Discussion If there was an holistic recovery process (not only therapy + medication), do you think you would recover?

[ForgottenAgain]

Imagine there was a service that would assess you and your life as a whole, so not only evaluating your mental health, but also evaluating several other aspects of your life so they can have a deeper understanding of how all these problems connect and influence your well being.

As an example, this imaginary service would look into the following areas of your life:

• Mental health
• Physical health
• Personal finances
• Fulfilment/purpose
• Social connection

And based on this, they would define a tangible plan to tackle your problems in these areas.
You would meet with them every X days/weeks and discuss the steps that were taken, what comes next, what worked and what didn't and adapt the plan.

 

[ma0]

I could see it helping slightly more, but as a person I don't really care about my health. I could absolutely see this new system helping me understand my thoughts and feeling better, though, certainly a lot more than meds could :P

 

[missedmybus]

I think society would have to change first.

 

[GlassMoon]

I think that's what I've been looking for in a way, even though it's still going slow. I have something like a social worker now, and that helps me tap other aspects of life to some extent. But if a medical rehab program were based around "living a well rounded life", that would make so much sense! Like, they'd teach you to cook meals that you can also quickly prepare for a family during work-life, instead of a diner which we were taught, and which takes 2 hours to make with 5 people. Or role-playing interactions with new people, how to work from having an acquaintance to make friends with them, and how to keep a conversation that got stuck going, and knowing how much you can open up to others. How to tell your co-workers that you're not going to be the one convincing the boss of something, and generally, how to be more brave in confronting your boss. We did do a section on "values", but that was purely theoretical. Would have been nice to discuss those with others, see which values might be missing.

Time with those people was really great, but when I met some of them a while later, I learned how much of the human interactions I had missed out on, and there's barely traffic on the chat group which we established during the clinic stay. I do my part to engage in discussion every now and then, but usually only get short replies from the same few people.

Or just generally peeking into the lifes of people who can deal with job, family and friends without being overwhelmed.

 

[inthebay]

i think something like this would theoretically help me immensely, but the reason for my si atp is so strong that it definitely downplays the effectiveness of all if this- i really think this would help a lot of people though.

 

[Flightless Wings]

It's too late. As long as I'm driving the bus, it's going off a cliff. The emotional problems just feel too innate to fix.

 

[Poltergeist]

Only if they had an accurate understanding of my experience and believed what I had tried.

It would also need to be like a service where they come in to my room every morning and force me to do things, maybe helping me start to move and get up. A lot of therapy models focus on those main areas as well, but I need someone to act as the physical push during depression when language and words lose any volitional ability.
I saw a therapist twice a week when I was paying and they were very nice, understanding, and trained in all the areas you discuss but the experience in itself didn't help when I lost my mind.

 

[Forever Sleep]

Wouldn't a life coach do this or, do they just focus in on specific areas? This is what I think therapy should be about also though. Evaluating a person's needs vs. whether their lifestyle fulfills them and, how it might need to change to do so. Practical advice.

I doubt I could either afford the money or the time for such a service though. My work schedule is very much all or nothing. It can be hard to live a balanced life after we make certain choices.

Especially career choices. We have to earn money. Some jobs are incredibly demanding. Even if we enjoy them, they can take up the majority of our time or leave us too tired for other things. Yet, they may give us the most fulfilment in life and they may not pay well enough to reduce our hours.

I've certainly been in that position and I know others who are also. I just think the practicalities of life can sometimes all pile up to work against one another. You prioritise the things you believe will bring you the most happiness or, the things you need to survive but, you may end up neglecting other things.

Unless this service was willing to just give you the cash to free up some time, I don't see how it could solve some people's problems. It wouldn't though. It would take up more of their time and money instead. Great though- if you've got the money and time to do it and are willing to make changes.

I suppose it's something we could do ourselves though also. What are we lacking in life? What could we change in order to provide it? Ultimately- we'll know better than a strager what we do and don't have. What makes us happier. Even what the healthier choices are in life. I suspect most of us know them. We just don't always do them!

 

[ForgottenAgain]

Wouldn't a life coach do this or, do they just focus in on specific areas? This is what I think therapy should be about also though. Evaluating a person's needs vs. whether their lifestyle fulfills them and, how it might need to change to do so. Practical advice.

I doubt I could either afford the money or the time for such a service though. My work schedule is very much all or nothing. It can be hard to live a balanced life after we make certain choices.

Especially career choices. We have to earn money. Some jobs are incredibly demanding. Even if we enjoy them, they can take up the majority of our time or leave us too tired for other things. Yet, they may give us the most fulfilment in life and they may not pay well enough to reduce our hours.

I've certainly been in that position and I know others who are also. I just think the practicalities of life can sometimes all pile up to work against one another. You prioritise the things you believe will bring you the most happiness or, the things you need to survive but, you may end up neglecting other things.

Unless this service was willing to just give you the cash to free up some time, I don't see how it could solve some people's problems. It wouldn't though. It would take up more of their time and money instead. Great though- if you've got the money and time to do it and are willing to make changes.

I suppose it's something we could do ourselves though also. What are we lacking in life? What could we change in order to provide it? Ultimately- we'll know better than a strager what we do and don't have. What makes us happier. Even what the healthier choices are in life. I suspect most of us know them. We just don't always do them!

From the very little I know about life coaches, they are not experts on all these areas.

In my mind, this service would be through something like the NHS and you would meet with experts in the relevant areas that you struggle with (psychologist for mental health issues, finance person for money related issues, etc). Then these people would work as a team to create a plan to hopefully get your life on track. So if your job is too draining and you're struggling with money and mental health, the team would setup a plan to find other better suitable job openings, improve your finances if there are expenses that can be cut or replace by cheaper ones, activities/relaxation to help recharge for the next day, etc.

The service would have to be publicly funded so all could access and benefit from it. Obviously this is all imaginary, but it's something I wondered whether people would feel like it would be a better help.

 

[Praestat_Mori]

Depending on the severity of the problems someone has it's likely to help if suitable holistic solutions can be provided.

Example: If there are MH problems bc of external circumstances then those circumstances must change to have a chance the MH problems can be successfully treated. It can be a quite complex process.

In my case, I would easily recover if I had a solution to my problem.

 

[Forever Sleep]

From the very little I know about life coaches, they are not experts on all these areas.

In my mind, this service would be through something like the NHS and you would meet with experts in the relevant areas that you struggle with (psychologist for mental health issues, finance person for money related issues, etc). Then these people would work as a team to create a plan to hopefully get your life on track. So if your job is too draining and you're struggling with money and mental health, the team would setup a plan to find other better suitable job openings, improve your finances if there are expenses that can be cut or replace by cheaper ones, activities/relaxation to help recharge for the next day, etc.

The service would have to be publicly funded so all could access and benefit from it. Obviously this is all imaginary, but it's something I wondered whether people would feel like it would be a better help.

It's a lovely idea.

 

[TransilvanianHunger]

Sounds very strange, honestly, at least from the way it's being described — a group of people who tell you how to live life, how to face every challenge, how to fix every issue. Mothering-as-a-service, almost. Instead of helping people regain a sense of agency over their lives, we get a group of people to do things for them. Feels like it would almost be detrimental rather than beneficial.

Also, a lot of the information being discussed here can be obtained pretty easily if one wants to do so, particularly regarding practical skills, financial literacy, exercising, improving one's diet, and so on.