Freudian slip of the month

The Danish media today reported that the "battle against suicide among the mentally ill has been fruitless". Statistically, once every other week a labelled person commits suicide while incarcerated at a psych prison. In spite of, as the media has it, an increased focus on the problem, various plans of action, increased screening for suicidality, and a lot more controlling measures applied to those, who are assessed to be suicidal, the number of suicides at psych prisons has remained stable. "In spite of"??? Well well...

While surfing the net for blog entries about the matter, I came across a post entitled "Kamp mod psykisk syge slår fejl", which translates into "the battle against the mentally ill has been fruitless".

My comment: "While I suppose the choice of words wasn't a conscious one, the title of the post is right on. It is indeed a "battle against the 'mentally ill'" psychiatry (and society) are conducting. Unfortunately though, there's a limit to how fruitless it has been so far. Psychiatry is actually quite efficient, as the unchanged suicide rates suggest."

Even more thoughts about The Doctor Who Hears Voices...

...in reply to WillSpirits reply to me:

Will, the essence of it all is, that once you've understood what it really is that your existential suffering tries to tell you, the suffering stops. It's true. It's possible. Not that it stops once and for all. That would mean that you are permanently in a state of pure consciousness, and only God is permanently in that state. Or, put in other words, "God" is a symbol for consciousness. And as human beings living in the world we're living in, challenges will happen: "This too shall pass" applies to everything in life. Enlightenment as well as suffering. But the moment, you've understood - not only intellectually, but, and maybe even more important, spiritually - that there are no problems, only challenges, you are free to make a decision whether you want to suffer or not. It's in a way the same decision people who hear voices can make not to obey what the voices tell them to do. It's the same decision someone can make not to give in to suicidal thoughts. It's the purpose of existential suffering to show people, that they are free to choose.

Personally, I must say, that I at any time prefer that freedom to a pill, no matter if the pill really helps or not. And, even if I truly respect someone else's choice to take the pill, I think that no one has the right to a) tell anyone they're disordered, unless they add in the same breath, that what they mean by that is that the person doesn't fit into a disordered society's order...(thanks for doing that in your latest reply!) and/or b) to prevent anybody from achieving personal freedom. Which is exactly what the mh system does.

Suffering, if it's physical or emotional, is never a means without end. Martyrdom is. If you suffer hunger, you have a choice to either eat (provided you have food; if you don't, next challenge: get some), or not. The latter would make you a martyr. Or you can take a pill, that makes you forget you're hungry. But if you keep on taking pills, instead of eating or if you keep on and just don't eat, you'll eventually die from starvation. The same applies to existential suffering. You have a choice. If you avoid the challenge, one way or the other, your soul will eventually die from starvation. And nothing will have changed. Maybe the world won't change. Actually, who's to say? But you can change. And if you change, that means a change in the world...

It's because we're not perfect, that we are alive. If we (or the world) were perfect, there would be no suffering. Neither would there be a reason to be alive as a human being. The only really acceptable reason for someone to commit suicide is that the person in question has reached a state of permanent, pure consciousness. No more challenges to be faced, no more suffering. And now look at, what the mh system tries to do: it tries to make people forget all about the challenges in their lives, not by, magically, transporting them into a state of permanent, pure consciousness, but by giving them pills, that make them more and more unconscious, thus taking away the possibility to make a conscious decision. That's murder.

The mh system doesn't save lives. It maybe sometimes saves a biological existence. And even that is doubtful: in Norway for instance the suicide rate among psychiatrized people is a hundred - 100 - times higher than among those, who don't get incarcerated and forcibly "treated". Why? Because there's no reason to keep on and exist, when your soul has been murdered.

There is no excuse to do that to someone. No matter how "insane" they might seem. And it doesn't first start when someone is committed and "treated" against their will. It actually starts the moment someone becomes aware of the existence of psychiatry: "Look what happens to people, who don't behave!"...

Again, yes, "Ruth" hears a voice. It's not gone. Neither are mine. But hearing voices, even if they tell you horrible things, doesn't have to equal to suffering. It's one's own choice. I don't have the impression, that "Ruth" suffers more than people who don't hear voices. Rather less. She certainly isn't a martyr. She decided to face the challenge, and grow beyond it.

I know that when you read this, it doesn't immediately look like I respect choices different from mine, or "Ruth" 's. But believe me, I do. I know that I can't force anyone. It's something, people have to decide for themselves. In fact, all I want to do is to show you, that there is a way out of suffering. And that it actually are the pills, that prevent people from finding that way. Suffering can be transformed into consciousness. Suffering is the incentive for this transformation to take place.

And also again, death is a symbol. And no matter how stuck the world is, you are free to change.

BTW: Have you heard of St. John of the Cross?

Cry for Help - Being a teen is a mental illness

PBS has a documentary on it's site, Cry for Help. Teenage Mental Illness and Suicide, that represents one huge piece of propaganda for NAMI and screening programs like TeenScreen (check out "Recources: Hotlines and Web Sites for Parents") and STEPS (Screening, Treatment, and Education to Promote Strength).

Here are some quotes from the featured story of Stacy Hollingsworth, who today works for NAMI, NJ:

Question: Why did you hide it [her "depression" and suicidal thoughts] from your parents?

Stacy Hollingsworth: I didn't want to hurt them. I knew they would be the type of parents, who would feel they were somehow to blame for my illness. (...)

Q: Were you afraid at all they wouldn't understand?

S.H.: (...) If they did have a negative reaction to it somehow, it was something that I couldn't escape. They would be in my life the whole time.

(From "Stacy", 1. part)

Sharon Hollingworth, Stacy's mother: And then I thought, it was all over, this was the end of all those dreams a parent has for her child. She certainly wasn't going to have the life, that I had hoped and expected her...

(...)

She never really had a chance with us, because we never opened the dialogue. And I guess, she didn't want to disappoint us, or worry us. She was the perfect child.

(From "Stacy", 2. part)

Well well... But no, of course it weren't inhumane expectations to this "perfect child", or the "overachiever", or "All-Star-daughter", as the documentary also describes Stacy, that were causing her trouble at an age, where about everybody, as a quite natural part of their personal development, starts to question among other things society's norms and values of perfection and perfect achievement. Nope. It was a chemical imbalance in the brain, that, as it will seem to me, most if not all teenagers do suffer from. Just as a remarkable number of teenagers suffers from a biological brain disease, that's called "I'm coming from a broken home", "I get bullied", or something else along those lines.

Yes, indeed, the documentary mentions these things. Nevertheless, I got the impression, that being bullied, growing up with violence and abuse (if it is in the shape of parental expectations of perfection, or other) is caused by the victim's defective brain. NAMI's essential message: Depressed? Suicidal? Never ever blame your parents, or society! Blame your brain!

I wonder, why screen at all? Why not straightforward call being a teen a "mental illness", and NAMI-style drug up everybody above age, hm, let's see, 12? 10? or no, wait, it's "early intervention" isn't it? so, 8 maybe? who isn't yet on one or the other or several kinds of mindaltering drugs?

There are numerous options to comment on (and rate) this piece of propaganda at the site. Make use of them, if you feel up to facing tons of NAMI-parents' cheers. Right now, I myself don't.

The true terrorists - An open letter to cartoonist Kevin Siers

Yesterday, when I learned about this outrageous atrocity, I wasn't sure if to react to it at all, or not. Things like this can leave one speechless. Nevertheless, today, inspired by Kim, and his own reply to someone's e-mail, I sent the following e-mail to Kevin Siers:

Dear Mr Siers,

let me tell you right away, which I suppose I am not the first to tell You, that Your cartoon in the Charlotte Observer, http://www.charlotteobserver.com/kevinsiers/story/638466.html, is something of the most tasteless and discriminating I've ever seen.

Now I learned from others, who have contacted You, that You are "unsure what else to call that rage and alienation" than "mental illness", and that You wonder, if those "terms would have sufficed".

Let me assure You, they would have sufficed. In fact, they would have been far more to the point, than the alienating concept of "mental illness" ever can be.

In context with this, there's something I can't but have to wonder about: What makes You so certain, as You seem to be, that so-called "mental illness" is a brain illness? If You have any evidence for this allegation to hold true, I'd love to see it, since no one yet has been able to provide this evidence.

This is rather important in regard to Your cartoon, because what Your cartoon does is that it scapegoats a whole section of the population on the basis of a mere theory, in complete lack of any scientific proof, as brain defective individuals, who do not react, but act. Without any ratio involved. While the natural response to terms like "rage" and "alienation" is to question what kind of environmental, societal factors would be likely to cause this rather rational rage and alienation in the individual.

When You choose to make use of the term "mental illness", what You actually are doing is that You contribute to society's enraging and alienating forces, to which some people, very naturally, react enraged and alienated. I am sorry to have to say this, but that is one more assault on people, who've already been assaulted to an extent, that makes it inevitably necessary for them to defend themselves, while the alienating concept of "mental illness" as being a brain disease efficiently keeps these people from seeing through the inhumanity of society, evidently represented by Your cartoon.

You, and everyone else who holds up the idea, that "mental illnesses" would be brain diseases, do society an enormous disservice. So-called "mentally ill" people go on shooting sprees, because they are kept from realizing that the true source for their very natural feelings of rage and alienation are the long-standing assaults, they have been exposed to. They go on shooting sprees, because they are denied a language of their own, that would allow them to hold their abusers, society, accountable. They go on shooting sprees, because they are silenced with the concept of "mental illness". The true gunman, the true terrorist here is a society that prefers to oppress and silence its critics to lending them a voice and listening to them, and it is You.

I am a person, who has experienced what You call "mental illness", i.e. extreme states of mind, caused by trauma. I am a highly functioning, fully recovered person today, because I did not get the "treatment", I suppose You have in mind when You write: "...people also in desperate need of treatment who are not getting it." Instead I was as lucky as to be helped to realize and work through my trauma, and establish a language of my own, which renders going on a shooting spree as an act of self-defence superfluous.
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If you want to contact Kevin Siers, Rick Thames, the editor of the Charlotte Observer, and/or the Charlotte Observer itself, here are the e-mail addresses:
Rick Thames, editor:
 rthames@charlotteobserver.com
Letters to the editor:
 opinion@charlotteobserver.com
Cartoonist Kevin Siers:
 ksiers@charlotteobserver.com

Hat tip to Gianna for drawing attention to this in the first place.

Reply from Kevin Siers
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Update, 04-12-09: Via Kim I got the notice this morning, that the Charlotte Observer obviously has removed the cartoon from its website.

Merete Nordentoft, the OPUS-project, and The International Society for the Psychological Treatments of the Schizophrenias and other Psychoses, ISPS

The following is a rather nasty slamming of the Danish branch of The International Society for the Psychological Treatments of the Schizophrenias and other Psychoses, ISPS. So, don't get me wrong, it is not a critique of the international organization, or of any other countries' groups! - With the exception of the Swedish ISPS-group, that is.*)

I must admit, that it was a somewhat pleasant surprise when I learned, that The International Society for the Psychological Treatments of the Schizophrenias and other Psychoses, ISPS, also has a Danish branch. "They hide efficiently," I wrote in an e-mail to Daniel Mackler, since I usually don't miss important things going on in this country's mh system.

Well, apart from the fact, that even an organization, that gives high priority to psychological treatment options as help for people in extreme states of mind, does have its problems with avoiding to pathologize the individual, I thought, naive as I at times can be, that there maybe really was not just a very few helpers, that can be counted on the fingers of one hand, but maybe even a whole organization of helpers, who do take people who experience extreme states of mind seriously, and really make an effort to offer these people the kind of help they want. And well, the pathologizing we can thank Freud for. Just as we can thank him for psychoanalysis. So...

I guess, I'll have to reconsider.

For a moment, I thought I'd add a link to the ISPS to my sidebar. And yes, the American branch of the organization does actually have some very interesting articles on its site, and on the home page it says: "We promote the humane, comprehensive, and in-depth treatment of psychotic disorders." Very nice, indeed! So, maybe this really was something, I should add to my collection of recommended Danish sites?

Now, I don't just link to something without first investigating a little further what I am possibly going to recommend. - Which doesn't mean that I would be looking for 100% conformity with my own views, only. But well, one has to draw the line somewhere, right?

The first name I came across was Bent Rosenbaum, a Danish psychiatrist. This reverberated mixed emotions. The next name did no longer reverberate mixed emotions, but red alert: Merete Nordentoft.

Why red alert? Well, Merete Nordentoft, psychiatrist and one of the Danish mainstream medias' pets on the subject of "mental illness", also is the initiator of the so-called OPUS-project **). The acronym stands for "tidlig opsporing og behandling af unge psykotiske", meaning "early detection and treatment of young psychotics", which already tells me a whole lot. Alone the choice of words: them (the "psychotics") - and us. (And "opsporing" may as well be translated as "tracking down", giving the concept a whole new - somehow slightly TAC-like - dimension...)

But let's have a look at what this, allegedly so revolutionary, project actually is all about. According to the report, I link to above, treatment consists of five different initiatives: Individual dialogues, medical treatment (here we go!), psycho-education (Honi soit qui mal y pense!), social skills training, and family work (of course meaning work with your biological family, your relatives. Certainly not the "family" of your own choice, your friends. As we all know, care providers are much more fond of relatives than of friends. And they have their reasons, yahahhh!).

'Well,' you may think, ' individual dialogues does sound promising, doesn't it?' Let me tell you right away: I'll have to disappoint you. In another report on the project, that in the meantime has disappeared from the net, it was stated that the individual counselling a person is entitled to during the two-year-period she is assigned to the project, is limited to 12 - TWELVE! - in certain cases up to 24 - TWENTY FOUR! - sessions with a therapist, and that the subject of the sessions would have to be agreed upon beforehand. Yep. Unfortunately, this is not a joke. While the counselling itself definitely turns into a joke, under these circumstances.

My own course included 45 sessions, spread over the period of three and a half years. A (-n absolute) minimum, when it comes to "psychosis". And only possible because I a) wasn't twenty years old - or young - anymore, but more like two times twenty, with the according life-experience and a certain background knowledge in relevant areas (such as philosophy, literature, and, yeah, psychology/-analysis).

Because I b) was as motivated and determined as you possibly could be - not to learn how to live with a chronic, limiting illness, but to become aware of, understand, and resolve my existential problems.

Because I c) wrote - 24/7 ("I'm fond of saying psychosis does not fit the 50-minute hour -- because it goes on 24 hours." -Loren Mosher), and not for the drawer, but for my therapist to read. Which means, that, anytime, I could have a certainly imaginary but nevertheless somewhat concrete conversation with my therapist, on paper. Also at 3 a.m. in the morning, if necessary.

Because I d) wasn't additionally traumatized by a stay at a locked ward, respectively by the betrayal of my trust it would have been to arrange for such a stay against my explicit will. Something that inevitably hadn't only meant a remarkable setback in my recovery, but that under all circumstances also had ruined any trust in my therapist for good. And that in any other professional in addition. While I, at the same time, was pretty clear about what to do in case it should turn out, that there, obviously, was no trusting in humanity at all. "Suicide was my ticket out," Catherine Penney says in Take These Broken Wings, asked about what she thinks would have happened had she not met Daniel Dorman. It also was my ticket out.

Because I e) wasn't at any time drugged,

because f) nothing ever was agreed upon beforehand but date and time for the next appointment,

and last but certainly not least because I g) didn't raise to the biological bait, other than for a, luckily very short, period where I had some doubt, caused by the massive propaganda everywhere. By the way the only period of time in my entire life where I seriously contemplated suicide - the real deal, not the "I want/have to go somewhere else"-thing the voices tried to convince me of. You don't change your genes, or a chronic chemical imbalance in your neurotransmitters just like that. You can only, passively, hope, that the "medication" works its magic. But you can always become active, and change learned behavior - and recover fully.

Which brings us back to the OPUS-project. According to the report I link to above, the weekly dialogue sessions are sessions with what is called a contact-person. The term "therapist" thus has disappeared entirely from this, obviously newer report. So what. Eventually, it anyway was just a joke, wasn't it?

Well, and in this, newer, report it says under "individual dialogue":

"The dialogue treatment can include many elements: counselling, guidance, crisis intervention, psycho education, relaps prevention, psychological support of insight and actual cognitive therapy. [Ah, so there they maybe were anyway, those 12, maximum 24 sessions with a therapist??? Absolutely out of this world fantastic!]

In general, the dialogues can be scheduled according to the phase, the patient is in, like this:
Acute phase:
Contact and treatment compliance are established. The dialogues are primarily of supporting and psycho-educating character, (...)
Stabilizing phase:
The patient is supported in him continuing to follow the treatment, although he has improved. Psychological support is given for insight and acceptance, (...)
Maintenance phase:
Support is given to continue the treatment, (...)"

Under "medical treatment" you can read in detail about what exactly is supported with such a great effort and persistence:

"For most of the patients antipsychotic medical treatment has been indicated."

Really cosy it gets a little further down in the document, where it is stated, that many people in crisis experience periods of "depression" - strange, very strange indeed, that they feel down after they were made believe, they suffer from a chronic biological brain disease - which then of course preferably are treated with antidepressants, SSRIs, according to the report. Since the "depression" is to be regarded part of the biological disease, and certainly not a result of humiliating and disillusioning messages from the "helpers", that render the individual in crisis completely disempowered and helpless, no no! And since, as we all know, they've shown to be so effective, the SSRIs, yes! And by the way, no no, it is neither the so-called "antipsychotic medication", that can cause depression as a side effect!

Yah, and since both "psychotic and depressed states can cause a lot of anxiety" - no no, this is certainly not a side effect of the recommended SSRIs! - we can easily add one or the other benzo to the cocktail, that in case of a diagnozed substance abuse (and we will have to term the consumption of three different psychoactive substances on a daily basis for an indefinite period of time - it's chronic, remember?! - a substance abuse, although it hardly will be diagnozed) can get spiced up with some methadone or the like. Cheers! Or: Your health!...

If you're lucky, you then end up like Gianna, who, after almost twenty years in a medical daze, saw through the charade, and now in her fifth year, physically seriously damaged by the drugs, struggles to free herself from the prescribed psych drug hell. If you're not so lucky, you end up more or less a vegetable at some supported housing program - or like Luise.

And, in case you should be the owner of a healthy amount of scepticism, OPUS also has a solution for this:

"It often happens, that the patient doesn't wish to take medication, especially the antipsychotic medication. (...) At OPUS our philosophy has been, that, if the patient didn't want the medicine, that was found necessary for him, the patient had his reasons, and it was the task of the staff to investigate the background, educate about what the medication could be used for, and which side effects could be expected, and to try continuously to motivate acceptance of the relevant treatment." Yep. And then you end up like Gianna, or Luise, anyway. When you, because you already are in a somewhat vulnerable state of mind, can't stand the psycho-terror (being "motivated") anymore. With or without healthy scepticism.

Note that "treatment" in the above quotation equals to drugs. So, don't count on other kinds of treatment to be offered. Obviously, the weekly dialogues are not so much meant as treatment in a therapeutic fashion, as they are meant to be indoctrination. While, in a way, indoctrination is the exact opposite of therapy.

OPUS finally died as a "masterpiece", in my opinion, with the following quotation, that, characteristically, is found under "Familywork", which according to the report includes "individual meetings at the start of treatment" with the relatives, "without the patient but with the patients acceptance" - What is attempted to be saved here, by the bell? The "Nothing about us without us"-concept? Nice try. Try again! Cf. above: psycho-terror of people in extremely vulnerable states of mind - :

" - psycho education with weight on a biological model (guilt-reducing)"

How did Loren Mosher put it? " 'Biologically based brain diseases' are certainly convenient for families and practitioners alike. It is no-fault insurance against personal responsibility." And: "Biological differences 'make them different from us fundamentally,' he says. 'They're sort of a slightly different race than we are.' Mosher thinks it's all 'a way of carefully saying, 'These people are really different. And therefore we have the right to do whatever we goddamn please with them,' ' " he is quoted in this article.

Or, to put it in a slightly different way: Whether or not it costs "the schizophrenics" their lives - due to the drugs, or because suicide, quite logically and not the least sick, becomes the ticket out of an existence with a chronic brain disease - most important is, that doctors and relatives can wash their hands.

More fitting than one immediately should think, that Merete Nordentoft was awarded Den Gyldne Skalpel (The Golden Scalpel) for the OPUS-project. Reminds me of a certain Nobel Prize laureate...

And with this quite clearly stated disdain for people in crisis, the Danish branch of the ISPS, which Merete Nordentoft is a member of, and at whose International Symposium at Copenhagen in June 2009 she is going to participate as a member of the local scientific committee, died too in its shape of a pleasant surprise, and a potential link in my sidebar.
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Concerning other than the "insight" and "treatment alliance" promoting "support" offered by OPUS: I had a friend who was assigned to OPUS. "A place to stay? Sorry, we can't help you with that. A job? Sorry, we can't help you with that." But the pills he got. Straight out. And all for free. He didn't even need to ask for them. Oh, and along with the pills came the message: "It's a lifelong burden." I wouldn't be surprised if he killed himself. He chose to believe in their message - and was devastated by it - although I did my very best. But it was my word against the "experts"...

This really must be termed excellent support of people in crisis.

And no, I was wrong. They don't hide. Not at all. They're right there. Having a biobiobiopsychiatrically splendid time right in the middle of Danish biobiobiopsychiatry. The members of the Danish branch of the ISPS. Obviously, promoting the "psychological treatments" in their interpretation means nothing much else than promoting "the slightly more sophisticated" version of pitch-black, poisonous pedagogy. Sad but true. But not that surprising anyway, in the country of the Jante Law.

By the way, also Lene Falgaard Eplov, who is convinced that recovery can't be anything else than learning to live with a chronic brain disease, and biopsychologist Torben Schjødt are members of the Danish ISPS group. Uhm, yah, R.I.P. ISPS Denmark.
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If you should read the report on the OPUS project, note that the possibility to receive trauma related therapy isn't mentioned once throughout the entire report. Not even a superficial look at the individual in crisis' life story is mentioned. Thus it is denied in advance, that traumatic experiences can cause emotional suffering. Apropos of the persecutor at any given time doing whatever is in his power to prevent the victim - and the surroundings - from becoming aware of the abuse/mistreatment.

The report is an evaluation from the years 1998 to 2002. The OPUS-project still operates, by and large in the same way as described in the report. It's outcomes: no change in the number of people who become chronically ill and go on disability - roughly 90% of those labelled with "schizophrenia" or other "psychotic disorders" in this country. Indeed, what a masterpiece!
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*) While I'm at it: A quote from the "Guidelines for practice" published by the Swedish ISPS-group: "Antipsychotics are a corner stone in the treatment of patients with psychosis. During the acute phase benzodiazepines are to be offered to treat sleepnessness and anxiety."

**) Originally, I here had a link to a paper on the OPUS-project published on Århus Universitetshospital Risskov's - Danish biopsychiatry's stronghold, setting the fashion for the psychiatric system all over the country, and the location for OPUS to, initially, be established - website. Unfortunately, the paper has disappeared from the website. Several other publications about OPUS can be found here though.

More misconceptions, some thoughts about delusions, suicide, and about true suicide prevention

The following are two, slightly edited, replies to a discussion at Beyond Meds. - You have to be a member to view the discussion, so, join! - Gianna suggested, I should post here too, and I decided to post both replies.

1. There's this (mis-)conception, that, whenever it just gets "weird" enough, i.e. no longer easy to get, there must be something really really wrong with a person's head, in a biological way. That idea serves as some kind of "explanation" whenever someone's behavior no longer can be understood and explained without effort in relation to the at any time adopted idea of "normal" human behavior as such. It's not an explanation, though. It's explaining away. What we don't understand, we fear. "Beware of the unknown" is a natural reaction/defence and survival mechanism. Especially of prey animals. And humans are both, predators and prey animals. So, we prefer to explain the unknown away, in order to keep it at a safe distance. One of several reasons why the biological model is so attractive to the majority.

The suffering that people in distress experience is caused by a lack of understanding, a lack of self-/consciousness. Partly the suffering is caused by a lack of understanding of themselves, or of what is happening to them, and partly by a lack of understanding from their surroundings. The fact, that people who receive understanding, empathetic, support, that focusses on helping them to understand their experiences while going through a crisis, usually don't suffer to the same extent as those who don't, who only receive drugs to get numbed out on, and maybe even traumatizing, coercive, "treatment" into the bargain, and that the former fare remarkably better in the long run than the latter, proves this.

Somehow, this is where I see a connection to what you say in your post here. Explaining away seems the safest and easiest way out. But it leads inevitably to more and more suffering. In a qualitative as well as in a quantitative sense. We want perfection. We want to be able to (and we are expected to) perfectly fit the mould. And whenever we don't, we panic. And/or those around us do. Something must be profoundly wrong with us. Let's get it fixed, so we can, perfectly, fit the mould again. What we miss in our tireless struggle to be "perfect" - perfect according to the cultural norms and values of our time (!), that is - is that our imperfection is just perfect. In its imperfection. We are not meant to fit a certain mould. We are meant to just be. Real perfection isn't something that can be defined in terms of "different from". Real perfection is the unity of all dualities. Thus, our culture, while desperately chasing what it supposes to be "perfection", actually loses the real perfection more and more out of sight.
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2. Whenever you want to die, if it's that you think the thought, or if it expresses itself as a voice, telling you to kill yourself (hearing voices is nothing but thinking aloud), you don't want to end being as such. You want to end what is, and make something else be. Death is a symbol for transformation. And the language of the unconscious is pure symbol language.

I don't know if you're familiar with it, but the Delphic Oracle from the Greek mythology for instance never answered any question other than in a more or less symbolic way. You got an answer to whatever your question, but you had to figure out the meaning of the answer yourself. Or: you actually gave the answer to your question yourself. Your unconscious, your intuition, did. The Delphic Oracle is the unconscious projected into the world.

Today, we live in a culture that isn't especially conscious of the unconscious. We are not conscious of symbolism in the same way other cultures are/were. What counts is the literal, the hard facts, science, "rational" thought (with "rational thought" being the kind of thought that is easy to get for everyone else, because everyone else thinks in the same, normative, way). Well, and things like traffic signs. But if I were an adviser, let's say of the Danish Prime Minister, he came to ask me my opinion about his campaign for the next election, and I'd say: "Make your own nature, not the advice of others, your guide in life," I'd probably lose my job, and be regarded, at least, a weirdo.

So, the question always is whom or what you really want to die when you contemplate suicide. One thing is for sure: it is not yourself. Your self (it's not a typo) is who/what you really are, and that is being, life. Life can't die. Death is a part of life, not the opposite. And life is transformation: something ends, "dies", something else begins. Every moment. Life is constant arrival and departure. Nothing actually is stable. There can be balance, but not stability. Total stability (like in "mood-stabilizer"), total unchangeableness and predictability, is a myth. And our culture confuses it with "perfection" - and chases it.

Some people want their outer form, i.e. their body, to die. People who suffer from a terminal illness, for instance. What most people in an existential crisis want to die though, is not the outer form either. It's their ego, i.e. who they think they are, and who they think, others think they are. Nevertheless, the ego partly manifests itself in the outer form of someone. That is, the body becomes a symbol for the ego. There you are: instead of letting go of your ego, and become who/what you really are, you interpret a symbol literally and consequently "let go" of your body, and,voilà: suicide. Literally. And since our culture is as unaware of symbolism as it is, chances are, that you won't find much help among this culture's members (in the mh system) to figure it out. Because everybody probably will interpret in the same literal way as your own thoughts do.

I eventually figured it out, because of the "delusion" that the real me wasn't a human being, but, well, something along the lines of a dryade, i.e. a spirit, nameless, ageless, without a history (all that ever had happened in my life, hadn't happened to me but to the body, the true me was caught in), immaterial, although caught in a - material - body. And what the real me wanted, wasn't to die, but to become free - of this body that represented an ego, a self-image, I've never felt less connected to than during crises.

Another aspect of this are "out-of-body-experiences", that usually also just are explained away as meaningless symptom of a brain disease.

Now, it's characteristic for our culture that people identify with their body, their thoughts, their mind, their life-story, their ego. Our culture teaches us to do so. In eastern philosophy though, there's another dimension beyond this formal, material one: the space wherein the formal, material expresses itself. Who/what you really are, your "true self" with Laing, is this space. So, the "delusion" actually wasn't a delusion, but the very truth.

Eventually, I figured, that letting go of the identification with my body, my ego, my thoughts, etc., meant the freedom, I'd thought, I only could gain through letting go of my body itself. A symbolic suicide, not a literal one. Or: an "egocide", not a suicide. That is the end of suffering. - That is not to say, that I don't suffer anymore. Nothing is forever. "Enlightenment" neither. It is extremely tempting to identify with the ego. Especially in a culture that worships the ego as our culture does. I yield to this temptation, time and again, and then I suffer. But existential suffering is human. It's not an illness. On the contrary, the way to "redemption" often goes through an awful lot of suffering. Without suffering, there would be no need to change anything, no need to develop and grow. Thus, existential suffering actually is more like a blessing than the curse, our culture wants to make it be.

As mentioned, usually people don't get any real help. (Since the "helpers" don't have a clue themselves, how could they help anyone to understand, what they haven't even understood themselves?*) The idea, that existential crises would be brain diseases prevents understanding just as the drugs do, whose prescription and administration only and solely is justifiable when what really is a wake-up call is defined a biological illness of the brain.

The trouble is, that the more your true self has been oppressed, the more you've been asked to identify with and as a false self (who/what others want you to be, but who/what you are not), the deeper the split between who/what you really are and this false ego-identification obviously becomes. The deeper the split becomes, the more you will suffer, and the more you suffer, the louder the wake-up calls will be. Whether you get a label of "OCD", "depression", or "schizophrenia" is not a question of suffering from distinctly different conditions. It's a question of the extent to which someone suffers, and the volume of the wake-up calls, they consequently receive. So-called "psychosis" being the loudest possible wake-up call. And they won't cease coming in, the wake-up calls, before you actually listen to them, and do wake up. This is why the drugs have a chronifying effect on crisis. It will inevitably happen again and again, until the day, you understand. And there is no drug strong enough to silence the unconscious. Drugs can't even target the unconscious. All they do is reducing consciousness. The unconscious is almighty and unassailable. You can't fight it and win. All you can do is turning it from being your master into being a tool of yours, by becoming conscious of it.

* It's actually quite funny, that a lack of ability to interpret things in a symbolic way is listed as a "symptom" of "schizophrenia", while the "experts' " ability to recognize a symbol as a symbol when it's staring them right in the face, equals to zero...

Coercion in the mental health system - A Norwegian documentary

On October 28th 2008 the Norwegian television station NRK 1 broadcasted the documentary "Tvang i psykiatrien" (Coercion in the mental health system) in the series "Brennpunkt" (Focus). The program can be watched here (in Norwegian language).

In the program two young women, Kristina and Hege, tell about their experience with commitment and coercion in the Norwegian mental health system. The thought that immediately came to my mind after watching the program was: 'Grotesque'. While I, at the same time and once again, hardly could believe my own luck.

Kristina

Kristina S. Larsen's first experience with psychiatry occurs after she has been assaulted physically and, as a result of this, loses the child she at the time is pregnant with. She says, that what she herself felt she needed, was to be listened to, a calm and safe environment, and her feelings being acknowledged as real enough.

Around Christmas 2007 her mother notices that Kristina becomes more and more stressed, doesn't sleep well, and loses her appetite. Kristina is committed to a psychiatric hospital where she is assessed as being in need of "protection" - "protection" and "protected unit" are euphemisms for seclusion, while there officially is no such thing as seclusion in the Scandinavian mental health system - to "calm down", as her psychiatrist says.

Kristina describes the situation as extremely humiliating, especially being forcibly drugged, and not knowing when she'd be allowed to leave. She says, the only way to get a somewhat tolerable stay at the hospital was to not get angry,not criticize, not cry, not show any emotions, and to just please the staff. "These people act as if they are gods. They may define, they may judge, and no one can in any way re-examine what they say and do", she says.

After some time at the "protected unit", Kristina is moved, only to be sent back into "protection" shortly after again, because she, according to her psychiatrist, has a very "unfavourable influence" on the other patients at the unit, whom she makes refuse to take their drugs.

In March 2008, after two and a half months at the hospital, Kristina is discharged, but is now under outpatient commitment referred to the community mental health system. She asks for a female therapist, preferably with some experience in treating women who have experienced violence and the loss of a child due to spontaneous abortion. She is referred to a young male psychiatrist in training, who hasn't much understanding for her situation, and whom she often becomes angry with. In July 2008 the therapist assesses, that Kristina isn't angry with him, but "hypomanic". He contacts her psychiatrist at the hospital, and they decide that Kristina would have to go back to the hospital, since another "episode" seemed to be on its way.

Kristina's mother arranges for her to escape and hide at Store Torungen Lighthouse Station. The lighthouse keeper says, there were no problems with Kristina whatsoever during her stay. On the contrary, she was cooking, making coffee, and easily socializing with the people in the community.

Meanwhile, her psychiatrist chooses to see her escape as a "sign that her ability of decision making is rather poor. She could have come here, and proven that she was sane, and left again. But she chose not to show up. I experienced this as poor ability of decision making. And it is typical for these episodical diseases that the ability of decision making deteriorates."

Three weeks after her escape, Kristina's mother succeeds to arrange a meeting between her, Kristina and the psychiatrist. On neutral ground. Kristina, of course, refuses to go and talk to her psychiatrist at the hospital as long as the court order for her commitment is effective. "You never know what these people can imagine to do", she says, while she attentively watches the parking lot where her mother is waiting for the psychiatrist. He, nevertheless, arrives alone, and after a one and a half hour long meeting at a nearby hotel, he agrees to lift the commitment order for Kristina if she is willing to stay in touch with the community mental health system and see a therapist.

Hege

The other woman in the documentary is Hege J. Orefellen. In summer 2003 Hege has been in contact with Folloklinikken, a community mental health facility under Aker University Hospital, for a shorter period because of emotional problems. - Interestingly, at the top of the website the terms "openness", "community", "respect", and "involvement" appear in turns. Well, just a - somewhat funny - observation. - Hege, whose baby daughter suffers from a rare condition, and is very dependent on Hege breast feeding her, is not minded to take psychiatric drugs, and wants to end her regular talk sessions at Folloklinikken.

The 3rd of July 2003, while Hege is preparing to go to university to discuss her thesis with her supervisor, she receives a phone call from Folloklinikken and is told, that if she doesn't show up at the clinic within an hour, they'll send the police to come and pick her up. After consulting her GP about the matter, Hege, who feels clearly threatened by the phone call, and says, just as Kristina, that no one knows what these people might imagine to do, decides to go "voluntarily" to the clinic, still convinced, that she'll be able to leave as soon as she has made sure, that she isn't in any need of "treatment". What she doesn't know is that the psychiatrist at Folloklinikken assesses her to suffer from "major depression" and to be "a danger to herself", "acutely suicidal".

Hege says about the conversation: "I realize then, that my words don't count anymore. No matter what I may say, it is of no importance." She is denied permission to call her partner or her GP, and is referred to Blakstad hospital, where another psychiatrist is to assess her within 24 hours, and confirm that she is acutely suicidal in order to keep the commitment order effective. At Blakstad hospital Hege, who according to the psychiatrist at Folloklinikken is acutly suicidal, is asked to wait in a kind of workroom, with scissors, glue, paint, and lots of other stuff that easily could be (ab-)used to commit suicide...

At night, Hege writes a complaint to the control commission at Blakstad hospital: "I write this complaint, hoping that someone might see what a commitment can do to an individual. My story is long, but the way here to Blakstad is terrifyingly short. I admit, that I was in need of help and support, but instead I got a traumatizing commitment."

The next day, the psychiatrist at Blakstad assesses Hege as not suicidal, and she is discharged. Since she hadn't been under commitment for more than 24 hours, her stay at the hospital is registered as "voluntary".

Hege decides to sue Aker hospital for violation of human rights, illegal loss of liberty, and violation of family and private life, in regard to the threatening information she was given in the initial phone call from Folloklinikken, and wins in court.

The commitment procedure has left Hege with a deep feeling of insecurity towards both the health system, telephone calls, and the police, and a couple of months after she is discharged from Blakstad, while passing by a police station on her way to her GP, there's a turn-out that provokes an anxiety-attack in Hege. Her GP gives her a couple of valiums and a prescription for more. Hege isn't quite happy to take the valiums, as she isn't happy to take psychotropic drugs at all, since she has experienced adverse drug reactions before, but agrees to take them anyway. The valium causes an adverse reaction. Hege doesn't recall anything from the time period after she left her GP's office until next day, when she recovers her senses at Moss hospital. She learns, that she has been to a pharmacy and bought the prescribed valium, which she then took altogether.

Moss hospital has Hege assessed by a psychologist while she still is under the influence of the valium - she doesn't recall the conversation with the psychologist either - and the psychologist evaluates that she should be sent to Blakstad psychiatric hospital. At Blakstad hospital, Hege is asked to give up her cell phone which she denies as it is her "last lifeline to the outside world", as she says. The alarm goes, and Hege is violently thrown to the ground by four staff members, her arm twisted around onto her back, and the phone pulled out of her hand, with her fingers getting sprained. The whole incident only takes a few seconds, and Hege says, she didn't even get what was happening to her, and only felt extremely trampled on.

"The first three days at Blakstad were a downward spiral for me, psychologically seen", Hege says. "I can't stand further commitments, I can't stand further assaults. I won't be able to cope if they do implement involuntary drugging, I won't be able to cope if they do implement electroshock, I won't be able to cope with further interventions against me now. I reached a point where ending my life was the only solution. But it wasn't a solution anyway, because I could never have done that to my child."

Also this time, Hege complains to the control commission. At a meeting with the commission on the sixth day of her hospital stay, the commission evaluates her as neither depressed nor suicidal at all, and she is discharged.

Hege, who holds a doctorate in chemistry, went to law school after her experiences with human rights violations in the mental health system, and specialized in human and patient rights. She is active in the user/ex-user/survivor movement, and a member of MindFreedom International.

Accidentally, I came across Sørlandet hospital's reaction to a statement by Hege from 2005, quoted in a Norwegian newspaper, that says that one of the main reasons for people to commit suicide are the mental health system's "own suicide-triggering mechanisms". A statement, clearly based on her own dehumanizing and humiliating experience. Of course, the staff at Sørlandet hospital "believe[s] that Hege Orefellen is wrong to theorize" this. I believe - also from my own (even though only hypothetical) experience - she is right on. My plans in case of a possible commitment were quite clear to me.

Some thoughts about the documentary

There are several things, I found noteworthy about this documentary. First of all the striking difference between Kristina's experience of herself, her situation, and her needs, on the one hand, and the "expert's" perception of her and her needs on the other. While Kristina says, that what she felt she needed most was someone to ask her what had happened to her, that made her react the way she did, and while she, additionally, expresses that she didn't feel any whatsoever need for "protection" (isolation), or to be "medicated" into a consciousness erasing, mental fog, the "expert" states, that he couldn't "expose" Kristina to the "strain" a dialoge with her at the time of acute crisis in his opinion would have been. "Kristina was asking for dialogue. That's right. But during the acute phase, I don't work with dialogue but with treatment to stabilize", the "expert" says. "And when an individual is stable, then the intention is, that dialogue, accordingly to what Kristina is asking for, treatment of her psychological traumas, becomes relevant. Because this in itself, being treated for psychological traumas, is a strain. I can't put strain on someone in an acute phase."

I wonder how it is, that this "expert" doesn't seem to realize how much more straining it can be for an individual in acute crisis to be denied his/her most vital need, the need to come to an understanding of him-/herself through dialogue, to be met, than a dialogue in itself ever could be. And I wonder, if we also here have projection being at work, to be understood in the way that a dialogue with Kristina first of all would have been straining for the "expert", and not for Kristina.

As far as I myself am concerned, the need for dialogue, for being listened to, became overwhelming at periods of crisis. And that I certainly not am an isolated case, this experience can serve as a good example for. In principle, I guess, everyone has at some point in their lives had the opportunity to observe that the more overwhelming an experience is, the greater the need to come to terms with it - through expressing one's feelings about it in words, terms, through a dialogue with another human being - becomes.

It sometimes seems to me like there's a short circuit happening in the thinking of people, especially in that of the "experts": On the one hand it is acknowledged, that people who've had an overwhelming experience need to talk it through, and crisis intervention is offered. But as soon as the overwhelming experience, on the other hand, isn't immediately understandable for one's surroundings, the reaction to it is defined as "sick", the reacting individual as having a brain disease and thus in need of medical "treatment": "protection" (isolation) and the administration of chemical substances, that blunt consciousness, and render clear thought and speech a city in China. Instead of being recognized as in need of a dialogue. If at all, a dialogue is only offered after the individual has been "treated" enough, to make an open dialogue with the potential for coming to terms more or less impossible. Backwards world.

Thus, of course, the "expert" in the program also questions Kristina's ability of decision making. By definition, an individual's ability of decision making is put out of the running - by an alleged brain disease - if the individual is in crisis, and the cause of the crisis isn't immediately recognizable for the individual's surroundings - so that the cause can't but must be the alleged brain disease. Very simple.

Unfortunately - for the "experts" - the outcome of Kristina's story shows, that her ability of decision making obviously, and in stark contrast to the "expert's" allegations, was at its peak. Intuitively, she did what was best for her in her situation. While she mentions, that her immediate reaction to hospitalization and "treatment" - as being the opposite of what she herself felt, she was in need of - was anger.

Kristina's story clearly shows, what people in crisis really need, instead of "treatment": self-determination, personal freedom, and security - for, even if she is on the run for three weeks, this situation feels more secure to her than a commitment, with the inextricably linked to it loss of personal freedom and self-determination, ever could have felt. Security does not equal to be exposed to others' "care", for better or for worse. Security equals to being respected unconditionally.

The worst that can happen to an individual who has had an overwhelming experience, is feeling an additional loss of control over the situation. For instance by being controlled by others, by being told what to do and what not to do, by being "protected" (isolated), by being "medicated" with substances, that make the individual concerned lose control over their own thinking, intuition and body sensation, by being told by others what and how to think, and feel, and how to define oneself, etc. Such interventions in an individual's privacy will already under "normal" circumstances be perceived as a violation of one's limits. It becomes unbearable, if an individual beforehand is in a very vulnerable state because of an acute crisis. Nevertheless, the only logic reactions to the intrusions - in the shape of fear and anger - are regarded a worsening of the "symptoms", of the "illness", thus needing further "treatment", i.e. further intrusions. A vicious circle, or spiral, that unfortunately all too often ends with the individual in crisis going down, breaking. Mentally - or physically.

Quite interesting I also find the system's definition of "voluntary", in the program illustrated by Hege's story. "If you don't show up within an hour, you'll be picked up by the police", and the defence lawyer underlines how much effort is put into making people to show up voluntarily, although they also need to be informed about what will happen, if they - completely voluntarily - decide not to show up. A somewhat strange definition of "voluntary" the system makes use of. Kafka* comes to my mind. Just as I think 'Kafka', as I hear Hege tell about her conversation with the psychiatrist at Folloklinikken: "I realize then, that my words don't count anymore. No matter what I may say, it is of no importance."

I wonder, when the system eventually will start to respect and treat its clientele as human beings. And if the system ever will be capable at all of the humility, this would require. That the outlook, so far, is rather sinister, also this documentary again shows.

Which distinguishes this program from most other programs on the matter I've seen, is that not only Hege but also Kristina is given the opportunity to present herself as a fully accountable human being, fully aware her own situation and absolutely capable of making reasonable decisions about it, that she is given the opportunity to speak for herself, while, even though the "expert" involved in her case also is given the opportunity to tell his view of the situation, there is no attempt made to devalue Kristina's self-presentation as being that of a "mentally ill" person, and thus not trustworthy. On the contrary, the program actually proves the in the psychiatric establishment widespread idea that "patients" with "serious mental illnesses" have poor insight and thus are incapable of decision making, that is explicitly stated by Kristina's psychiatrist in the program, wrong.

Kristina chooses not to name her diagnosis directly in the program. But that it isn't in the category of some sort of "anxiety disorder" or the like, stands pretty clear. Her mother tells that the therapist saw Kristina's anger toward him to be "hypomania", so, figure it out. While, if at all I had to label anything in regard to Kristina, in regard to my own experience, and/or in regard to everything else, that gets labelled as "mental illness", I'd say there is only one "mental illness": PTSD.

No matter how critical of psychiatric practices otherwise, all Danish programs dealing with the matter of psychiatric "treatment", choose to only interview individuals who, in contrast to Kristina, display "insight" and furthermore, and also in stark contrast to Kristina, are compliant with psychiatric "treatment", i.e. drugs. The Danish media still has it coming to them to give people labelled with "serious mental illnesses" who are not "insightful" and "treatment compliant" a fair chance to speak out.

Until today, this group of "patients" is only reported about. Preferably in context with incidents that are meant to prove the insanity and lack of accountability of the individuals in question on the one hand, and to emphasize the alleged necessity of getting these individuals into psychiatric "treatment" as fast and extensively as possible to prevent further damage and deterioration, on the other. Proving psychiatric "treatment" - i.e. drugging and electroshock - to be both life-saving "treatment" measures, and the only reasonable, "evidence-based", "treatment" options for "severe mental illness", and thus being completely in line with the mainstream doctrine.

Individuals labelled with "severe mental illness" who successfully chose to do without the "help" of the system, have not yet been given a chance to present themselves and their reasons to do without the system's "help" in the Danish media. Hat off to the Norwegian NRK 1 for having the courage to do this groundbreaking documentary!

You can read more about the documentary, Kristina and Hege at MindFreedom's website.
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* or Orwell

Psychdiagnonsense II - ...and some more frustration

This is a thing, I'll never get. I just ended up surfing the blogosphere a bit. It happens sometimes. Someone has a link to someone who has a link... etc. I came by some of the V.I.P.s in the mental health blogosphere, too. Especially one of them - no names here - actually breaks my heart, each time I come by there.

Well, nevertheless, I keep on wondering. Most of these people have had no less than horrid experiences with the mental health system. And most of them seem to be rather intelligent people. Still, it doesn't seem to enter their heads, that there might be something essentially wrong with psychiatry in itself. They seem to think, it were just them, and maybe one or two others, who have been unlucky. Or, at most, that there are some few unfavourable tendencies, like the tendency to overmedicate, that would have to get adjusted, and everything would be fine with psychiatry. No, sorry folks. Nothing would be, is, has ever been, or will ever be fine with psychiatry as such!

Never mind, I just sometimes get really desperate about all this blindness, or naiveté, or whatever...

Well, now that I allowed myself to vent a little frustration - I'll move on to vent some more. Although the following frustration already has been vented at my Danish blog, this past weekend. Here's part two of the discussion about psychiatry's status as a medical science and, in particular, about psychiatric diagnoses.

As I wanted to address the question whether psychiatric diagnoses were of any benefit for the diagnozed, but as feelings still were running somewhat high the next afternoon, after I'd posted the first part, I decided to concentrate on quoting others' accounts of how they perceived psychiatric diagnoses, just adding a few remarks of my own.



"Powerful words with much and little meaning. They help to classify, but not understand. They act as excuses, but not answers. They make it easy to describe, but not really explain. They separate us from ourselves and others. So do you fear me or trust me, do you help me or punish me, do you believe me or call me a liar if I am diagnosed with one of these labels? Do you not think it hurts me to be labeled like this? Do you not think it takes away my dignity, hope, and initiative to do better or be better in life? We have to hide now to keep the system from forcing one of these diagnoses on us or using it in such a way that it hurts and stigmatizes us for the rest of our lives." Janie Lee, M.Ed.
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"Psychiatric diagnoses like schizophrenia always risk harming people, always risk becoming a self-fulfilling prophecy, always deny people the right to define and understand themselves for themselves, always mislead people about the facts of what is truly known and not known about mental illness, always unfairly promote narrow drug treatments against holistic alternatives, and always impose an interpretation on based on subservience to power. Psychiatric diagnoses perpetuate a long legacy of mistreatment of the mentally ill, who should be embraced as humans deserving of full dignity, not labeled as broken and different.

I believe that our system of helping people in extreme states of consciousness and severe suffering can and should dispense with pseudo-scientific psychiatric diagnoses. I believe we can find ways to care for people without harming them." Will Hall, co-founder of Freedom Center
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"I had an experience in the early 1950's, shortly after I started in private practice, of how psychiatric diagnosis can harm. A young mother was referred to me for aftercare upon her discharge from Hillside Hospital, where I had trained and where I was on the clinic staff. We met, I took a history and I saw no obstacle to our working together psychotherapeutically.

At the end of the meeting, she asked me her diagnosis, and I told her 'schizophrenia' - her hospital diagnosis which, even then, I did not consider irreversible. But that's apparently how she saw it, because she went home and hanged herself.

Since then, I have never used that term with a patient or a family; for those disorganized enough to meet the diagnostic criteria, I merely say they are somewhat disorganized and that our therapeutic task is to help them get their heads together again.

The basic problem with psychiatric diagnosis, as I see it, is its denial of the ease with which people's minds can change. Someone facing a difficult situation can be anxious on Monday, depressed on Tuesday and a bit disorganized – 'schizzy' - on Wednesday. Whichever day he is seen by the psychiatrist will determine his 'diagnosis,' which will in turn magnify his related symptoms and dampen the others.

Even more important is the permanence which "diagnosis," (schizophrenia especially,) is supposed to possess. Although I had a schizophrenic break (my response to drugs during that episode is described in Bob Whitaker's superb book, 'Mad in America'), many of my psychiatric colleagues insisted that the diagnosis had to be wrong because I recovered. This means that whenever these colleagues diagnose someone as having "schizophrenia," they are convinced in their hearts that the patient will never recover. This attitude is hardly helpful for the patients they care for!" Nathaniel S. Lehrman, M.D.
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A remark in connection with Nathaniel S. Lehrman's account: So-called "schizophrenia" - psychiatry's sacred cow - has always been defined as an incurable illness, a "life sentence", and still today is defined the same by psychiatry - disregarded the large number of people labelled with "schizophrenia", who at any given time throughout history have achieved full recovery, and do achieve full recovery today. Though, as mentioned in other contexts before, it is only people who either manage to completely avoid the system, or who manage to leave the system at some point, who do fully recover. People who stay in contact with and dependent on the system do not recover fully. With the exception of those, who use the system's services to emancipate themselves from it, that is. - Having Gianna at Beyond Meds in mind, yep. - Since only those who stay inside the system do appear in the system's statistics, "schizophrenia" thus is confirmed to be an incurable illness.

Still today, psychiatry doesn't hesitate to tell every person with a diagnosis of "schizophrenia" - or of any other "severe mental illness" - that this diagnosis is irreversible, a "life sentence". While it, at the same time, is tried to explain away the high percentage of especially first-time "psychotics" who commit suicide as a "symptom" of the "illness" - rather than that suicide is acknowledged to be a completely natural and rational - not at all "insane" - reaction to receiving the message of having a life-long, incurable brain disease. Rather than that full recovery is acknowledged to be possible, and rather than that the consequence is taken in regard to the by now well-established fact, that psychiatric "treatment" prevents full recovery. Instead the system stops at virtually nothing in order to legitimate itself as a "medical science"... "Forgive them, for they don't know what they do"?

The above quotations are retrieved from Paula J. Caplan's website, PsychDiagnosis.net. Paula Caplan has been a member of the DSM V writing group, leaving the group when she realized how little real science actually provides the basis for diagnoses to be approved respectively dismissed. Again, I want to outline that psychiatry is the only "medical science" that approves respectively dismisses diagnoses alone on the basis of voting, and not on the basis of any given behaviour to be scientifically provenly a symptom of illness, or of any other scientifically provable diagnostic criteria for "mental illness" to exist. An interview with Paula Caplan can be listened to here.

I want to contrast the above quotations with a quotation from an article at a Danish website, that clearly shows the false ego-identification, that is promoted by psychiatry and its diagnoses, and that in a decisive manner contributes to the diagnozed individual becoming stuck in irreversible crisis, "chronic mental illness":

"Following this [having experienced increasing signs of an extreme state of mind] Jacob is admitted to a psychiatric ward, and, after three months of hospitalization, is told that he has schizophrenia.

'Subsequently, I entered into the OPUS project, and got started with the so-called social skills training together with four other young, mentally ill people.'

He describes his experience with OPUS like this: 'I experienced it as an awakening... it was like finding my identity, an explanation for the feelings and thoughts I had. From feeling odd man out, it was like I'd went to find my right place'."

The example is taken from J.A. Jensen (ed.), Sindets labyrinter. Seks beretninger fra mødet med psykiatrien. (Labyrinths of the mind. Six accounts about the encounter with psychiatry. - And, sure, Jacob's example is meant to illustrate a successful encounter with psychiatry. As if there were such a thing!) Copenhagen, 2002.

Jacob found an identity, yes - as a "schizophrenic". But is this who he really is? And what will happen the moment Jacob realizes, that he has become a victim of a huge self-/deceit, realizing at the same time, that he cannot leave the place he found - as a "schizophrenic"?