorities banned her from even contacting her son. But could she be a bellwether of a coming nation-wide wave of protestors?
Diving into Your Soul: Lessons from “Queer Eye”
"Queer Eye" has a fresh, therapeutic twist: Installment after installment, it sends the repeated messages: Take care of yourself. Be kind to yourself. Youâre beautiful. Youâre good. We love you. Love yourself. Or, in the words of Van Ness: Yass, queen!
The Surprising Mental Health Benefits of Volunteering
A program offers psychotherapy in exchange for voluntary service in the community. But the act of volunteering itself can have mental health benefits of its own.
Giving Caregivers a Platform: Meagan, Mother of Matt
A mom describes her son's descent into the harms of psychiatryâand his way out. "It was really difficult to watch Matt decline. He had given up hope that he could get well."
Teen Arts Exhibition: Beyond Labels And Meds: What It Feels Like To Be Me
28 teen artists share the power of their creativity in this collection of profoundly moving, courageous, and beautiful artwork.
In the Courts, a Partial Win for Informed Consent and ECT Justice
Price Hancock views the Thelen verdict as a partial win. "The jury agreed that the manufacturer 'failed to warn.â That's huge. It's a step in the right direction."
Mad Pride Rises in Mexico
The Mad Pride movement continues to spread around the world, with a first-ever march in Mexico City.
Grassroots Activism: Rethinking Psychiatry Builds A Community
In the United States and abroad, a growing number of groups have devoted their mission and mindset to rethinking psychiatry, doing their best to...
Love is Dialogical: The Open Dialogue UK International Conference and Training
In the past five years, there has been a dramatic explosion of interest in the Open Dialogue Therapy practiced in Tornio, Finland. It is a humanistic âtreatmentâ that has produced five-year outcomes for psychotic patients that are, by far, the best in the developed world, and there are now groups in the United States, Europe and beyond that are seeking to âimportâ this care. However, the challenges for doing so are many and, last month, Open Dialogue UK - on the occasion of the first-ever fully recognized Open Dialogue training outside of Tornio - organized a conference in London to hold an open dialogue about Open Dialogue.
Screening for Perinatal Depression: An Effective Intervention, or One That Does More Harm Than Good?
Why does the U.S. describe perinatal screening as providing a proven benefit, while the task forces in the U.K. and Canada see no evidence of such benefit?