Families Healing Together
OCTOBER 17, 2014 BY ADMIN
By Krista MacKinnon
I’ve worked in the mental health system for twelve years now, and prior to that was a patient for three. My family was educated to believe that I would be sick my whole life, and that they should have very little hope for my future. When I became a family counsellor, I vowed to never “educate” anyone in such a way. Since then, I’ve watched “Recovery” grow from a subversive whisper to a full-blown growing paradigm in mental health services. Countries have adopted Recovery and implemented its model into their health care planning, academics have studied it and written thousands of articles in peer-reviewed journals, organizations have restructured and reorganized their teams to reflect it’s principles, and brave everyday people have told their personal recovery stories to friends, colleagues, conferences, and the media. Recovery is a strong political force, a narrative, a system, a way of life, and a tool. So why then, has this incredible force of “Recovery” not leaked its way over to Family Education?
READ MORE HERE
I think my family could have done with this, long ago.
It’s really an excellent course and takes a revolutionary perspective on how to help someone through an extreme period in their lives. Unfortunately, some people can’t deal with focusing the spotlight on how families can help, not hinder, their relative. The big difference, IMO, between this course and what NAMI and other groups offer, is that this course strenuously avoids labelling someone, does not believe in the diseased brain model, and does not take it as axiomatic that meds are the answer.
That does sound good. I am sure it will benefit a lot of people. Rossa, I accidentally deleted your last comment on my blog, while trying to publish it. If you remember, could you please post it again and I’ll reply (if necessary). I can’t even remember what it was about now – I feel really stupid but it was late at night and I should not have been fiddling around with my blog at all!