Category / blog / mentalthoughts
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What is a mental health problem?
What is a mental health problem? You hear the term used a lot in mainstream mental health (I mean the charities and press here). Mental health isn’t the same as physical health, there are of course cross overs, but the experience and the way it’s understood and explored are different. As an aside this is…
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Latvian theatre critic Silvija Radzobe on Mental.
Thanks to Anna Zagorska for the translation. — Mental is performed by a young man who is the only member of art and activism collectivecthe vacuum cleaner. In the center of a small room (not bigger than 20 m2) a large mattress is located where someone is sleeping under the blanket. The audience of 15…
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Mental – Autumn Dates | Madlove and other news.
the vacuum cleaner. News. Mental – Autumn Dates. Riga. Glasgow. London. Manchester. “One of the most powerful portraits of creativity and depression I’ve ever seen… a heart-rending journey.” RealTime Arts The Metropolitan Police call him a Domestic Extremist. The NHS have described him as ‘highly disturbed’ and labelled him with Borderline Personality Disorder. ‘A real and present threat…
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Casual Mental Health Stigma in The Guardian today
People that know me will be fully aware that I have a bit of a bee in my bonnet about the stigma the media has towards people with mental illnesses. It tipped this morning when I read this very offensive piece in the Guardian by Maev Kennedy. http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2013/mar/25/children-parents-mental-health-problem-poor-care (copied below, I will pull the reposting…
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Crying into my tea, instead of rehearsing. – Mental Update 5
Image courtesy of Hannah Hull In a week and a half I’m showing a work in progress of Mental at In-between Time, Bristol. (Afraid the tickets are sold out.) The process from November onwards is going okay, I made an active decision to work with the material on a little and often basis of a…
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Let’s go fucking Mental. – Fourth Mental Update
“Let’s go fucking Mental. Let’s go fucking Mental. Let’s go fucking Mental.” Is a chant I’ve heard groups of beer fuelled white men sing before… I think I was on the train to Glasgow, which is odd as some of the UK’s radical mental health practice originates from the Asylums of 50’s Glasgow, with it’s…
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Mental Health Crisis – A rough survival guide for supporting.
What follows is an email I wrote earlier this year to a group of friends and activists following a serious suicide attempt that lead to an admission to an acute psychiatric ward. Apart from names and places I’ve keep the email as it is because although it speaks about specifics I hope it also speaks…
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The Mad Genius and other pathetic clichés – Second Update.
The Mad Genius and other pathetic clichés. Or. Why is madness fascinating, terrifying and underwhelming in equal measure? You’ve heard the list; Sylvia Plath, Syd Barrett, Van Gogh, Yayoi Kusama etc. – I can’t really be bothered listing more, you know the cliché. The question of significance here is: Are people who suffer debilitating mental…
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Mental – First Update.
Obviously it was something my therapist said. ‘Do you not think that your adult life has been difficult?’ I replied that it hadn’t, until she talked me through some of my experiences I had shared with her. Of having a serious mental illness and being fairly politically active. At which point I reluctantly agreed that…