RCSD6: Top Priorities

We are rating the priorities from last meeting and coming up with an initiating activity for each. More later

RCSD5: More Vision

Respect is the way you tell whether the system is transforming; Every part of the system needs to be flooded with recovery; it needs to be seen everywhere.
We need an operational model of recovery to impact the system as an infrastructure; Boards need to be immersed in recovery;

RCSD 4: National Pillars of Support and More Vision

Supervisory support is a key Pillar of Support in the system; PSS ID; Issues of Support for burnout, building an outside life; not taking on too much; sharing ways to balance; support for peers working full time with benefits and a career path; eduation around nutritional approaches to recovery; positive media re recovery; resolve paradox of recipient rights and employee rights; all DCH documents related to recovery should be reviewed; we need a much fuller vision of a complete community system of supports based on recovery;

RCSD 3: More Vision

Concrete signs of respect for PSS; Stories by peers about how they are getting a life; professional incentives for understanding the recovery movement; actual effort by CMH to respect peers; held a conference focused on providers and recovery, and we will hold another this year; The RC has bonded, and will show collaboration in reaching the outcomes we plan today; More attention to rural areas, enough to publicly show their understanding of the importance of recover; empowerment of peers through modeling of RC activities, and modeling by peers;

RCSD 2: Accomplishments and Vision

# of peer support specialists; REE implementation and the data it produces; The system would understand and show that each person's chosen life is possible; relationships outside the system; PSS embedded in day to day workings of the system; Recovery in education and training and public education; PSS on university faculty in Georgia!!; More stories of recovery in the public arena and self-identified peers in positions of power;

Recovery Council Strategy Development, Part 1

Ike is leading our effort today, to build a Council strategy for 2010 at LCC West. We will be reviewing our vision and our priorities, and modeling our future relationship with DCH and the CMH system.

Problems at the Core

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Both our political parties have

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significant structural and functional problems. They each contain a group that believes  the purpose of politics to be ideological warfare, and they each contain a group that believes politics is a tool to serve their interests. Since the groups within each party are not compatible with one another, there is a struggle within each party that mirrors the struggle between parties in oddly complementary and paradoxical ways. 

We might call the two groups Selfish Toadies (ST) and Cultural Fanatics (CF).

There is a cycle of dynamic dominance between the two groups in each party. Currently, the Republican party has seen the rise of more and more ideological cadre, with the STs trying to co-opt the message of the CF's for their own purposes. In the Democratic party, liberals are gradually taking the role of spoilers, again with the STs trying to co-opt the CW message for their own purposes. The Obama administration is largely STs at this point. 

Across parties, the struggle is between CFs in the Republican party and STs in the Democratic party. The current political instability is not just between the parties, but also between the components within each party. Any stability that occurs either within or across parties will be immediately undermined by the other inside "enemy" or the other party. This general instability will not change any time soon, especially with the economy crashing and the growing deterioration of the health care system, local infrastructure, and the fragmentation of allegiances in every part of the political fabric. In a phrase, everyone, in multitudinous and shifting groups, is struggling for the "soul" of “their” party.

The national political system is no longer capable of solving any major problem. The two parties view vetoing effective action by the other as the only predictably useful political strategy, and within the parties, the components view vetoing the other component in the same way. Joe Lieberman is kind of the poster child for this approach to a political career.

As the whip cream on the sundae, the Supreme Court has now allowed a far greater use of corporate funds to promote political agendas than at any time in modern history. Spin and insults are standard competitive tactics used by corporations to undermine competitors. Therefore, we will be spending far more money to create an incompetent political class than we have in the past. 

Needless to say, the extra money  will not produce better political results.

What to do?

Recent Recovery Links

#RecoveryMI: VOCAL,A Voice for Mental Health Recovery http://bit.ly/4T6cTh

#RecoveryMI: New inpatient unit based on recovery http://bit.ly/6qxNiJ

#RecoveryMI: New Book Shares Stories of Recovery from MI http://bit.ly/5aRAkx

Emotions and Recovery

From Gerald Butler…..

1/8/2010

Possibly one of the greatest lapses in the system of treatment has been the failure to acknowledge that our emotions are the same as every other human being.

     If someone feels as if they were treated disrespectfully at a business they are patronizing the average person would no longer utilize that company. It is a natural human emotion to shun environments where one feels mistreated. As consumers we often do not have that option so we must find other ways of dealing with demoralizing treatment. Many of us build walls around our psyche to keep from being hurt and/or discouraged. Building walls is a defense mechanism that keeps us from emotional harm, but it also keeps potentially destructive emotions buried inside and undealt with.

       Having an illness does not mean we no longer possess basic human emotions. Personally, I feel emotions are somehow elevated during the healing process. The desire to feel validated and to be listened to is another vital emotion as it provides a sense of belonging. Emotions play a vital role in how well we do in recovery, however there are times we must suppress certain feelings and/or emotions. The main component to a recovery-centered environment is its ability to make consumers feel safe enough to freely express our emotions.

      It’s no secret; the system of mental health treatment in the U. S. is antiquated and must change. Too often, time and energy is wasted attempting to adapt new recovery models to fit the old system. This can result in the unconscious dilution of the recovery aspects of the new model. As we transform the system, meeting consumers where they are, requires providers who are willing to move from positions of leadership/control to support status. This encourages folks who are in recovery to take charge of their lives and help others who are where we used to be.

       Luckily, we are seeing more providers willing to admit to and change (on a personal level) their stigmatizing views of us. These people are the leaders of the transformed system of treatment.  They appreciate that folks in recovery have a lot to offer a recovery-oriented system so they listen to and learn recovery from us. Transformed providers are busy making changes systematically, opening doors, removing obstacles, and paving new roads to recovery.

     The desire to feel respected is a basic human emotion. The CHARGE recovery-enhanced environment promotes individuality, encouraging consumers to take charge of their own healing processes by, 1) self-awareness: “I am a person, not a disease” 2) providing a transparent, genuine, safe atmosphere that encourages people to utilize their natural talents/gifts as recovery tools. The process of honing ones natural talents also increases self worth.

      Since July the Recovery Band and the ‘Visions of Recovery Community Choir have played for many community based organizations. We have established and nurtured working relationships in the community. CHARGE has adopted the ‘Visions, Mission, & Values’ of the Michigan Recovery Council and an Addendum to the IPOS from ‘Project Doors’ in Lansing. We have utilized our talents in the fight against stigma. We even did a spot on T. V. thanks to NAMI. We long to be role models of recovery, encouraging others to do the same.   The cool thing is that despite not having a place to work out of, we have done these things and more on our own.

     Primarily, we are asking to be allowed to share what we have learned with others in a recovery-centered environment, designed and run by consumers for consumers. We enthusiastically seek leaders willing to view us as partners in transforming the system of treatment in the U. S. 

Gerald Butler

Certified Peer Specialist

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Judi Chamberlin has Died

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Dear MindFreedom News list,
I received sad news this morning from several good friends of long-
time mad movement activist Judi Chamberlin in Massachusetts.
I'm sorry to provide this news to you all by e-mail, but last night
Judi died at the age of 65. I send my support to Judi's relatives and
friends, and everyone who admired and loved her.
Many were aware that she was in hospice for some time. True to the
amazing passionate and practical person she was, Judi had a hospice
activist blog you can find via Google at:
     Judi Chamberlin hospice blog
Judi has been a good personal friend of mine since we met in Mental
Patients Liberation Front in 1976, and she has been a unifying leader
with so many organizations in our mad movement, including for many
years on the board of directors of MindFreedom International.
Judi has sometimes been called the "grandmother" of the mad movement,
beginning with her pioneering work for empowering alternatives for
mental health consumers and psychiatric survivors with her book "On
Our Own: Patient Controlled Alternatives to the Mental Health
System" (1978).
I'm sure there will be information and remembrances soon about this
remarkable heroine and human being. While she was alive, Judi's
friends and relatives held a celebration of her life this past 20
August 2009.
When we celebrate Martin Luther King, Jr. on his holiday tomorrow, 18
January 2010, let's also remember all late leaders for a nonviolent
revolution in all justice movements, including Judi Chamberlin.
MAD PRIDE, JUDI, MAD PRIDE!
In support,
David W. Oaks, Executive Director
MindFreedom International