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Psychiatry Must Stop Ignoring Trauma, says Dr. Bessel van der Kolk
Yes, please, and thank you for saying so!
Of course psychiatry must not just stop ignoring trauma, it must stop retraumatizing the already traumatized. It’s clients. The very vulnerable people who seek help and end up being harmed further. Not only are hospitals and a lot of standard treatment horribly abusive the medications have been found to be further agents of trauma.
It’s also true that coercion, subtle or otherwise, is the rule in psychiatric care and that the United Nations has also declared forced treatment to be a form of torture.
Hallelujah for folks like Bessel van der Kolk and Gabor Mate who are helping bridge the gap between lived experience and academic clinicians who are totally missing the boat and causing more harm.
We can heal and we do given the right sort of supports. The mainstream mental illness…
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