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Avoid an Isolated, Institutionalized Life in the Mental Health System!

Many sufferers, providers, family members, and the public at large do not know how to welcome the experiences of psychosis into their lives. Instead of being afraid and rejecting, we need to redefine what psychosis is: something to which most of us can relate. We need to rethink medical assumptions we make about the emergency state and challenge the cultural delusion that these experiences lead to irreversible brain damage. Finally, we need to learn to call upon to shamanic teachers who know how to live well with psychosis for help.

As someone with twenty-five years of experience as a provider, I am still haunted by the fact that, six years in, I found myself a ward of the state and warehoused for three months in a state hospital. The two years of crisis I went through during and after my incarceration was a challenge. In fact, it was so bad, I wrote an award-winning book about it.

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Posts that are reflections on experience with schizophrenia, post traumatic stress disorder, autistic spectrum disorder, schizotypal personality disorder, attention deficit disorder, dyslexia disorder, anorexia disorder-bulimia disorder, anorexia disorder, social anxiety disorder, and major depression disorder. Yes, the shrinks have had a field day with me. It has only got worse as time goes on. Now that I am well, they have me diagnosed as schizoaffective disorder so I can’t get long-term-care insurance! Thank you very much psychology!

These posts offer support for providers who are curious about the hearing voices movement and want to apply its principles in their psychotherapy practice or case management  outreach efforts. If you are looking to connect with people who experiencing alternative realities or hearing voices or have a history of psychosis or mental health warehousing these posts provide food for thought.

In these posts I focus on lessons learned from my experience that may be helpful for family members to help them make decisions about how to include and support their loved ones. I also feel family members can benefit from my posts in my therapy platform.

Posts that focus on redefining psychosis, extreme states, alternate realities, hearing voices, spiritual emergence, madness, disassociation, or what I prefer to call special messages crisis. These may include articles I have write that reconstruct these experiences into eight solvable components to help the public better understand what is happening when someone is in psychosis.

There are many terms:

PSYCHOSIS,
EXTREME STATES,
ALTERNATIVE REALITIES,
SPIRITUAL EMERGENCE,
HEARING VOICES,
DISASSOCIATION,
MADNESS,

I have coined the term special messages!

 

One in ten people hear voices alone. Everyone has dreams, receives interpersonal impressions from body language, senses intuitive knowledge, and has the capacity to learn from symbolic associations!

 

In a crisis these special messages experiences can dominate your life. But with support and mastery a person can transform and come out of crisis!

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Five Star Reviews

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As a practicing counselor working with people experiencing psychosis I wanted to understand this better from someone who had experienced it. I felt as if I was experiencing it through the author. I found the book well written, creative, and I couldn’t put it down . . . As my own biases crumble, the biases I see around me seem glaring, ignorant, and at times fueled by the very profession that claims to “help.” Thank you for writing the very important book, and for having the courage to do so.

Victoria O’Brien, Amazon

“[Clyde’s] story is fascinating because he is able to intellectualize what he was thinking and feeling at the time, even if he is discussing his paranoid delusional thoughts . . . As someone with a Master’s of Science degree in a counseling field, I have found my greatest lessons have been from real people and not material in textbooks. As I read Clyde’s story, I felt like I learned many lessons through what he has to share. My work will definitely be more beneficial by what I learned from him.”

Paige Lovitt, Readers Views, five stars

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Growing Up with Complex Trauma in an Era of Misinformation:

by Tim Dreby, posted in Reflections on Madness

I grew up in the mental health system when Prozac was the new craze. Prozac was the second drug I took and within three years there was the new field of psychopharmacology. By that time, getting the right combo became quite the rave. What that meant there was little to no exploration of the role … Continue reading Growing Up with Complex Trauma in an Era of Misinformation:

The Need to Include Experiences of Stigma in the Definition of “Psychosis:”

by Tim Dreby, posted in Redefining Psychosis, Therapy Platform

I contend that the negative power of a label is a significant part of a sufferer’s condition when they experience a “psychosis” or what I prefer to term a special message crisis. Indeed, many acknowledge that words like schizophrenia, schizoaffective, and bipolar lead people to being treated as though they have a hereditary brain disease with a poor prognosis that limits their ability to thrive.

Looking Backwards for Psychiatric and Behavioral Health Solutions for “Schizophrenia” Syndromes:

by Tim Dreby, posted in Reflections on Madness

It was once suggested to me in a sociology class that sometimes we should be skeptical of advances in society. “Sometimes for the truth,” the professor with a nose ring exclaimed, “it is wiser to go back in time. Sometimes the wisdom in ancient societies can teach us a lot.”   Nowhere, in my opinion, … Continue reading Looking Backwards for Psychiatric and Behavioral Health Solutions for “Schizophrenia” Syndromes:

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