Why Clinicians Need to Address Institutional Trauma:
According our country’s cultural delusions, social institutions take care of people and deliver social justice based on a persons’ merits. Institutions for education, law, health, religion, athletic achievement, arts, recreation, work, transportation, housing, and social entitlements are often thought to be entities that people can trust to learn from and get the support they need […]
Overcoming Factions, and Politics in My Recovery from Psychosis
In my experience, being singled out and excluded from the discourse because I don’t fit in is what causes me most pain. It is taking me a long time to realize exactly how and why this happens to me repeatedly. For me it is not a simple process. It seems to do with people who […]
The Neurodivergence of Fawning for Mental Health
Fawning, saying yes sir, or shining it on is such an important skill in enduring life, especially during a break from reality. It is a skill I struggled with during times of mental health crisis prior to my break. Indeed, I have had to get pretty good at this fawning skill to survive. Prior to […]
Learning Self Compassion After A Psychosis Episode:
It’s been nearly twenty years since I came out of a two-year break from reality. I am no longer faced with the prospect of homeless and unable to find work. I have a career, a marriage and a sense of stability. But in other ways I am just starting to realize how fragmented and dissociated […]
The Cultural Delusions that Put Vulnerable Communities Out on the Streets!
I have come to believe that one can learn more about on the ground social realities from personal stories than the news media or researched academic books. In fact, one could take this argument farther and suggest sometimes true reality may be more hidden in fiction or comedic insights than it is in the cultural […]
Support Healing from Psychosis Versus Imposing Social Control!
When a person has a break from reality, others often feel a sense of urgency. Most people think that if this does not get treated with antipsychotic medication immediately, grave and progressive brain damage will ensue. Friends and loved ones may fear that this is the beginning of degenerative process that will leave the person […]
The Challenges of Finding Community Support When You Have A History of Exile
Maintaining a sense of community support is precious when you struggle a history of exile. In my life words like “schizophrenia” and “anorexia” mixed with periods of institutional incarceration have resulted in alienation, trauma, and exile. It’s been twenty years since my most recent incarceration for “schizophrenia” and it remains very hard to find community […]
Eulogy On Irish Schizophrenia
I unlock the door to the institution’s finest office. A doctor’s name is inscribed on a linoleum slide that changes every few years. I press the darkened door smudge on the off-white paint job that dominates the unit. The door swings open. I invite Eugene’s cousin in. Eugene’s cousin sits in the cushioned seat that […]
How Message Mindfulness Can Help Change the Madness Within Our System!
A Definition of Psychosis that Includes Internal Processes: I believe there are fundamental ways that the inaccurate social definition of psychosis and schizophrenia lead to mistreatment in mental health institutions. The historical definition of psychosis in all the Diagnostic Statistical Manuals is: hallucinations, delusions, and disorganized thinking. In master’s level training I never got more […]
How “Psychosis” Can Lead to Intuitive Knowledge and Connection to Spirit:
Consensus Reality and Psychosis (or Special Message) Reality: I believe there are a lot of errors among those who remain in consensus reality. I mean it is quite clear when we in the United States consider that different cultures have different consensus realities that there are errors in any reality. Look at Fox News verses […]
How to Validate Conspiracy When Working with People in Extreme States of Psychosis:
PART ONE–Introduction: Perhaps it can seem daunting to agree with some of the radical conspiracies that get tossed around during extreme states of psychosis. When people experience what I prefer to term a special message emergency, sharing their stories becomes very important. However, it can be hard for supporters to truly believe that the resulting […]
A Different Kind of Worker
When I took the job at the Housing Authority facility dubbed the “Hotel of Horrors” in the local media, I thought I was on a mission from god. The weekend before I started the job, I took a spiritual retreat with the Quaker community I frequented. Out on an island on the Puget Sound, in […]
What it Takes to Make Friends with People who Torment You:
What does it take to make peace with powerful people who are there to torment and target you? I think the answer to this question becomes a simple formula. It is terribly easy for an observer to suggest, but it is a profoundly difficult to carry out. The purpose of this blog is to articulate […]
Why Mapping Out a Person’s Voices Is Not Always Enough!
While treating voices as though they are real things may seem like a revolutionary step for a mental health clinician to take, I feel it can only be a small piece of the picture for some of us. Sometimes hearing voices is just the tip of the ice burg. Ultimately the clinician needs to understand […]
What Do You Do When Your Loved One Thinks You Are Evil?
When in the throes of what is commonly termed a “psychotic break,” people often become focused on good and evil causing interpersonal friction. Whether you are a parent, therapist, spouse, or a friend or colleague this can translate in you being viewed as evil. Perhaps, this projection is not a comfortable feeling for a supporter […]
Why Eclectic Strategies Are Important When Working with Psychosis
In my experience, people who survive psychosis are very diverse! There are many routes to recovery and many different tools used along the way to get there. Indeed, recovery looks very different for one person than it does for another. For forty years, most everywhere in America there has been one treatment option that is […]
Healers, Imposing Your Reality on People Who Experience Psychosis is Part of the Problem!
Therapists and peer supporters learn not to impose their beliefs on the people they help as part of their cultural competence training. Why, then, do so many people who suffer from psychosis flagrantly have beliefs imposed on them in treatment? A huge part of knowing how to provide treatment that does not impose beliefs involves […]
Seven Strategies to Use that Help Avoid Retraumatization While Working with Psychosis:
Stories related to psychosis can be intense, and can lead to traumatic recall when a sufferer retells them and does not feel contained or believed within the relationship. Perhaps this is the reason many therapists, family members, and psychiatric wards learn to shut down the telling of the story. Shutting down stories can be seen […]
Depicting Psychosis as a Thought Disorder is Misleading!
I contend that the trendy depicton of psychosis as a thought disorder misleads the public and can lead to misunderstandings that sabotage treatment efforts. I am writing to suggest that psychosis should not be defined as the result of spewing distorted thoughts that need to be corrected, but is actually the result of uncanny perception […]
Why I Still Don’t Think Schizophrenia is an Illness!
No, I still don’t believe schizophrenia is an illness! Many would say I still demonstrate poor insight into my illness for the declaration. That’s okay with me. I received the diagnosis from a pony-tailed man wearing rodeo work boots with a decorative slab of leather along the base of his lace. He walked with a […]
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