As some of you may know, I write pieces that sometimes get a lot of hate mail in response to them. This is normal for a writer with an opinion. It happens here, it happens with newspaper pieces, it happens in response to books, it happens absolutely anywhere a writer stands out and says something others consider controversial. (Sometimes, people even threaten to sue me.)
I totally get that and pay it no mind, as a general rule. In fact, I mostly don’t talk to critics as I have very limited time and feel they are not worth it. I write for the people who respond positively to my work, not those who don’t. If you want to know my thoughts, I suggest you reread the article, as that’s where they are.
Peer-Support-Based Initiatives Funding Clarifications
However, I am making an exception today. People have so misrepresented my views and so spewed such ridiculous notions that I feel compelled to at least clarify a few things.
Here is my additional clarification on We Shouldn’t Fund Peer Support-Based Initiatives for Mental Illness.
1. Why do you only like medication and hate therapy?
First off, this isn’t true. I neither “like” nor “dislike” any particular treatment but, rather, believe that mental illness medications work for most people (statistically true) and believe that, for serious mental illness, a person needs to have a degree of stability before therapy even has a chance of taking hold. I, myself, have had lots of therapy, both individually and in groups. The difference there is that every one of those was facilitated by an actual professional such as a doctor or a psychologist. And while, in the groups, people were obviously like me — had a mental illness — I would not call that a “peer-support-based initiative” by its very definition.
I also attended a peer-run support group for months. I was not impressed. (And this had nothing to do with the attendees.)
And, in case you’re wondering, I suggest professional therapy to people all the time. The literature shows that people who get therapy and medication treatment together do better than people who get either one alone. There’s nothing not to like about that. Unfortunately, many people do not have access to professional therapy.
2. You misunderstand all the types of peer support.
This may be true. I can’t say what I don’t know. What I know came from the studies more than it did by studying the landscape of every type of peer support in every state.
3. Isn’t what you do peer support?
Not in my opinion. If I had to categorize myself I would say I’m a highly-knowledgeable source of psychoeducation. I do not, typically, do one-on-one peer support with anyone. I try to help people where I can, but that’s a little different. True, I do take on personal clients but, again, we’re talking about psychoeducation here and not “support” per se.
But even if I did do peer support, it wouldn’t matter because my argument is the same: government funding should not pay me to do what I do, whatever you call it.
4. You’re wrong. Peer support is evidence-based.
Um, okay. If you say so. I pointed to two 2014 meta-analyses that say otherwise for people with serious mental illnesses and, so far, no one has brought me a more recent study that says anything else.
The one thing that all the commentary has convinced me of is this: In the case of very well, professionally-trained staff, with the right oversight, professional conduct and setup, it is possible that peer support people could provide a service that would be evidence-based, I’m just not sure what this would look like.
5. Peer support doesn’t take money away from other programs.
I hate to break it to you but when you spend budget on one thing, you have to cut somewhere else. That’s kind of the nature of money. It’s finite.
And even if this were the case — say the money was taken out of the roads budget and it didn’t touch healthcare — I would still say that money needs to go to mental illness treatment. Period. People need treatment to become stable before anything else will help.
Once we manage to keep the mentally ill off the street and unfairly out of jail and offer them actual, medical care, then maybe I’ll think leftover money should go to other things. Oddly, I don’t think we’ll get to that point.
6. Peer support worked for me.
Okay. I believe you. People are different and people respond to different things. You’re allowed to find effective what you find effective.
7. I’ll never read you again, you’re evil.
Again, um, okay. That is certainly your prerogative. I will mention, however, that, as of today, 467 posts have been published on Bipolar Burble and if you’re irate at 0.002% of them, I think I’m doing okay.
8. You’re just paid by the drug companies.
I get this one all the time and it’s always unfounded. No drug company pays me. That’s it. And even if they did, my opinions are my own. Always have been.
Update: See this great article from an ex-SAMHSA employee that talks about this very issue: The Federal Government Ignores the Treatment Needs of Americans With Serious Mental Illness.
Quick note on the image: I was referring to how people felt about the last piece not about how I feel about the commenters.
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Banner image from here.
Hi Natasha –
I have a story about volunteering for DBSA.
I recently suddenly had to abruptly stop volunteering. On top of dealing with a major depressive episode, I was feeling burned out and stressed in this role as group facilitator.
I lasted just over a year.
I never willingly stepped up and said I wanted to do this work. I was more cajoled into it over a period of time by the organizers of my city’s chapter.
I thought I would give this a try because there is such a need and they thought I would be good at it.
After attending a two day online training (on top of an initial training,) I learned that there is a serious shortage of volunteer facilitators across the nation.
In short, I was left saddled with the majority of facilitating a group for various reasons. My first co-facilitator asked me if I could lead it “for a while” and then he never returned. They eventually sent someone else to help who has a high up position in the chapter. Literally half the time, he had some reason for not being able to facilitate the every other group he was responsible for. Because I had to be there anyway to co-facilitate, it felt natural that I would just take it on.
I also volunteered to cover for other facilitators until I got really burned out on being asked 2-3 times every two weeks between my co-facilitator and another guy, who is trying to step away from his Zoom meeting role. I felt that was going to be pushed on me eventually, too, as I know this guy is trying to transition out of the organization.
I know it is easy to just say “No,” but when you feel bad for those who wont’ get their support if someone else doesn’t step up, and you have the time, it’s easy to say “Yes.” But the time came where I said more “No’s”.
It seems like they are trying to hold too many groups in the city and don’t have enough facilitators or backup facilitators who have the energy or time for extra groups.
As well, I was feeling increasingly stressed from responding to newcomers’ shares that would take up most of the group, and then you would never see them again. Or, some would come a few times, say they liked the group, and then you’d never see them again. That left mostly only 3-4 regulars that I wasn’t seeing a lot of improvement in their quality of life. I was seeing repeat hospitalizations or involvement in outpatient programs. (I do not blame myself for any of this as group leader.)
I was seeing a lot off people who were in crisis, exhibiting homicidal or suicidal ideation, who were very manic, and/or had just gotten out of a hospital. It seems the behavioral health centers are funneling them towards DBSA right after they get discharged. I’m not sure most of these people are even well enough to be in a peer support group situation . Either way, I didn’t see any real effects that the group was helping that many people “move towards wellness,” which I imagined meant a lessened need for crisis type resources and inpatient stays.
Now that I am beginning to put this experience behind me, I feel like a major weight has been lifted. I was starting to also feel potentially unsafe in the groups and was worried what might happen at one in the future.
I recently looked at my chapter’s mission statement on their web site. They aim to have yet another group and two full time facilitators for each group by a certain time.
After I quit, they promptly sent out a message to everyone about the seriousness of “facilitator burnout”, which they never addressed in any of the trainings. They wrote that if you need a break, tell us – or if you need to step back for a meeting or two, connect with your other facilitators for backup. What other facilitators?
In my email to them, I did mention that I was so exhausted from depression that I couldn’t even deal with the many requests I was getting to take on someone else’s group and how i had led three groups a row. Maybe they ought to examine their overall competency in terms of sustainable caring.
Many other cities have nowhere near the number of groups we have, and that’s for a reason, I suspect.
Mental health care is not that great in the city I live in, though it’s getting better. However, there
are a lot of people needing services, too. I think DBSA is aiming to take some of the pressure off.
I’m not a paid peer support specialist, and maybe that’s what they need to make this work better. But I would rather see the money go to helping to fund other endeavors in mental health.
I noticed in their email, that they are now uggesting that a competent, untrained peer might step in to cover if need be. This could work or it could not as they have no training on how to handle a real crisis situation.
In short, I agree that government funding would not be useful here. Trying to cover all these groups with peers with their own mental health challenges, and then continuing to try and recruit from the meeting of peers, is not really sustainable without causing mental stress to volunteers or those who attend groups.
I would rather have them fund more clinics with interns helping, or paid peer specialists at the very least.
If they were to get funding to do this, maybe that would be better, but again, the data does not suggest that peer support groups are as helpful as one would imagine. I looked into this myself and your research is correct.
VenusH has gone too far. I do not recall reading any prayer-bashing, venom-spitting, or vitriolic reaponse to criticism in any of Natasha’s posts. I have not always agreed with her, but I I have always appreciated her respect for others who might disagree. If she has sometimes fallen short of that goal, VenusH surely shows how that could happen. Even a saint . . .
Natasha
Thanks for your willingness to wade into this territory. I printed out your posts and comments, and just started working through them. A couple of concerns hit me quickly, though. One was the notion that some people deserved medical care, and others don’t, based on symptom load or whatever. The other was that there was some sort of fixed limit on healthcare resources, instead of policy choices and options like Medicaid, grant-funded programs, and insurance reimbursement systems that make sense. I agree with you on one thing, though, the need for healthcare systems to do things that actually work. No fake therapists for me either. Thanks again. –pk—
AA and NAMI uses free peer support. The meetings that I’ve attend were effective. I am a peer support specialist
and use what I know and live through to help others with their mental illness. I am certified and am constantly
taking courses like Mental First Aid, Trauma and other courses.
So taking on private clients for psychoeducation when you have no professional credentials is a worthy endeavor, but working towards a professional certification as a peer support specialist to help people who have no private funds and no support system is not, as government funding shouldn’t be spent on this. Make note peers.
“In fact, I mostly don’t talk to critics as I have very limited time and feel they are not worth it. I write for the people who respond positively to my work, not those who don’t.” Okay…….so you respond to people that agree with you and not to people that don’t? A bit of arrogance and insecurity.
Hi Paul,
I don’t think so. Someone other than me once said, “you don’t write for your critics, you write for the people who read you” (paraphrase).
The point is that you can’t get wrapped up in your critics. You can’t write for them or you’ll lose yourself. You need to write for the people who actually want to read you.
That is neither arrogant nor insecure, it’s simply practical, as a writer.
– Natasha Tracy
Natasha, I could not agree with you MORE regarding BOTH of your arguments AGAINST funding peer support groups. I am actually shocked to see so much dissent. One of the reasons I believe you are receiving a deluge of disagreement is because it appears many of the commenters are confusing “support” from forums like Facebook Groups versus face-to-face, peer-coordinated/supported groups such as DBSA (Depression and Bipolar Support Alliance). These are two vastly different entities!!
I have been a consumer of mental health services for 36+ years. I have been exposed to practically every form of treatment available for Major Depressive Disorder, Panic Disorder, OCD, and chronic Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. This treatment ranges from attending DBSA meetings in person (which are always unsupervised by a licensed professional) to full-blown, 100 day-stays, at a locked-down, residential treatment faculty, the renowned Menninger Clinic, as recently as 2014.
These DBSA-“type” peer support groups, in-person, face-to-face, lacking any sort of professional supervision, I believe are SPECIFICALLY what Natasha is addressing.
First and foremost, science (research), including my personal/anecdotal experience, proves that peer support groups related to trauma and PTSD are highly discouraged. (Possibly with the exception of the veteran population.) A peer supported group for survivors of trauma cause far more harm than good! My treatment facilities would never allow them. Psychosocial education by a licensed clinician is where funding should be directed as far as trauma and PTSD are concerned.
Now onto general peer support groups such as DBSA…NEVER have I been exposed to a more a chaotic, literally physically dangerous environment, than when I have attended DBSA peer supported groups – and I mean EVERY SINGLE meeting I have ever attended! The combination of a group of folks suffering from a wide array of mental illness together, in-person (many suicidal, some even homicidal) plus the absence of any supervision from a licensed clinician, has great potential of placing the consumer in grave danger – I’ve been there! To even consider offering more funding for these groups is abominable!
If the funding was used to add an experienced clinician to supervise these groups, than perhaps, yes, I would be completely behind it. But that is NOT what Natasha’s articles are addressing.
I am a member of multiple Facebook Groups and find them to be great resources. I also belong to other various online support groups and appreciate the freedom to “take what I need, and leave the rest.” All of the above I enjoy in the company and protection of my own home. And most of all, I know to take all advice and suggestions “with a grain of salt” until I have personally vetted the source of information and/or consulted with my psychiatrist of 22 years or PTSD psychotherapist.
Natasha, I stand behind your responses and conclusions 100%. And can support each and every one of them with my own personal experience. Please continue to keep up the great work!! Those that send you heinous and disrespectful responses need to take a closer look at themselves before deflecting their suffering on to you.
Take good care!????
Oops! Please ignore the punctuation at the end. I had attached a sunflower emoji and it turned into exclamation and question marks. :-/
Please remove those if possible. Thank you!
Yay Jules!!! Thank you for supporting Natasha’s position! I totally agree with you and Natasha! I had no idea that DBSA is funded by the government??? Is it? You wrote about it: “general peer support groups such as DBSA…NEVER have I been exposed to a more a chaotic, literally physically dangerous environment, than when I have attended DBSA peer supported groups – and I mean EVERY SINGLE meeting I have ever attended! The combination of a group of folks suffering from a wide array of mental illness together, in-person (many suicidal, some even homicidal) plus the absence of any supervision from a licensed clinician, has great potential of placing the consumer in grave danger – I’ve been there! To even consider offering more funding for these groups is abominable!” I never felt in physical danger on the 3-4 times I TRIED DBSA. But it was very chaotic, I agree! Another thing I didn’t like about DBSA is that relatives/parents are welcome. At one group, a mother took over the leadership of the group. What a mess! I felt insulted.
I don’t believe DBSA (or NAMI) is in any way funded by the government. It is a non-profit funded by private donations, the vast majority of which are from pharmaceutical companies. http://www.dbsalliance.org/AR/2014/DBSA.html See donors, corporations at the bottom.
Debby, without a doubt DBSA receives government funding! NAMI supports DBSA. It is clear as day on NAMI’s audited financial statements that they receive income via “Government grants and contracts” to the tune of $400,000+ in 2014. See page 6 at
http://www.nami.org/getattachment/About-NAMI/Our-Finances/Annual-Reports/NAMI-14-FS-Final.pdf
Debby, further proof that DBSA absolutely does receive government funding:
A copy of their own specific audited financial statements (2014); see page 6.
http://www.dbsalliance.org/pdfs/Audited_Financials/2014.pdf
Sorry you feel people are saying you suck. Mostly I saw people begging to differ. Challenging your controversial position. In a respectful way.
If anything, it felt like you were telling people who did peer specialist work that their work was not respectable,worthwhile,or helpful. The best they could aim for is warm fuzzies. (In vernacular, ” they suck”). At least that’s how it feels to me.
It does feel like “you sucks” are in the air. Ironic we both feel it.
Here’s to better days.
Natasha, once again thank you for your article. In addition to my first I’d also ask you the public health outcomes of the peer worker demographic being made unemployed, by your suggestion.
Building a health economics model of 1000s being made unemployed and then charting their health standards, possible employment and employability, projected health decline and any hospital or prison intakes, loss of life, social wellbeing costs and externalities occurring from financial hardship – how much will that cost economically and community health standards – compared to peer worker health funding expenditure? the balance sheet.
Hi Ariel, you’ve made a good point about stopping funding for peer counselors — BUT. The System is replacing mental health professionals because peer workers are cheaper! What about the mental health professionals who have lost their jobs — and their careers — because of governments choosing to spend their funds on peer counselors instead of them? Qualified Mental Health professional and licensed therapists are some of the most underpaid professionals already! I do have an a partial answer insofar as other ways to employ and pay mental health peer counselors. As I said before, it’s to open many mental health peer managed drop in centers, and government should pay to train the peers to make the drop in centers financially self supporting, and fully separate and independent of the System. As I said in a previous post here, we had three such great peer MANAGED drop in centers in my city, but since the peer workers did not realize or understand the absolute necessity of freeing themselves from the System by creating self-financing (NOT GRANTS!) the agency closed them down! Grants are just another way to control organizations; when the grants finally end (and they always do) either the organization crashes or else it’s taken away by the government funding, then funding is removed later on. I have seen this happen several times in my long life. It would take several – — many? — years for a new peer managed drop in center to become financially self sufficient. But two of ours were well on their way to do that, but, of course, the System ended their existence.
I’m going to assume what your saying about mental health professional jobs seesawing to peer jobs as anecdotal.
I agree about funding predicaments. Mad economic theory is only in it’s infancy. I refer to the initiative of Ron Coleman for example
to apply a business protocol of something like user pays for peer to peer services in a country with universal health is something i wouldnt want to do
ps i live in Sydney AU to give context
Hi again, Ariel. I’m thinking you are responding to me when you wrote, “I’m going to assume what your saying about mental health professional jobs seesawing to peer jobs as anecdotal. ” Actually, no. It’s not anecdotal. I have experienced this when I worked for the huge mental health agency. 9 counselors were laid off from the drop in center. They were replaced by peer counselors.
Brilliant and salient comment I think. Your perspective is one I hardly ever hear – thank you.
PS – I was referring to Ariel’s original post.
Natasha, I think your public health economics analysis is wanting. May I suggest you provide quantitative breakdowns of government health expenditure along with flow on effects in not only client health and return to work in a longitudinal analysis along with externalities analysis of peer workforce spending to start off with
i’d be interested to read that
and yes having an institutional analysis of whatever peer practice is like is desperately of touch and stereotypical, enablist mythologies if you will
thanks for starting a conversation but imo your balance sheet style economic argument is rudimentary
best
Hi Ariel and Natasha, great suggestions! Here are some figures from the Oregonian Newspaper, January 24, 2014. COSTS: Care at the Oregon State Hospital runs an estimated $945 a day, or about $344,925 a year, per person, compared with Assertive Community Treatment services, which run $15,000 a year per person. HOSPITAL STAYS: The state has made only limited progress in decreasing use of the state hospital or residential treatment centers for people suffering from mental illness, in decreasing the rate of re-admission and in average confinement time. CASELOADS: Community Intensive management teams in counties across the state have dramatically lower caseloads than other states. [Synergy says] I cannot even imagine caseloads being higher than they are in Oregon.t Oregon has some of the worst mental health systems in the country. The case loads fluctuate up and down every VERY FEW years at a time. The same newspaper’s online site, Oregonlive, says on January 23, 2014: “Oregon far behind in community mental health services, federal report finds. The share of dollars Oregon spent on the state hospital and residential treatment centers actually increased in 2013 — from 69 percent to 74 percent of the state’s mental health funding for adults — while spending dropped for community-based services. ” Golocalpdx says in Dec. 27, 2014: “Oregon 5th Worst State in Caring For Adult Mental Illness” and this state is the #1 worst as far as mental health care in the prisons. The jails and prisons are the main place where people with mental illness end up here.
Respectfully Ariel, your comment is nonsensical and “rudimentary” and only serves one purpose: an insult. Your lack of grammar and attempt to be verbose does not serve your argument well. I am sincerely interested in yours thoughts and opinions yet cannot translate into English what you have posted. Rather your words are merely some sort of illegible insult toward Natasha. Thoughts and opinions on topic are always welcome; personal insults are just a waste of everyone’s time. Lastly, having a career as a licensed certified public accountant (CPA), I am baffled by your use of the terminology “balance sheet”. Perhaps researching the nature of this financial statement would be helpful:
bal·ance sheet
noun
noun: balance sheet; plural noun: balance sheets
1. a statement of the assets, liabilities, and capital of a business or other organization at a particular point in time, detailing the balance of income and expenditure over the preceding period.
Gosh. I’m interested in learning about peer specialists. I read many well written and thoughtful accounts, for which I am grateful. oddly, you responded with a thumbs down and a you suck. there are worthy perspectives here. Not Hate mail. maybe WTF mail. You didn’t find any good to praise.
Hi Manygins,
You may have read the images the wrong way. That was what people thought of me, not what I think of them. Apologies for the confusion.
– Natasha Tracy
Dear Natasha, You are great — you must be totally unflappable, at least that is how you come across at this blog. One time when I was trying to get some articles published in a national magazine (didn’t accomplish that….) I was in an article writing class. The teacher was a published article writer. he said, “If you are going to be a writer, you need only a few things; A small, quiet, private office with only these things in it: A typewriter (in those days!), paper, desk, chair, and a little rhinoceros figurine. The rhinoceros reminds the writer that s/he has to have a VERY THICK SKIN. I appreciate you and your blog and beautiful writing, Natasha. I totally feel really bad for you and the rest of your readers who have to put u p with all this hate mail. Most of the Replies today have been hate mail. I try to read some of them to see if they really have any thing of value to say. Some do, some do not. “You suck” is not hate mail???? C’mon.
Hi Synergy,
Oh, I definitely flap :)
But I totally agree, that unless you are writing about how cute bunnies are, you need an impenetrable (as much as possible) skin. It’s not an easy thing to say what you think, especially when you _know_ that hate mail is coming.
But unless someone starts the conversation, then when will se talk about important issues?
And, believe it or not, some serious activists do agree with me on this one. I won’t name them because I don’t want them to get hate mail, but I know they are on my side, even if the others are not aware of it.
– Natasha Tracy
By the way, Natasha, since you moderate all the Replies and Comments, why do you allow hate mail, without deleting it? It really is very offensive to me, you, and maybe some of your other enthusiasts. Lately your blog is overbalanced with hate mail.
Hi Synergy,
Honestly, I can’t win with comments. If I delete things (which I wouldn’t) then I’m censoring people and if I don’t, then people disagree with what I allow online and it causes others distress.
All I can tell you is that I come down on the side of free speech. I believe that people, no matter how hateful they are, deserve to express themselves. There are limitations to this, however, and I do remove some of the worst comments that have nothing useful to say whatsoever.
And I tend not to allow people to insult each other in the comments. That I try to nip in the bud. But for me, I know that I can take the hatred, so I let it be.
I’m sorry you find it offensive but try to understand that the freedom of speech is important and these people? What they say says more about them then it does about me (or you).
– Natasha Tracy
Thanks for your two nice Replies and explanations! Glad to hear you are have your “little purple rhinoceros.”
A strong “prescription” for people with bipolar or major depression is to surround ourselves with positive people, programs, etc. This does not mean “positive thinking” to exclusion of recognizing problems and working on solutions. I, for instance, only go to websites that are positive. I ignore any sites that bug me or give me a sense of frustration or anger. I do not ever watch mainstream News because it bums me out, and is slanted by the corporations that own the three main TV networks. I also do not buy from stores where the owner or workers are rude. Disagreeing with Natasha respectfully is great and important. But , how about regarding people who have extreme negative reactions to her blog, just go spend time on mental health sites that are helpful to you, make you feel good. Nobody likes trolls or listens to them. I’m amazed that Natasha does not ban trolls. . Ugly comments here just make ma sigh or laugh ruefully.
Thank you for your clarification. I am pro-peer support for certain interventions; some more than what various State Medicaids establish, some less. Overall, I attempt to bring all sides of the peer support movement together to form a common platform. This is a fairly new industry with broad views within and from outside the industry.
I might ask you to consider that you have not received hate mail from your previous article – yet, rather, a different perspective. The most respected journalists, IMHO, are those that try to understand the various perspectives and present an unbiased and objective point of view for folks to ponder. Please embrace the feedback you received and view it as constructive criticism that may shed some light on a different way of viewing things.
It is absolutely clear that the populace has spoken here. Whether individuals, social entities, municipalities, states and the federal government: mental health Peer Support has gained traction in the public sphere for nearly 10 years with a large curves in a) utilization, b) expenditures and c) people within the field. Kindly respect the tens of thousands of Certified Peer Supports as well as non-certified peer supports within the context of your writings.
Thank you for providing space on this topic.
Wow.
Natasha seems to be upgrading her level of hatred to everything that is a pill from pharma company. Bashing prayer, article spitting venom on peer support… and now this vitriolic response to criticism.
“that’s it.” is hardly arguement worthy of anybody considering themselves a writer and educator. (Let me take a moment to laugh at that).
Natasha, tell us, do meds work for YOU? Obviously, ECT didn’t and by your experimention with truehope (how telling your alternative treamtment of choice again is a… pill) meds probably don’t work all that great for you either. Yet you keep pushing it, hush hushing the negatives and telling others to hush hush them, because these treatment might help somebody…. but they may harm them too, so why not give everybody a full opinion?
Of course, you hopped on the Jaffe bandwagon of not promoting programs that help people who WANT IT, but instead give them money to drug up people who DO NOT WANT.
Honestly, this blog used to be interesting, but it more and more seems you are just getting angry and have hard time comprehending nuances… one has to wonder where is this change coming from…..,
Was surprised to see this and went back to read the comments on the original post. I hadn’t read it as dismissing peer support, but just saying that there are so many holes in terms of availability of treatment programs (which are necessary and do require money to fill) that it seems ridiculous to divert money to support programs (which can be helpful for many with less severe mental illness, and don’t usually require money to fill). It’s a zero sum game.
The fact that all treatment programs (or providers) aren’t always helpful/useful might on the surface be an argument to divert money towards other types of programs, but to me it’s a stronger argument for better funding for treatment to ensure there are more treatment options, in the hopes that individuals can find a decent treatment solution for them.
(Anecdotally… we moved to Victoria this past year and have been a bit shocked by the gaps in mental health care, both due to the centralization/restriction on services, and the number of subpar providers in those settings, leaving people with few places to turn. Making more treatment choices available is what’s needed, not less.)
Thank you for clarifying your opinion. I was confused because I value your insights so much and I would consider what you do with this blog as peer support for me. But that is simply a semantic debate. I was totally taken aback by some of the more irate comments to your opinions. I think it is part of the ongoing angst that we are all feeling about money and government involvement in healthcare. Unfortunately, one size does not fit all. One medication does not work for everyone, nothing is completely free and you cannot reduce every treatment to a 12 step program model. Please keep posting your opinions. I find great value in your experiences. Thank you.
Your separation between education and peer is a distinction with a difference. I’d suggest that you reiterate this from time to time as part of your core message and credential. I am a supporter of bipolars as adjunct authorities to aid families and first responders. Your insight – for instance this very distinction – can be life-saving. This is very important in light of how citizens with personality disorders will be treated during encounters with police.