Hi folks, I'm very proud to say that my book, Sedated, is released today! I've done everything within my power to write a book worthy of your time - one that illuminates via interviews, stories & research why our mental health sector is broken & how we may put it right again. 1/5

RT @JDaviesPhD: A psych-diagnosis doesn't identify what your problem is. It's rather, at best, an fumbling attempt to describe the form you….

RT @joannamoncrieff: Our critique of the 2024 antidepressant withdrawal review. Underestimating withdrawal "means the many people who suffe….

I think this is essential. The presenting problem is almost never the actual problem; so much of the early work is about discerning, clarifying, rendering conscious, what the actual problem is. That evolving understanding shapes the therapeutic direction of travel.

A psych-diagnosis doesn't identify what your problem is. It's rather, at best, an fumbling attempt to describe the form your suffering takes. Diagnosis has therefore nothing remotely useful to say about what generates your distress. That's the most generous take I can muster.

5/ . This isn't to say avoid the clinic, it’s to say know what you're entering; its to say think sociologically about what dynamics & forces are at play behind the barage of surface practices and meanings. End.

4/ . (just like the confessional; where personal problems are celestialised & redemption rooted in greater deference to God). Entering the clinic means subjecting yourself to a site that work us into particular kinds of subjects, recipients & consumers. .

3/. certain economic, political or ideological interests. To socialise people in interested directions. It's a space where people’s vulnerability is easily converted into subservience; into a mindsets advantageous to exisiting power arrangements. .

2/ . into ideologies that pronounce upon what is wrong with them, what causes their distress & what must be done to put them right. This has naturally made the clinic a space of vital importance for many institutional actors, who see this it as an opportunity to advance. .

A short 🧵on the sociology of the clinical space. The psych-clinic isn’t a disinterested, apolitical medical space. It’s a ritual space, loaded with meanings legitimated by the powerful symbolism of medicine. It’s where vulnerable (& so susceptible) people are socialised. .

RT @joannamoncrieff: For those who, like me, may have been away from X for a bit, here is Bob Whitaker's summary of the evidence on antidep….

The psych-status quo would much rather you believed in the authority of ‘experts’ than in the authority of science & evidence.

A sinister phrase in mental health is 'treatment resistant' (meaning: you've tried 2 different drugs but neither worked). The phrase implies there's something wrong with *you* rather than with the drugs, or with your being denied more effective non-drug, psychosocial provision.

RT @MitoPsychoBio: The amount of resources invested into creating a profitable disease care system is sickening.

RT @drjasonfung: Wow. Big Pharma paying $millions to doctors writing guidelines that govern the practice of psychiatry. Don’t you think the….

RT @JollyAlice: Was absolutely fascinated by this book.

Among depressed older adults, those prescribed SSRIs or SNRIs had a 33% increased risk of dementia within 2 years compared to those receiving psychotherapy, after adjusting for demographic/clinical factors. Are SSRIs helping drive the dementia epidemic?

"The mental health interventions preferred since the 1980s are ones that have pathologised, depoliticised & commodified our emotional distress –robbing it of its capacity to illuminate social ills, galvanise social action & facilitate lasting/meaningful personal & social change".

RT @bullfranx: As it turns out, there are no shortcuts to the examined life. Not even disciplinary ones!.

RT @JDaviesPhD: All psych-disciplines like to project the idea that they have some kind of privileged access to psychological truth. Som….

All psych-disciplines like to project the idea that they have some kind of privileged access to psychological truth. Some even go so far as to build whole psychological fantasy worlds to claim privileged access to truths only they can fathom. .