RECOVERY FROM MENTAL ILLNESS IS, GENERALLY SPEAKING: A LEARNED SKILL
The treatments on this website can be delivered by peers, those who have experienced a mental illness, and learned many secrets of recovery.
Recovery 101 contains the Consensus Statement on Mental Health Recovery (also below), explains the stages of grief an individual goes through after receiving a diagnosis of a mental illness. Typically family members and other loved ones will experience grief as well. It also contaons the L.E.A.P. program, giving valuable tools to aid yourself, or others in the recovery process.
Recovery: A Path for Difficult People is primarly about transforming anger. Recognizing our own difficult behaviors can be a difficult task. The Video series How to Deal with Difficult People by Dr. Rick Brinkman & Dr. Rick Kirschner is recommended for this as well as for tools in dealing with the difficult people you do encounter.
Peer to Peer is the NAMI approved scripted course on recovery.Peer to Peer
Understanding your emotions is a valuable tool in recovery. Often those with a mental health diagnosis have difficulty seperating out their emotions. This is often due to traumatic events occuring nearly at the same time a strong differing emotion occurred, particularly during childhood. The WRAP program helps people to increase thier emotional intelligence.
Forgiveness, both of ourselves and others is important for Recovery to become a reality as if we hold anger within we will never truely recover.
Consensus Statement on Mental Health Recovery
Hope
Recovery provides the essential and motivating message of a better future- that people can and do overcome the barriers and obstacles that confront them. Hope is internalized; but can be fostered by peers, families, friends, providers, and others. Hope is the catalyst of the recovery process.
At the beginning of the 20th Century, approximately 6% of those diagnosed with a serious mental illness ever recovered. By the beginning of the 21st century recovery began to exceed 50%. Recovery rates are expected to grow.
Self direction
Consumers lead, control, exercise choice over, and determine their own path of recovery by optimizing autonomy, independence, and control of resources to achieve a self-determined life. By definition, the recovery process must be self-directed by the individual, who defines his or her own life goals and designs a unique path towards those goals.
Individualized and Person Centered
There are multiple pathways to recovery based on an individual's unique strengths and resilience as well as his or her needs, preferences, experiences (including past trauma), and cultural background in all of its diverse representations. Individuals also identify recovery as being an ongoing journey and an end result as well as an overall paradigm for achieving wellness and optimal mental health.
Empowerment
Consumers have the authority to choose from a range of options and to participate in all decisions-including the allocation of resources-that will affect their lives, and are educated and supported in so doing. They have the ability to join with other consumers to collectively and effectively speak for themselves about their needs, wants, desires, and aspirations. Through empowerment, an individual gains control of his or her own destiny and influences the organizational and societal structures in his or her life.
Holistic
Recovery encompasses an individual's whole life, including mind, body, spirit, and community. Recovery embraces all aspects of life, including housing, employment, education, mental health and healthcare treatment , complementary and naturalistic services (such as recreational libraries, museums, etc.), addictions treatment, spirituality, creativity, social networks, community participation, and family supports as determined by the person. Families, providers, organizations, systems, communities, and society play crucial roles in creating and maintaining meaningful opportunities for consumer access to these supports.
Non-Linear
Recovery is not a step-by step process but one based on continual growth, occasional setbacks, and learning from experience. Recovery begins with an initial stage of awareness in which a person recognizes that positive change is possible. This awareness enables the consumer to move on to fully engage in the work of recovery.
Strengths Based
Recovery focuses on valuing and building on the multiple capacities, resiliencies, talents, coping abilities, and inherent worth of individuals. By building on these strengths, consumers leave stymied life roles behind and engage in new life roles (e.g., partner, caregiver, friend, student, employee). The process of recovery moves forward through interaction with others in supportive, trust-based based relationships.
Peer Support
Mutual support-including the sharing of experiential knowledge, skills and social learning-plays an invaluable role in recovery. Consumers encourage and engage other consumers in recovery and provide each other with a sense of belonging, supportive relationships, valued roles, and community.
Respect
Community, systems, and societal acceptance and appreciation of consumers, including protecting their rights and eliminating discrimination and stigma-are crucial in achieving recovery. Self-acceptance and regaining belief in one's self are particularly vital. Respect ensures the inclusion and full participation of consumers in all aspects of their lives.
Responsibility
Consumers have a personal responsibility for their own self-care and journeys of recovery. Taking steps towards their goals may require great courage. Consumers must strive to understand and give meaning to their experiences and identify coping strategies and healing processes to promote their own wellness.
The National Consensus Statement on Mental Health Recovery is available at SAMHSA's National Mental Health Information Center at
