‘Neutralising Suffering: How the Medicalisation of Distress Obliterates Meaning and Creates Profit’ by Joanna Moncrieff

May 22, 2021 by

jmoncrieffThere is so much great content on Mad in America. Here’s an excellent article from British psychiatrist Joanna Moncrieff, one I wholeheartedly endorse. On the one hand, society discourages people from taking psychoactive drugs, and even prosecutes them for doing so, whilst on the other hand it encourages people to take psychoactive (prescription) drugs. Sometimes, they are the same drugs or very similar-acting.

‘People have used psychoactive substances to dull and deaden pain, misery and suffering since time immemorial, but only recently, in the last few decades, have people been persuaded that what they are doing in this situation is rightly thought of as taking a remedy for an underlying disease.

The spread of the use of prescription drugs has gone hand in hand with the increasing medicalization of everyday life, and a corresponding loss of the previous relationship that people had with psychoactive substances.

Read More ➔

Filed Under: Blog Tagged With: , , , , , , , ,

‘Shh… Just Whisper it, But There Might Just Be a Revolution Underway’ by Peter Kinderman

March 4, 2021 by

I have just received two books written by Peter Kinderman from a publisher as part of a thank-you for reviewing a book proposal. The books look real good, so I thought I’d start this new part of the Resources with an excellent article by Prof Peter Kinderman which was posted on Mad in America in August 2014. I first posted Peter’s article on Recovery Stories at the same time.

‘The idea that our more distressing emotions can best be understood as symptoms of physical illnesses is a pervasive, seductive but harmful myth. It means that our present approach to helping vulnerable people in acute emotional distress is severely hampered by old-fashioned, inhumane and fundamentally unscientific ideas about the nature and origins of mental health problems.

We need wholesale and radical change in how we understand mental health problems and in how we design and commission mental health services.

Read More ➔

Filed Under: Blog Tagged With: , , , , , , ,

‘Shh… Just Whisper it, But There Might Just Be a Revolution Underway’ by Peter Kinderman

August 19, 2014 by

pkindermanHere is an excellent article by Prof Peter Kinderman from Mad in America. Yes, recovery-based care is needed!

‘The idea that our more distressing emotions can best be understood as symptoms of physical illnesses is a pervasive, seductive but harmful myth. It means that our present approach to helping vulnerable people in acute emotional distress is severely hampered by old-fashioned, inhumane and fundamentally unscientific ideas about the nature and origins of mental health problems.

We need wholesale and radical change in how we understand mental health problems and in how we design and commission mental health services.

–o–

It’s all too easy to assume mental health problems must be mystery biological illnesses, random and essentially unconnected to a person’s life. But when we start asking questions about this traditional ‘disease-model’ way of thinking, those assumptions start to crumble.

While it obviously serves the purposes of pharmaceutical companies, ready with their chemical pseudo-solutions, the evidence doesn’t support this view.

Read More ➔

Filed Under: Blog Tagged With: , , , , , , ,

‘Neutralising Suffering: How the Medicalisation of Distress Obliterates Meaning and Creates Profit’ by Joanna Moncrieff

March 12, 2014 by

jmoncrieffThere is so much great content on Mad in America. Here’s a piece from British psychiatrist Joanna Moncrieff, one I wholeheartedly endorse. In fact, this blog is essential reading. I first posted this blog on Recovery Stories in 2014. The original article on Mad in America has all the references.

‘People have used psychoactive substances to dull and deaden pain, misery and suffering since time immemorial, but only recently, in the last few decades, have people been persuaded that what they are doing in this situation is rightly thought of as taking a remedy for an underlying disease. The spread of the use of prescription drugs has gone hand in hand with the increasing medicalization of everyday life, and a corresponding loss of the previous relationship that people had with psychoactive substances.

Elizabeth Gaskell’s novel Mary Barton was originally to be named after Mary’s father John Barton, a working class factory hand addicted to opium. The novel depicts the unimaginable poverty and exploitation of industrial Manchester that made opium-induced oblivion an appealing escape.

Read More ➔

Filed Under: Blog Tagged With: , , , , , , ,

‘A healthy mind in a healthy society’ by Dinyar Godrej

October 16, 2013 by

rsz_imagesHere’s a wonderful blog on the mental health scene from the New Internationalist magazine.

Sitting in the waiting room of a busy psychologists’ practice in Rotterdam, I’m intrigued by the furtive nature of the experience. People waiting for their 50 minutes of focused talk avoid each other’s eyes, acknowledging each other with embarrassment, if at all. I could be in the waiting room of a sexually transmitted diseases clinic.

I’m a bit puzzled. With the increased familiarity of stress-related problems nowadays, shouldn’t this kind of guilt (no other word quite captures it) be a thing of the past?

Read More ➔

Filed Under: Blog Tagged With: , , , , , , ,