Whose Reality is it Anyway? Consumers/Survivors/Ex-Patients Can Speak for Themselves

Abstract

The author uses personal narrative to vividly describe his entry into the mental health system with a diagnosis of schizophrenia. Based on his experience, he describes and criticizes a mental health system that forces people to endure oppressive treatments in the name of help. Interweaving first-hand experience as a patient with his later training as a psychologist, he challenges the biomedical brain disease model and advocates for self-help, empowerment, and peer-run alternatives. The history of the almost 30-year-old movement of activist consumers/survivors/ex-patients is described and introduced as offering promising possibilities for creating innovative options for services. Questions are raised as to why mental health professionals have absented themselves from speaking out against the obvious abuses, rights violations, discrimination, and social injustices faced by people who are diagnosed and treated for madness. An invitation is extended for professionals to modify and reconsider the usefulness of the expert role and instead to form new partnerships of collaboration and advocacy.

How Do “Mental Health Professionals” Who Are Also or Have Been “Mental Health Service Users” Construct Their Identities?

“…(Jo) This discourse of control by professionals echoes Deegan (1987) who experienced the imposition of "schizophrenia" (p. 4) as a self-characterization, and Bassman (2001), who wrote of learning to become "a good hospital patient" (p. 13).…”

“…They are doing this verbally and through professional journals and autobiographies (e.g., Ahmed, 2007;Bassman, 2001;Beresford, 2005;Burling, 2005;Clarke, 2012;Deegan, 1987;Fox, 2002;Frese, 2000;Friedman, 2004;Harding, 2005;Kottsieper, 2009;Lemelin, 2006;Linehan, 2011;MacCulloch & Shattell, 2009;May, 2000; How Do "Mental Health Professionals" Who Are Also or Have Been "Mental Health Service Users" Construct Their Identities?…”

Qualitative Methods in Psychotherapy Outcome Research

“…Books such as Alexander's (1995) "Folie a deux: An experience of one-to-one therapy" and Sands' (2000) "Falling for therapy: Psychotherapy from a client's point of view" along with journal articles such as Bassman (2000Bassman ( , 2001 and Tenney (2000) would seem to offer a valuable insight into clients' changes over the course of therapy. The potential here is that such accounts can be searched in order to hear what people are saying spontaneously about what they got out of psychotherapy.…”

De la conformité au refus : analyse d’un parcours

“…Les données recueillies dans la démarche de Sylvie et leur analyse concordent avec celles qui émanent d'études ou d'autres témoignages venant de survivants de la psychiatrie (Bassman, 2001;Fisher, 2001;Deegan, 1990) et confirment du même coup plusieurs éléments de la pensée antipsychiatrique véhiculée, entre autres, par Szasz (1976), Breggin (1991) et Basaglia (1970 Ainsi, la personne chemine à partir d'un statut d'impuissance jusqu'à une authentique participation sociale, tout comme Sylvie qui résume ainsi son parcours : « Une chose que j'essaie de faire pour aider les autres, c'est de leur dire : "Essaie de faire ton propre bien, parce que ce n'est pas normal qu'on te dise : 'Je sais ce qui est bien pour toi et je te l'impose!' " » Sylvie constate que presque toutes les personnes qu'elle rencontre au sein des réseaux de services de santé mentale ont subi des traumatismes ou des abus.…”