Why Does Noone March, Protest, Or Riot For Us?

Great question fern

Both. (the history, origins, "founders", premises...)
It is also patriarchal --- I think over all more progress has been made by women in this area. And, at least in major cities, there are more people of color involved in mental health treatment and thinking now than in the past.

My experience has been a mixed bag. When I was in IP there were men and women pdocs and therapists. There were people from various racial backgrounds. White practitioners were actually a minority in my IP experience.

The same was true of the patients in the ward I was on. The first ward had men and women and there was a mix of racial backgrounds and ages. The second ward I was on was for women only, but there was a healthy mix there as well that seemed fairly representative of the relative numbers of each race and agre group in my community.

It is not important what age or race or gender my practitioner is. My main concern is to work with someone who can add value.

The female pdoc I worked with was of color. She dismissed me at every appointment and asked me questions she would not have asked if she took 5 minutes to read my file. I did not attribute this to her color or gender, but to her lack of care. I actually wanted to work with a woman because the trauma related to my case is easier for me to discuss with a woman. I was disappointed with her care and always sensed she was just trying to move as quickly as possible to get on to the next patient.

The older Indian pdoc I initially saw in IP was awesome. Very knowledgeable. Very caring. The woman I saw works in his practice, so he is a poor judge of hiring talent, but he is a good pdoc. I wanted to stick with him, but he mostly handles all of the IP patients, so I had to choose between his two in office pdocs.

The white male pdoc at the same practice is my preferred provider. He remembers me and asks me questions beyond just how my meds are working. We discuss my therapy progress and my pursuit of my own psychoanalytic efforts. He actually cares and my empathy senses feel he is genuine. He has offered advice beyond what med adjustments to take. He listened when my meds had adverse affects. He weaned me off meds eventually.

As for patriarchal, I agree as far as the history of modern psychiatry. Historically, many cultures deal with mental illness quite differently. They view it as a spiritual disturbance that requires intervention on a soul level. Some cultures deem males fit for that duty. Some look to females and others believe it is a journey to be taken alone. All of them focus on addressing the root causes over the modern preference to apply the band aid of medicine to manage symptoms.

We actually used to have far fewer patients experience recurrance of symptoms here in America before pharmacology intervened...

for me - my main concern is to work with someone who can add value,...

I am so sorry.

I’m sorry

I have come to believe that at least part of my illness had to do with my spiritual health. The psych meds I take manage some of the symptoms but not the causes. I am not against these meds but they do not fix everything. My POV is that at least some (perhaps all) of our mental illness is caused by external trauma, our own bad choices and lack of awareness of who we are spiritually. Healing mental illness is more like a life long journey of self discovery.

I couldn't agree more. The meds were a helpful tool for me. I needed them and I am open to needing them in the future.

Therapy is the same for me. It addresses certain aspects of my health, but I needed a lot more to address the roots of my issues.

Spiritual imbalance was a huge issue for me. Mental imbalance was at play. Emotional imbalance contributed and the same was true on a physical level. Trauma was definitely involved. I was making terrible choices. Some had the right heart, but the execution was incredibly flawed.

My soul was screaming and I didn't listen. These kinds of issues manifest holistically even if we cannot see how they are related. I feel other cultures intuitively understand this and we have lost that knowing in the name of science and progress. I use those terms loosely

I think we move away from that center point all the time. I lost my way back for a while. Stepping out to new experiences and finding the way back home is a lifelong journey as you say. What a ride...

I agree with everything you said and especially relate to this part. Out mind effects our body and vice versa. We have to spend as much time caring for our mind and soul as we do our physical health. In addition to what you have said about medical science not treating the whole picture, community, eating properly, exercise, etc plays a huge role in our well being though Western medicine (antibiotics, emergency surgeries, etc) can be lifesavers as well.

Every Fake Rumor About the Black Lives Matter Protests, Debunked
As protests spread, misinformation in Facebook Groups tears small towns apart

We are most definitely on the same page in approach. Maybe this isn't the thread for it, but I'd be interested to hear your strategy and how it works for you. Mine is evolving, but it includes the areas you mention.

What is the difference between our mind and our brain?

Wagner to my ears, Sarah. Yet another reason not to ever, ever support Sheryl Sanberg and Mark Zuckerberg and their 10 billion sycophants. Sorry, I know lots of people love facebook. I do not.

You didn't ask me, but this is my take... The brain is the physical structure located in your head. It consists of the neural pathways, nodes, etc. It is a piece of the physical structure of the mind. Thoughts are processed alongside emotions and emotions generate chemical responses while thoughts are electrical. They use many of the same pathways. So we are electrochemical and there are pathways all throughout the body itself.

Outside of all of that there is the actual data of the thoughts and and the emotions. While there is a physical component to that, there also seems to be a hidden and non-physical essence to it as well. The mind to me is the combination of both. The body strutures that process experience as well as the non-physical pieces. Some people call it the bodymind. I resonate with that.

Some of the changes I have made would be better suited for discussion elsewhere because they involve allowing my creator to help me with my anxiety and fear. My anxiety and fear caused me to not push back hard enough on some issues where someone else was behaving badly and also effected my judgement. Had I been mentally stronger, perhaps some of the traumatizing things (to others, not just myself) would have still happened but I would have had a much better chance of resolving issues more quickly. It is important to treat others as we want to be treated but also not allow ourselves
and others to be mistreated. When bad things happen, it can be because of communication breaking down which causes misunderstandings and one error can cascade into others. When we are unkind, uncaring, uninclusive, it causes a lot of problems.

Some of the uninclusiveness, etc has been passed down from one generation to the next and it isn't always a simply thing to fix it. Though I know that the riots (when property is destroyed and/ or the police overreact it complicates the whole issue--the two are separate issues and shouldn't be happening) are because of patterns of mistreatment. There are bad actors everywhere, but I acknowledge that many of the problems are systemic. I once said to someone I know, "Don't you think it is harder to be poor than black?" She said, "Imagine being poor and black." I had to agree that if you are poor and black, things are still very tough.

Mind (I had to look it up) One definition: 1. the element of a person that enables them to be aware of the world and their experiences, to think, and to feel; the faculty of consciousness and thought. 2. a person's intellect.

Brain 1. an organ of soft nervous tissue contained in the skull of vertebrates, functioning as the coordinating center of sensation and intellectual and nervous activity. 2. intellectual capacity.

IMO both our our mind and our brain effect our body. As far as our mind goes, if we get into unhealthy thinking habits or consume garbage information (pointless violent movies, pornography, fake news--lot's of fake news has bad motives and is about whipping up fear and creating doubts, etc.), in the long run, it is not good for our physical health.

Thanks all. I was thinking most of the origins and accepted practices/journals etal I guess.
Now that I mentally review my experience at State run facilities I did have a more diverse experience & learned a good deal from people from other places and backgrounds...
I can't say the same of the few private facilities I worked in.

As bad as some of the civil rights violations were, overall, the programming at our state hospital was way, way, way better than in any private hospital I have been. It was just outstanding in every way.

Bodymind. I like that.

Cool thread Bpcyclist -- thanks for letting us talk about anything.

As the days go by...as all businesses reopen while psychotherapists are stuck with/choose to provide only teletherapy (inferior, in my opinion)...as it becomes more and more clear that "mental patients" are (as always) last on the list - truly last on the list - I am becoming more and more frustrated and angry.

Why, indeed, isn't anyone marching, protesting, or rioting for us?

I do not believe you can compare systematic racism to those with mental illness. You cant see bipolar with your eyes and be denied a job but you can see the color of someones skin and deny them.

I can think of NAMI walks.


MI does not compare to systemic racism and violence.

There are instances of people with MI being harrassed by the police, but those people are likely already part of a population that is likely to be harrassed by the police.

There's a stigma of MI. But it's not comparable to systemic racism.

Systemic racism is endemic.

Some psychiatrists say there's a stigma towards psychiatrists and MI patients.

But, has any psychiatrist has been harrassed by police; been killed by police; been discriminated against on the basis of being a psychiatrist; been thrown in jail unjustly; been subjected to the death penalty unjustly; lost years of his/her life because of a lengthy prison sentence that is arguably unjustifiable; lost educational opportunities; been denied public benefits; or anything of the like?

I would think not. Maybe there's like one psychiatrist ever... I use the psychiatrist example, but you can replace that with MI patient and it still (mostly) holds true.

Huh. I see it a little differently. I believe humans can dehumanize other humans for "reasons" other than the external appearance of their physical body. Religion, for example. Hitler, various conflicts in Africa. China right now with the Uighurs. Etc. Or, disease states of their brains. Just my take, though.