‘Instead of asking what’s wrong with me, ask what’s happened to me’ - Belfast workshop praised for innovative approach to mental health

Consultant clinical psychologist Dr Lucy Johnstone has praised the co-organisers of the Curious Minds Will Find A Way workshop for their innovative approach to mental health.

Bristol-based Dr Johnstone was guest speaker at the workshop, hosted by Participation and the Practice of Rights (PPR) New Script for Mental Health and Glór na Mona.

Part of the West Belfast Health and Wellbeing Festival Féile na gCloigini Gorma, the workshop explored hopeful narratives about emotional distress.

Speaking to The Irish News following the event in Belfast’s Conway Mill, Dr Johnstone said there was a “major shift taking place about the way we think about mental health problems”.

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She added: “The most dominant model so far is what we sometimes call the ‘medical model’. People have disorders and illnesses which need medication and although medication can sometimes be helpful, there is increasing recognition that in just about every case, people break down and have very real experience of distress because of what goes on in their lives.

“So, the shorthand slogan for that is, instead of asking what’s wrong with me, ask what’s happened to me.

“I am not the only person saying that by a long way. I am part of a group of people campaigning to have the social determinants - what goes on in people’s lives - placed much more centrally in people’s understanding.

“The same message has been given out by the United Nations in several recent reports and by the World Health Organisation. So, big and small, grassroots organisations like New Script are very much in line with those messages,” Dr Johnstone said.

Dr Johnstone said a British All-Party Parliamentary Group, Beyond Pills, had recently released a report saying we need to understand what people’s problems are and how to help them best.

She added: “We need to acknowledge people have mental health problems because of reasons in their lives such as poor housing or loneliness.”

Sara Boyce, organiser with Participation and the Practice of Rights (PPR) New Script for Mental Health, said the “energy and buzz” during Dr Johnstone’s workshop was “palpable”.

She added: “There is a real hunger to have these conversations. The Curious Minds Will Find A Way series is about opening up space to have conversations because the existing model bio-medical model isn’t serving anybody well.

“We need existing services, but we need them to be better. People have been desperately failed by services so, at the same time as trying to reform and improve existing services, we are having these conversations, which chime with what is happening internationally about what a new approach would look like. It is really exciting.

“Yesterday was so positive. We had about 80 people there, a fantastic mix of people.”