Suicide prevention week- post #4

I appreciate professionals out there that are trying to look at treating mental health in creative ways.  Reading this article reminded me a lot of the therapist I saw in the midst of the depths, and the power of her respect for and trust in me.  It didn't always stop her from sending my to the psych ward, but in the state I was in, it shouldn't have.  She didn't make me feel like I was one of her "cases," despite the enormous files that built up from our work together.  To this day, there are few people that I respect and am grateful towards more than this therapist that walked through the depths with me for 2 years.

Anywho, here are some quotes from the above mentioned article looking at a particular approach to therapy.

Shrand said that studies find that two-thirds of those who think about or attempt suicide never seek help because of the stigma of mental illness. 

"They are resistant because they worry about being judged as sick," he said. 

The "unpredictability" of mental illness makes people nervous, he said: "It scares us." 

From a biological standpoint, Jan's depression can be seen as a coping mechanism to external influences, or domains, over which she has no control, such as her abusive home life and marriage. 

"It is always remarkable that people are not doing worse," Shrand said. "The imax approach truly sees people doing the best they can."

"I learned I need to be honest and blunt about my feelings. ... They were stuffed so way down deep, I didn't know what a feeling was."