Mad in America: Rethinking Mental Health

Ronda "Ro" Speight is a mental health peer specialist and recovery advocate at the Mental Health Association of Westchester in Westchester County, New York. She is a person with lived experience with the psychiatric system and a trained co-facilitator in an innovative approach that combines peer support and principles of the Open Dialogue approach called Peer Supported (Partnered) Open Dialogue (P...

This week on  MIA Radio  we interview Dr. Stuart Shipko. Dr. Shipko is a psychiatrist in private practice in Pasadena, California and author of the books Surviving Panic Disorder, Xanax Withdrawal and Dr. Shipko's Informed Consent for SSRI Antidepressants. Stuart has over 30 years' experience as a psychiatrist and an extensive background in the psychotherapies. He writes for Mad in America on issu...

This episode of "Mad in the Family" focuses on how adolescents can better manage and even overcome anxiety—something the news media and our own eyes tell us so many young people these days are struggling with. Our guest is Jodi Amen, LCSW, a psychotherapist and coach who has more than 20 years of experience working with children, their parents, and helpers. A graduate of Columbia University School...

N ikolas Rose is a professor of Sociology in the Department of Global Health and Social Medicine at King's College London. His work explores how concepts in psychiatry and neuroscience transform how we think about ourselves and govern our societies. Initially training as a biologist, Rose found his subjects unruly: "My pigeons would not peck their keys, and my rats would not run their mazes. They...

J ussi Valtonen is both a novelist and a psychologist. As a novelist, his work has been compared to both George Orwell's 1984 and Aldous Huxley's Brave New World for the way it weaves together social commentary and science fiction to jolt readers into confronting difficult questions about the soon-to-come worlds we are creating in the present. His research as a psychologist investigates how change...

This episode of the "Mad in the Family" podcast discusses the role of human interaction in child development. Specifically, how conflict and miscommunication between parent and child is not only O.K., but crucial to a young person's social and emotional development. According to our guest, Dr. Claudia Gold, the "messiness" of our relationships is exactly what helps us build trust, resilience, and...

Ian Tucker is a professor and director of impact and innovation in the school of psychology at the University of East London. His expertise is in digital media, emotion, and mental health, he has published over 45 articles and book chapters and has a monograph book entitled Social Psychology of Emotion . He is currently authoring an Emotion in the Digital Age monograph for Routledge's Studies in S...

For our second interview for this World Benzodiazepine Awareness Day podcast I'm so pleased to get the chance to chat with Baylissa Frederick. Baylissa is a psychotherapist, coach, and author with two decades of experience working with people from all over the world. She holds a Master's degree in therapeutic counseling and is involved in helping people affected by prescribed antidepressants tranq...

This week on MIA Radio , we present the second part of our podcast to join in the events for World Benzodiazepine Awareness Day 2020 (W-BAD). In part one, we interviewed Angela Peacock and talked about her experiences of taking and coming off benzodiazepines and also her involvement in the film Medicating Normal , which has a special screening and panel discussion on July the 11th at 1:00 PM EST....

This week on  MIA Radio  we present a special episode of the podcast in advance of the events being held to mark World Benzodiazepine Awareness Day, July 11, 2020. The reason we are sharing this interview early is to help draw attention to a special screening of the film Medicating Normal which will be shown on World Benzodiazepine Awareness Day itself. Following this special screening of the film...

MIA's Justin Karter interviews psychiatrist Awais Aftab about how "conceptual competence" uses philosophy to transform psychiatry. A wais Aftab is a psychiatrist in Cleveland, Ohio, and Clinical Assistant Professor of Psychiatry at Case Western Reserve University. He is a member of the executive council of the Association for the Advancement of Philosophy and Psychiatry. He has been actively invol...

This week on MIA Radio we turn our attention to electroconvulsive therapy (known as electroshock in the US). It's fair to say that ECT remains a controversial subject with proponents and detractors regularly disagreeing on its safety and efficacy. The number of psychiatrists willing to administer ECT, particularly in the UK, is in decline but we are still using it to administer electric shocks to...

S cott Greenspan recently received his doctorate in School Psychology from the University of Massachusetts Amherst. As a mental health counselor, he works to create opportunities for schools to be "hubs of wellness interventions." Scott's research draws from his own experiences working with youth in a variety of capacities, as well as his understanding of the vital role exercise plays in wellness....

D ainius Pūras is a medical doctor and human rights advocate. He is currently serving the final year of his term as the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the right of everyone to the enjoyment of the highest attainable standard of health. He is also a professor at Vilnius University, Lithuania, and the director of the Human Rights Monitoring Institute, an NGO based in Vilnius. Pūras has been a...

S unil Bhatia is a professor and chair of the Department of Human Development at Connecticut College. He is the author of two books and over 50 articles and book chapters. He has received numerous awards for his work in the field of decolonizing psychology, cultural psychology, and qualitative methods and for studies of migrant and racial identities. Most recently, his second book, Decolonizing ps...

This week on  MIA Radio , we interview Nicole Beurkens, PhD, about the impact of the COVID-19 crisis and "quarantine life" on children with different types of behavioral, emotional, and neurodevelopmental challenges. Families may be understandably worried that the stress of lockdown may aggravate their child's struggles. Yet, we hear some parents say the situation has changed their child for the b...

This week on MIA Radio we share the audio from our first Town Hall panel discussion. Mad in America, Open Excellence and the HOPEnDialogue project have collaborated to create an ongoing series of Town Hall discussions exploring the challenges, learnings and opportunities for personal and societal growth found through dialogical responses to crisis in the age of COVID-19. The title of this first di...

This week on  MIA Radio , we interview Sam Himelstein, PhD, about the impact of the Coronavirus crisis and "social distancing" policies on adolescents, taking a look at the unique needs teenagers and young adults may have and the challenges they may present for parents, caregivers, and other family members. Relevant Links Center for Adolescent Studies Family First Psychotherapy Sam Himelstein's we...

Ian Puppe is an instructor and research associate in anthropology at the University of Western Ontario in Ontario, Canada. Puppe's work focuses on the anthropology of First Nations peoples, global studies, social justice, and peace studies. As an instructor at the university, he teaches anthropology of tourism and Indigenous Studies. He also currently serves as the Canadian Anthropology Society's...

Mab Segrest is Professor Emeritus of Gender and Women's Studies at Connecticut College and the author of Administrations of Lunacy : Racism and the Haunting of American Psychiatry at the Milledgeville Asylum, and Memoir of a Race Traitor , both from the New Press. A long time activist in social justice movements and a past fellow at the National Humanities Center, she lives in Durham, North Caroli...

This week on MIA Radio , we chat with Paula J. Caplan . Paula is a clinical and research psychologist, author of books and plays, playwright, actor, director, and activist. She was born and raised in Springfield, Missouri, attended Greenwood Laboratory School, received her A.B. with honors from Radcliffe College of Harvard University, and received her M.A. and Ph. D. in psychology from Duke Univer...

Welcome to  MIA Reports , showcasing our independent and original journalism devoted to rethinking psychiatry. We take selected MIA Reports and provide them as audio articles. Click  here  for the text version of this and all of our MIA reports. Medication-Free Treatment in Norway - A Private Hospital Takes Center Stage Written by Robert Whitaker, read by James Moore with thanks to Birgit Valla fo...

Ian Parker is one of the most important contemporary critics of the discipline of psychology. A prolific writer, with over 25 books to his name, he has a formidable reputation in the fields of critical psychology, Marxist psychology, and psychoanalytic theory. He is a fellow of the British psychological society, Emeritus Professor at the University of Leicester, and the managing editor of the Annu...

This week on MIA Radio , we chat with Beatrice Birch who is the initiator of the residential healing community Inner Fire . For over 35 years, Beatrice worked as a Hauschka artistic therapist in integrative clinics and inspiring initiatives in England, Holland and the USA where the whole human being of body, soul and spirit was recognized and appreciated in the healing process. She has lectured an...

This week on MIA Radio , we interview Laysha Ostrow.  L aysha is the founder and CEO of Live & Learn , a research and consulting company that specializes in the inclusion of people with lived experience of the mental health system. She researches community-driven interventions that present safe and effective pathways to independence and empowerment. Ostrow earned her PhD from the Johns Hopkins Sch...