This document provides an overview of the concept of recovery in mental health. It discusses the history and origins of recovery as defined by service user activists, outlines various definitions of recovery including clinical and personal perspectives, and reviews frameworks that have been developed to describe the recovery process. The document also examines issues with quantifying recovery and potential abuses of the recovery model. It argues that social work approaches to recovery should focus on both personal change and challenging oppressive social structures. Finally, it suggests moving towards a social justice definition of recovery that promotes social inclusion, combats stigma, and creates supportive environments.
2. Session Plan
INTRO: What does recovery look like to you?
What recovery looks like to me …
A history of recovery in mental health
The Social Construction of Recovery
Definitions …
The Clinical vs The Personal
Frameworks and Stars – Quantifying Recovery?
Abuses of Recovery
Ten Top Tips to Recovery-Oriented Practice
Recovery and Social Work
Towards a Social Justice Definition of Recovery
5. A history of recovery …
The story of John Thomas Perceval (1803 – 1876) …
Detained in
‘mental asylums’
for a number of
years, including
Brislington House
in Bristol
6. A history of recovery …
Perceval speaks of his
‘recovery’, attributing
this to various factors,
including:
• access to books he
enjoyed reading;
• contact with family;
• spirituality;
• acceptance by
others; and
• being a voice for
others.
7. A history of recovery …
(Bateson, 1961, p.xiii)
Perceval turned his rage into action, and the same action proved
fundamental to his recovery. He has been acknowledged as a mental
health advocacy pioneer for his lifetime campaign. (Brandon, 2007)
8. A history of recovery …
The initial impetus for the development of ‘recovery’ in
mental health came from the ‘survivor’ movement, most
particularly within the United States during the late 1980s
and early 1990s (Roberts & Wolfson, 2004).
Publishing of a number of first-person accounts of
‘recovery’ from mental illness:
Marcia Lovejoy (1984): Recovery From Schizophrenia: A
Personal Odyssey
Esso Leete (1989): How I Perceive and Manage my Illness
Ron Coleman (1999): Recovery: An Alien Concept
9. ‘Recovery’ integrated into policy
The journey to recovery: the Government’s vision for mental
health care (2001):
“The mental health system must support people in settings of their
own choosing, enable access to community resources including
housing, education, work, friendships – or whatever they think is
critical to their own recovery” (p.24)
No health without mental health (2011):
“Objective (ii) – More people with mental health problems will
recover:
More people who develop mental health problems will have a good
quality of life – greater ability to manage their own lives, stronger
social relationships, a greater sense of purpose, the skills they need
for living and working, improved chances in education, better
employment rates, and a suitable and stable place to live.” (p.30)
10. The Social Construction of Recovery
Countless definitions of ‘recovery’:
“Each definition uses its own language and fits
different disciplines, models or frameworks…there
are unlimited definitions and meanings of
recovery, none of which are right or wrong…”
(Campbell et.al, 2013, p.39)
YET, from a Foucauldian perspective, power
relations in society are expressed through
language use – or discourse
Therefore, the definition we adopt represents a
particular discourse, a particular way of thought,
and we need to reflect on the role of power within
this discourse.
11. Some definitions …
CLINICAL Recovery …
Full symptom remission, full or
part time work / education,
independent living without
supervision by informal carers,
having friends with whom
activities can be shared –
sustained or a period of 2 years
(Lieberman and Kopelowicz, 2002)
12. Some definitions …
“The goal of recovery is not to become
normal. The goal is to embrace the human
vocation of becoming more deeply, more
fully human.”
(Pat Deegan, 1996)
“Recovery is not a gift from clinicians, but the responsibility of us all. We
must become confident in our own ability to change our lives, we must
give up being reliant on others doing everything for us. We must have
the confidence to give up being ill so that we can start being recovered.”
(Ron Coleman, 1999)
PERSONAL Recovery …
http://www.mentalhealthcare.o
rg.uk/view_all_videos/mike_sla
de_video_clip_1
13. The Clinical vs The Personal …
• “Flat. Lacking in motivation, sleep and appetite good. Discussed
aetiology. Cont. LiCarb 250mg qid. Levels next time.”
EXTRACT
FROM
CLINICAL
NOTES
• “Today I wanted to die. Everything was hurting. My body was
screaming. I saw the doctor. I said nothing. Now I feel terrible.
Nothing seems good and nothing good seems possible. I am
stuck in this twilight mood where I go down into a lonely black
hole. Where there is room for only one.”
EXTRACT
FROM DIARY
(O’Hagan, 1996)
16. Quantifying recovery??
‘Processes’ vs ‘outcomes’
Is the primary loyalty to:
“the application of a rather reductionist form of science” OR
“the honouring of lived experience and to justice in service systems and the
wider society” (O’Hagan, 2012a)
“…lack of standardisation in data collection” (Dickens et.al, 2012)
Conceptualising recovery as a ‘model’
“…may fit with the constructs and understanding of practitioners” BUT
“could destroy the essence of recovery from the service-user discourse drawn
from lived experience”
(Campbell et.al 2012, p.39)
There is a sense of ‘recovery’ being hijacked by professionals (O’Hagan,
2012b)
17. ABUSES of Recovery …
1. Recovery is the latest model;
2. Recovery does not apply to “my” patients;
3. Services can make people recover through effective
treatment;
4. Compulsory detention and treatment aid recovery;
5. A recovery orientation means closing services;
6. Recovery is about making people independent and
normal;
7. Contributing to society happens only after the person
has recovered.
(Slade et.al, 2014)
18. Recovery and Social Work …
The central tenets of the recovery movement are supported by social
work values, most notably those of:
consumer empowerment
self-determination
worth of the individual, and
concern for the environmental role in personal experience
(Carpenter, 2002)
For social work, ‘recovery’ should not be just about facilitating personal
change, but also about generating change in the oppressive structures
that are hindering recovery:
“…finding ways in which service users, family, friends and practitioners
can work collaboratively both to challenge and to resist the corrosive
impact of social oppression.”
(Tew et.al 2012, p.455)
19. Towards a social justice
definition of recovery …
“…facilitating social justice for persons in recovery means
directly targeting the injustices and discrimination that they
experiences due to stigma” (Carr et.al 2014, p.1112)
“
“…recovery-oriented social work
interventions should be directed at
promoting social citizenship for people
diagnosed with mental illness,
combating stigma, and creating the
psychological and social environments
for finding meaning and hope after
receiving a diagnosis.”
(Williams, Almeida, & Knyahnytska, 2015)
20. Recovery is …
‘Recovery’ is the term that mental health service user activists
adopted as a political statement to spotlight the totality of their
being, away from professionals’ definition of maintaining a
symptom-free existence, to one in which they live life in its
entirety, in the way they choose, while establishing their own
strategies to manage their mental health.
It is also the word that some mental health service user activists
are now considering abandoning as they believe that this has
been ‘colonised’ by professionals, and integrated into policy in a
way that makes it unrecognisable to them, as it has been reduced
to measureable outcomes debasing their personal, individual
journey as a process.
21. References
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Psychosis 1830-1832. Stanford: Stanford University Press.
Brandon, D. (2007, October). A friend to alleged lunatics. Mental Health
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Campbell, J., Stickley, T. Bonney, S. and Wright, N. (2012). Recovery as a
framework for care planning. In A. Hall, M. Wren and S.D. Kirby (Eds.) Care
Planning in Mental Health: Promoting Recovery. Oxford: Wiley Blackwell.
Carpenter, J. (2002). Mental health recovery paradigm: implications for
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Carr, E.R., Bhagwat, R., Miller, R. and Ponce, A.N. (2014). Training in mental
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Coleman, R. (1999). Recovery: An Alien Concept. Gloucester: Handsell
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Leete, E. (1989). How I perceive and manage my illness. Schizophrenia
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O’Hagan, M. (2012a). Recovery: is consensus possible? World Psychiatry, 11(3):
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http://www.scottishrecovery.net/Latest-News/the-science-of-recovery.html
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Slade, M., Amering, M., Farkas, M., Hamilton, B., O’Hagan, M., Panther, G.,
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Williams, C.C., Almeida, M. and Knyahnytska, Y. (2015). Towards a
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British Journal of Social Work, 45, Supplement 1, i9–i26.