PART X: Demonstrating to the Relatives
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TREASURE: In our last conversation you were about to tell us how you were able to demonstrate the Recovery principles to relatives who visited patients on the wards of the Psychiatric Institute where Dr. Low was beginning to formulate the Recovery self-help method. It was in your capacity as news-gatherer for the little self-help newspaper called The Retriever.
PHIL: Well, two or three times a week, afternoon teas were given and the relatives were encouraged to attend. It would have been very easy for each patient to simply sit at a table with his own relative, somewhat in isolation from the others who were gathered for the teas. But Dr. Low encouraged those of us who were working on the newspaper to circulate. So we made it a point to sit, for instance, at the table of a newer ward patient whose relative or relatives were present. After a few amenities we would bring out the fact that, although Recovery didn't tell us to shout it from the house-tops that we have been mentally ill to everyone who would listen, it did definitely make it clear to us that it was of great importance that we should not BLAME ourselves for our illness; that there was no disgrace in being an improving mental patient still in the hospital. We were able to demonstrate to the relative, to the other patient AND to ourselves that we should not feel stigmatized, one of the most important of the Recovery principles!
TREASURE: You news gatherers provided help for Dr. Low in reaching these relatives. Would this be written up in The Retriever?
PHIL: Well, sure, the afternoon teas were often a subject we wrote about. In fact there is a humorous side of it brought out in My Dear Ones, where one of the writers poked some fun at one of the nurses in attendance. In the case of the relatives we probably would mention that one of the patients had said he sure enjoyed the afternoon tea and the friendly spirit there was on the wards, and that he had learned to think of his illness as being average, after meeting other patients who spoke about their mental difficulties without shame.
TREASURE: I know Dr. Low was on the right track, Phil. Every time you folks talked about the sense of shame attached to mental illness, and brought out the Recovery principle that no one must be held responsible for an illness he has contracted, you weakened your own stigma and strengthened your own belief in the realistic fact that it is an illness, the same as pneumonia or asthma are illnesses. In the final analysis that's what we discover, as we get our training in Recovery. . . . most of the sense of shame resides right within our own thinking. Once WE lose that sense of shame, then we are much better able to handle any residue of stigma that may still be left in this world.
PHIL: The talking about it and writing about it in The Retriever certainly helped me to also be indifferent to the stigma when I finally was asked to accompany Dr. Low on a demonstration panel before the members of the staff of the Chicago State Hospital, and the relatives and friends of the patients there. This took place within about a month of my discharge from the Psychiatric Institute. It was much easier to demonstrate averageness because I had learned to speak fearlessly about my illness.
TREASURE: How did you demonstrate averageness at the panel demonstration?
PHIL: By not only giving an account of how I had improved but also by walking up and shaking hands afterwards with many in the audience. They were all strangers to me but I demonstrated that I considered myself an average member of the group, and not as a person who thinks of himself as exceptionally undesirable because he has been mentally ill.
TREASURE: But, Phil, you are such an outgoing person anyway, this was probably easy for you.
PHIL: At that time, I can assure you, it was not at all easy for me! I had never spoken in public and especially into a microphone. I remember in The Retriever it was written up something like this: "Phil spoke out at the Chicago State Hospital in a voice loud and clear about his own recovery from mental illness." As a matter of fact I recall that my voice came through a little TOO loud over that speaker. But Dr. Low reminded me that my loud voice was a triviality and that I should be giving myself credit for my good effort in demonstrating the Recovery stand against the stigma.
TREASURE: I can see how much leadership Dr. Low gave in this matter of the stigma. But also, Phil, you patients were the ones who had to speak out bravely and demonstrate again and again, in order to dislodge your own sense of stigma. In that day and age this was a rarity. You folks blazed the trail for the rest of us and we're grateful.
PHIL: It seems to me we have dealt with this idea of stigma in several of our articles. Next issue we'll go on to other matters where Recovery principles are important. But I agree with you on the vital importance of ridding ourselves (and as much as possible our relatives) from the stigma. It is a basic point.
TREASURE: Next issue, Phil, I would like to discuss My Dear Ones by Neil and Margaret Rau -- we both have been receiving mail from all parts of the country about it.
PHIL: Fine. No question about the impact that book is having and will have--and it certainly ties in with the history that you and I have been discussing. See you then.
