The Mental (Illness) system and thoughts on alternatives: a collection

“It is no measure of health to be well-adjusted to a profoundly sick society.” – Jiddu Krishnamurti

The “mental health” system is not healthy. Thus it’s more appropriate to call it a mental illness system. It”s important that we  do things completely differently if we want to help not only the most vulnerable people in our society, but also society itself. We create one another. None of this happens in a vacuum.

Below is a list of posts from Everything Matters that look at the system from many different perspectives. It will become one of the main drop-down navigation menu tabs at the top of the page.

This post will be updated as appropriate. Check the drop-down navigation menus often for updates and additional access to the archives. I’m always working on them.

New: History in the system and my vision for mental health on Nonduality Talk — Beyond Meds (audio)

• Retaining agency is not resistance to treatment…it is in fact a sign of health

• Community Mental Health in Times of Crisis

• State of mental health care

• From Self Care to Collective Caring

• Standard psychiatric care: torture (yes, the United Nations, too, calls forced treatment torture)

• Harms of over-treatment in medical care — this is true throughout all of medicine but especially true in psychiatry

• Where Do Messages of Hopelessness in Mental Health Care Come From?

• Health care is a human right

• Exposing the Mental Health system – Only Smarties exhibition

• Mental health professionals along with police, teachers and the corporate press are the guards of the system

• Coming Off Psych Drugs: A Meeting of the Minds — new documentary and info

• Can Our Medical Model of Care Be Remade? — By Robert Whitaker

• Why I’m pro-information and pro-choice when it comes to drugs and medications in mental health care

• Shrinks get patients hooked on drugs and then cut the cord

• Open Dialogue: Alternative Care for Psychosis

• Coercion, subtle or otherwise, is the rule in psychiatric care…

• Medically induced illness: iatrogenic injury

The below are pieces written specifically about the divide between the professionals in the system and those who are subject to their care and/or abuse.

• Bridging Patient-Professional Divide

• Professional denial is a form of retraumatization (new)

• Being the empowered patient

• The divide between client/patient/consumer and professionals (with list of links)

• healing journey — part 1 and 2 (brief thoughts from this morning to a friend)

• A doctor who talks sense about the all too frequent use of coercion in medicine

• Informed Choice: Pro-information and pro-choice when it comes to drugs and medications

• Words for all in the “helping” professions (and for any human who wants to benefit others)

• Medical compliance? Adherence? No. My MDs are my PARTNERS

• Letters to my shrink

Other significant pieces:

• Mad Rad Crisis Intervention Team Training: psych survivors train sheriff deputies

• Providing sanctuary (alternative to hospitalization in community)

• Breaking down in the service of breaking through: can madness save us?
• Introducing the Mad Triangle: Identifying Trauma, Diversity, and Insight in Locations of Madness – by Chris Cole

Having well-being in general is simply about learning to live well. It really doesn’t need to called therapy or need medical intervention most of the time. What a concept! Here is a collection of self-empowering ways to view our health and well-being from a holistic standpoint. This list does not begin to be exhaustive. There are as many ways to wellness as there are human beings. The below list of links all include additional collections of links on the topic they cover.

• learning to deeply love and attend to the body

• Nutrition and gut health — Mental health and diet

• Everything matters

• Meditation is the PRACTICE of learning to PAY ATTENTION. That is all.

• Yoga

• Help for Insomnia

• Fear and anxiety: coping, reframing, transforming…

• Rethinking bipolar disorder

• Grief collection

• Trauma and PTSD collection

• Conversations about suicidal feelings

People are recovering and thriving in spite of what psychiatry tells them everyday. Sadly many of us had to disengage ourselves from a system of “care” that harmed us gravely in order to do it. Non-compliance saves people everyday. This needs to change. It’s dangerous and tragic both.

• Drug free recovery from depression, anxiety, bipolar, schizophrenia, etc…

• Psychosis recovery: stories, information and resources

• Peer support? This is the real thing. Free of institutionalization. (psych drug withdrawal)

If you would like to know more about coming off meds as safely as possible start here:

• Psychiatric drug withdrawal and protracted withdrawal syndrome round-up

*it is potentially dangerous to come off medications without careful planning. Please be sure to be well educated before undertaking any sort of discontinuation of medications. If your MD agrees to help you do so, do not assume they know how to do it well even if they claim to have experience. They are generally not trained in discontinuation and may not know how to recognize withdrawal issues. A lot of withdrawal issues are misdiagnosed to be psychiatric problems. This is why it’s good to educate oneself and find a doctor who is willing to learn with you as your partner in care. See: Psychiatric drug withdrawal and protracted withdrawal syndrome round-up

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