#it inherently takes away your autonomy because diagnoses call your capacity to decide things for yourself into question | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

urghost-andurboo · 1 year

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Hiya! I was wondering if you knew of any literature about reforming the psych system because I agree its broken AF and as someone who's a part of it I want to be able to do better. No worries if not, I just saw posts you've reblogged and thought you'd be a good person to ask!

i do have some recommendations!

"mind fixers: psychology's troubled search for the biology of mental illness" by anne harrington and "comfortably numb: how psychiatry is medicating a nation" by charles barber both give a history of the medicalization of mental illness and critique the biomedical model. (hint: there's a lot of BAD science that makes up the core of psychiatry - the evidence for there being a biological basis for mental illness and psych meds working at all is very flimsy.)

the disorderland podcast debunks bad science, especially pop science, talks about the commodification of mental health, and explores whether the symptoms we pathologize are actually symptoms.

"madness and oppression" by fireweed collective is a workbook that helps you see how you're not crazy -- you're oppressed. it looks at how what a psychologist/psychiatrist would consider a symptom is actually a very rational and normal response to being oppressed.

"on your own: patient-controlled alternatives to the mental health system" by judi chamberlain is written by a psych survivor, and goes into her own experiences as well as what alternatives exist to the system. great for learning about peer support!

"stolen" by elizabeth gilpin is a memoir by a psych survivor. she was abducted and taken to a "treatment" program in Appalachia, then went to a boarding school that functioned more like a prison with abusive group therapy. this one's good for humanizing mental illness BUT can be triggering as hell to psych survivors - so proceed with caution.

"the zyprexa papers" by jim gottstein is probably my favorite on the list, it's about how the antipsychotic zyprexa causes diabetes and metabolic disorders, and is still commonly prescribed (this is how i got diabetes). it shows how psych med regulations are not enforced, especially since zyprexa is often prescribed off-label for conditions it hasn't been shown to be clinically effective for, and has led to death in some cases.

madinamerica.com is a good site to explore for psych abolition, debunking psychology research, new psychology research that centers patient's autonomy and rights, and personal accounts of mental illness. it's been around for a decade so there's a lot of quality content to sift through!

i also recommend reading about peer support and peer respite houses - i don't have any particular books or articles about them, but that can be a good jumping off point to looking for an alternative model to the current psych system.

#i say this all with the caveat that i am a psych abolitionist NOT a reformist #i encourage you especially to read the first two #it's really important to understand that the evidence we have for mental disorders/diagnoses are vastly unsupported by the science #that aims to prove them #if you are not a psych survivor i encourage you to read pieces by psych survivors #it's important to humanize the people you're working with/learning about and it also helps paint a picture of the abuse we experience #i HOPE that after engaging with the system you start to see that it's not broken it's working as intended #psychiatry is a form of social control #it is dehumanizing #it inherently takes away your autonomy because diagnoses call your capacity to decide things for yourself into question #we are often belittled #told we're crazy #minimized #talked over #told we couldn't possibly make responsible decisions for ourselves #ETC #AND psych wards function as a prison #like there is no way for the system to be reformed because the system is based on the idea that there is something inherently wrong with us #and there isn't #the symptoms we experience are actually NORMAL parts of the human condition #psych abolition #antipsychiatry #actually delusional #actually disabled #actually psychotic #mad

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