New scripts for mental health
We asked the community to write new scripts for mental health services. We've had a great response. Browse all contributions below. If you'd like to submit one yourself, go here.
The movement being pioneered in the US to change the language from 'what's the matter with you?' To 'what matters to you' so that care and medication can compliment life and not hinder it
Macmillan's holistic needs assessment 'concerns checklist' rolled out to all patients, create person centred care and the psychological safety created by feeling heard.
Preventing mental health deterioration by offering early intervention therapies with best chances of keeping a person off hospital reducing the need for meds and deprivation of free will/ sectioning.
Creating (in close cooperation with close family/ next of kin) an optimally fast path/action plan for freeing a patient back into the family/ community to re-establish a sense of control over one's life.
In hospital, creating home-from home environment and condition for maximum support from the patient's loving circle (no matter how good the hospital there is little room in it for building meaningful relationships and bonds of love essential for healing).
Access to green, blue and social prescribing, for those who request it. These sessions should be used with trained therapeutic staff and be used as an intervention or one of several strategies to support wellbeing, physical health and mental health
Stop denying people's lived reality and telling them they must have imagined abuse they disclose. Stop telling victims of abuse that they have a "disorder" and stop forcing antipsychotic drugs on people, especially when they've told you exactly what caused their "symptoms". Throw damaging labels in the bin! Stop patronising and controlling people. (This is my personal experience with MH services in the UK.)
The Clinician will explore:
Is this a natural human reaction to a given set of circumstances?
What has happened to this person?
Could this possibly be part of a physical health condition?
What does the person feel would help?
Looking at the picture from outside of the medical model which can, of course come in last if needed and helpful!
Regular medication reviews so people are not unecessarily sedated for longer than they need.
An awareness that recovery is not a destination it is a journey.
Permission to feel compassion.
Creative ways to express difficult experiences and feelings.
Normalisation of feelings as normal responses to challenging situations.
Share wealth and resources.
Help each other live beyond survival.
Teaching kids in schools about mindfulness, breathing and being kind.
Feeling acceptance, being accepted.
Connection with others, nature and your community.
what happened or is happening to you rather than what is wrong with you.
Honesty around the magnitude of suffering due to mental health.
Choice versus tick box.
Education around mental health in schools.
Don't funnel everyone down the same route.
Better community education so that through understanding there can be less stigma and more people will be aware of how to support someone and where to turn to for support.
Listen to the person that comes to your door asking for help, who wants the nightmare to end. Listen to the people who knows the person from DoB and then put down your assumptions and judgement that fuels your reaction. Stop, breath and think (after all that's the advice given to those at the end of their teather) and listen, listen and listen again to respond with compassion and attempts at understanding. Hear the voice of despair and think, that could be you, then respond with humanity and care, that you would want and expect. If it was you.
Small group physical strength training x 3 times weekly.
Certificate stating, there is nothing wrong with you, it's what happened or is still happening to you that is causing your symptoms.
Invitation to experience self compassion, gratitude for self and laughter
Breath work class
A soft revolution
Overthrowing the capitalist system
By connecting with our communities
And creating networks of compassion and care
A gentler way of living
Prioritising creation and experience
Over production and materialism
A radical hope
An optimistic apocalypse
A society made of love
My script would be for accessible long term specialist therapy to be made available and understood to be perfectly acceptable request and need. A safe and consistent space to explore self. Where a “patients” narrative is held with regard, and their symptoms are seen as desperate attempts to survive and to be understood. To exist in a world that does not want to understand or even acknowledge childhood trauma and the effects this has, is simply nonsensical for society as a whole.
I prescribe art or access to the arts.
Let's talk!
Mental health commissioners need to work across government departments to address the economic and ideological incentives that maintain policy and practise that fails to help communities experiencing high levels of emotional distress.
Psychology services and psychiatry services need to learn from organisations like PPR who know how to really engage with communities and speak truth to power.
I would like to see the Mental Health Strategy in Northern Ireland reorientated towards social determinants and prevention.
The prescription for government:
End inequality and support people with a living wage and suitable employment or occupations to meet their needs.
More therapeutic services in the community.
More supporting connections and wellness and prevention, alongside counselling, talking therapies, either one to one or group based.
All pharmacists and gps to be prescribed training on the World Health Organisation and the UN definition of mental health, and specifically on the statistics on prescribing of medication and diagnosis in deprived communities.
Get yoga into the school curriculum.
An end to the mental health 'business'.
Move to community based working with mental health issues.
A better understanding of mental health and money should be spent at the start of life, in schools.
Mental health training, more classes with experts by experience. Paragraph more honest training about the side effects of medications, ECT etc.
Our young people need to feel seen and heard .
We need to create safe communities to replace the idea that “ it takes a village to rare a child “
We need “wise grandmothers” wisdom to come back to life - less screens
We need to teach our children about how our nervous systems work . Why staying in fright / fight long term is damaging .
We need to teach our population how to use their breath to move them into the parasympathetic - rest and digest .
They need to feel safe and they matter .
How we can control our thoughts or sit with the thoughts . Meditation . We are the master of our breath and our thoughts .
Movement is medicine ! Get yoga
Here is someone who will listen to me without criticising me or minimising my difficulties.