Programme

25th Anniversary Intervoice & World Hearing Voices Congress

Cardiff, Wales 19-21 September 2012 Celebrating 25 years Congress Day One - 20th September INTERVOICE MEETING 08.30 – 09.10 Registration Meeting each other, exchanging experiences Coffee, market place & Networking 19 September 2012 09.15 – 09.25 Opening and Welcome Hywel Davies Chair of hearing voices All Nation Congress Centre network Cymru and Paul Roberts Chief Executive Abertawe Cardiff, UK Bro Morgannwg University Health Board of Health

This congress is part of the world Congress about hearing voices on 09.25 – 09.55 Paul Baker and Alan Leader (invited) -Beginning a movement 20 and 21 September, Cardiff UK 09.55 – 10.30 Prof Maris Romme & Dr Sandra Escher ()-Twenty-five PROGRAMME years On 10.30 – 10.55 Prof Robin Murray (UK) - 100 years of schizophrenia - is this e 08.30 - 09.30 Registration nough? 09.30 - 09.45 Welcome by Dirk Corstens Chair of Intervoice, introduction of themes for the day 10.55 – 11.05 Questions 09.45 - 10.00 Hearing voices & spirituality Progress or heresy Hywel Davis (Wales) 11.05 – 11.30 Coffee, Market Place & Networking 10.00 - 10.15 Recovery & work projects Life at the farm Carina Häkanson (Sw.) 11.30 – 13.00 Parallel Sessions - spirituality & differnet belief systems, hearing 10.15 – 10.30 CBT and Making Sense of Voices Alison Brabban (UK) voices research, workers changing practice, peoples stories, workshop one setting up & running hearing voices groups 10.30 - 11.00 Coffee break & networks workshop 2 training initiative for making sense of voices & visions 11.00 - 12.00 Parallel workshops 1 Hearing voices & spirituality - facillitated by Hywel Davies Afternoon workshops include older people & hearing voices, peer 2 Life at the farm: film and discussion. support, working creatively to communicate with voices 3 CBT discussion chair Marius Romme, 13.00 -14.00 Lunch, market place & networking Ron Coleman, Rufus May, Alison Brabban 14.00 – 15.30 Workshops 12.00 – 12.30 Introduction open space Karen Taylor (Scotland) Themes as above parallel sessions Formulating the question 15.30 – 15.55 Coffee, Market place & networking 12.30 – 14.00 Lunch Chair - Eleanor Longden 14.00-16.30 Open Space group discussions What do you see as the future for intervoice, what are 15.55 – 16.20 Dr Lucy Johnston (UK) - Constructs and formulations: could this be ground breaking projects that are going on, what are your the future? personal views of what is important to concentrate on, campaign on, do research on? 16.20 – 16.45 Dr Rufus May (UK), Living mindfully with voices

16.30 – 17.00 Report back on groups from the Op 16.45 – 17.00 Questions and Close Congress Day Two - 21st September

09.00 – 09.15 Welcome – Chair John Jenkins (Wales)Director Intervoice

it!

09.15 – 09.40 Joe Calleja CEO Richmond Fellowship WA Australia - Voices at work in Marina

Australia Lykovounioti experience with WORKSHOP SIX WORKSHOP WORKSHOP SIX WORKSHOP Give time to your your time to Give voices. It deservesvoices. 09.40 – 10.05 Prof Manuel Gonzales de Chavez (Spain)- working in group psychotherapy with people with

10.30 – 10.55 Prof Michela Amering (Austria) - Recovery and human rights David A quiet services Williams Matthew Matthew Morris & lives from from lives revolution Reclaiming change and change and approaches To introduce introduce To people to the the people to ideas in their potential and hostile voices: hostile voices: possibilities for possibilities for

10.55 – 11.05 Questions newinfluencing David Denborough Narrative therapy therapy Narrative WORKSHOP FIVE WORKSHOP WORKSHOP FIVE WORKSHOP

11.05 -11.30 Coffee

11.30 – 13.00 Parallel sessions - hearing voices research, peers changing practice, young people and hearing voices, psychic experiences and FOUR FOUR Elisabeth dementia sensitivity Svanholmer

spirituality. society that David Storm WORKSHOP WORKSHOP WORKSHOP WORKSHOP sensitive in a and blessings blessings and service which The The challenges of being highly Cumbrian NHS with & without Journeying with hearing A voices. Older people and Workshop 1 - coming off psychiatric medications to has responded voice hearers both hearers voice eficiencydemands Workshop 2 - male survivors of sexual abuse -

13.00 – 14.00 Lunch, networking & market place

Hall USA shop shop Highly THREE 14.00 – 15.15 Workshops - journeying with sensitivity, a quiet revolution, what is THREE Marissa Lambert Self help question question from the the from WORKSHOP WORKSHOP WORKSHOP WORKSHOP a peer? peer support Who is a Peer? addressing the the addressing Peer supportPeer & & Karen Machin Lessons learned movement in the in the movement Interactive work Interactive CONGRESS WORKSHOPS Listening to Ambassadors of Forbidden Truths Oryx Cohen & Will

15.15 – 15.40 Coffee

15.40 -15.45 Welcome Chair Dirk Corstens (Netherlands) Rachel Waithira Working Working with voices Caroline Von Von Caroline creatively to to creatively be different. be different. Waddingham MH self help Taysen, Kanja Taysen, communicate communicate It is normal to

15.45 -16.10 Kellie Conans (Australia)- young people who hear voices, our future of 2 alternative about a network presentation of a presentation documentary film projects, in Kenya WORKSHOP TWOWORKSHOP looks bright TWOWORKSHOP

16.10 – 17.00 Peter Bullimore, Eleanor Longden, Indigo Daya , Ron Coleman -snapshots of the future-where is the going DAY ONE DAY TWO DAY Listening to to Listening Living with or without voices Anders Schakow Ambassadors of Ambassadors

Chairs Closing remarks Rufus Sophie May, Forbidden Truths Forbidden WORKSHOP ONE WORKSHOP WORKSHOP ONE WORKSHOP Ashton and Topdog PARALLEL SESSIONS - DAY ONE

Parallel Session one Parallel session two Parallel session Parallel session four Workshop one Spirituality and Hearing voices three Peoples recovery different belief Research Workers changing stories systems practice

Chair Karen Taylor Chair Eleanor Chair Joe Calleja Chair –Marius Longden Romme

1 Sonia Johnson and 1 Clara Humpston 1 Pino Pini Robin Timmers Indigo Daya and Paul Patrick Le Cardinal Baker Schizophrenia is The importance Where do the fundamentally a to link closely the Setting up phenomena (voices, self-disturbance -In voice hearers groups and running tastes, visions, this paper I attempt to user and relative hearing voices smells, physical to explain the many associations and to networks. Two phenomena in facets of services a Tuscany very experienced general) actually Self-disturbances by experience network organizers come from ? disentangling the will take you Two different boundaries between through the process approaches self and other of starting groups & networks

2 Willa Casstevens 2 Amanda Waegli 2 Loretta Foster Mette Askov Workshop two

Voice hearing Outcomes of Leading by Interpreted: Richmond following the power coping with spirits, fellowship of the hearing Demons and/or voices@work project voices approach to Stress transform a mental health team

3 Jacqueline Hayes 3 Joachim Sue Ruggeri Berta Britz Peter Bullimore and Schnackenberg Chris Tandy Hearing from the The MHC experience dead; spirits or Experience focused transforming a This workshop will everyday lives counseling with private, low secure present the key voice hearers-early service to be aims and central feedback from recovery orientated themes behind a a randomized and embrace the training initiative controlled pilot hearing voices for making sense of studies approach voices and visions

4 Wendy 4 Wendy Traynor Marian Goldstein Simon Davies Micklewright Is person centred – Working as a voice Telepathy old as experiential therapy hearer at a crisis the hills ? helpful to adults centre who hear voices If voice hearing is often caused by trauma could it be telepathy, what do you think ? After emailing 900 psychologists with a simple questionnaire their replies were interesting PARALLEL SESSIONS - DAY TWO

Workshop/Parallel Parallel session 6 Parallel session 7 Parallel session 8 Workshop one session five day two Hearing voices Young people and Peer support and self Spirituality and research hearing voices help different belief systems Chair Lyn Mahoub Chair Rachel Chair Oryx Cohen Waddingham Carol Dugdale 1 Summer Schrader 1 Claire Chapman 1 Indigo Daya Will Hall An introduction to International Working with young Individual peer Coming off astrology as a tool perspectives on voice people throughout support programme psychiatric for self awareness hearing research their journeys to self Merging the HV medications and in identifying the defined recovery approach with harm reduction contradictory intentional peer approach nature with in our 20 minutes support personalities 45 minutes Ivan Barry 2 Angela Woods and 2 Claire Powell 2 Catherine Whitaker Workshop two Charles Fernyhough Oracles , dreams and Voice Collective “ I leave my voices in foot prints in the “Hearing the voice” group the cell on Fridays” sand. an interdisciplinary This presentation Hearing voices What happens when research project shares the range of groups in prisons we pay attention to based at Durham strategies we have This presentation signs and symbols University used to help young shares the journey of that manifest in people who are voice the groups we run in front of us as we hearers feel empow- prisons, drawing out travel this life? ered at home and the challenges as well school. as the things we have 45 minutes found most useful 30 minutes along the way

3 Eleanor Cross 3 Ros Thomas and Nicky Forysthe Jim Campbell and Ron Sarah Sewell Coleman I must be a beast Talk for health to be on a section, This presentation Therapy with out Working with male schizophrenia, aims to introduce therapists survivors of sexual identity and attendees to This is a new abuse normality one of the fresh approach based on and innovative teaching people how approaches we are to talk and listen in a using in our Young therapeutic way. people’s discovery program that assists our young people in making sense of their experience and reframing their lives 40 minutes

4 Marcello Macario Zanell I mix music, a DJ, on turntables with records and The Italian Voice CD’s. It has been the best hearers movement: coping strategy I have ever networking and experienced for ‘hearing voices’I explain the benefits research outcomes (not only are you listening to the music, but you also have to concentrate on counting beats, mixing sounds together and making 5 Maria Haarmans & the ‘set’ smooth. The volume Filippo Varese can go a lot louder than the usual mp3 player or sound system, very useful if having Links between ‘very loud voices’, and it is trauma, dissociation in the earphones and on and voices: Evidence the speakers (so you’re also listening at two places at the from quantitative same time). At worst, if the and qualitative music and volume doesn’t studies of the help to ‘drown out the voices’, alas you will at least Liverpool Psychosis be listening to some good Research Team music and concentrating somewhere else. Abstract Book the individual and the environment. This “goodness-of-fit” is reviewed for each vignette, and environmental contributions to voice-hearing experiences are briefly considered: Income level, Thursday, 20th September lodging, familial support, and perceptions of familial support, all played roles in individuals’ choices and their outcomes. Further, spiritual belief systems substantially contributed to how voices were Morning Keynote speeches: identified and welcomed (or not) into lifestyles and interpersonal relationships, demonstrating the unique nature of interpretation and experience. In this context, it would be presumptuous to talk Beginning a movement Paul Baker and Ron Coleman review the history of the development of the about symptom management, because none of these individuals viewed their voices as symptoms international hearing voices networks and consider what lessons have been learnt along the way. of illness. The concept of “coping” does play a role, however, since managing the voices presented at least occasional difficulties for each of them. Thus, this paper concludes with a summary of 25 Year On: Sandra Escher and Professor Marius Romme. The co -founders of the international successful coping strategies that these three individuals have developed and used with their voices. hearing voices approach reflect on twenty five years of achievement and consider the progress that has been made since their work began. 3. Hearing from the dead; Symptoms, spirits or everyday lives? Jacqueline Hayes

Is 100 years of schizophrenia enough? - Professor Robin Murray - This talk is about experiences of presence in bereavement. This is when a bereaved person experiences a voice, vision, touch or general ‘feeling of presence’ relating to the deceased. These are common Afternoon Key note Speeches: experiences in bereavement, but are they hallucinations symptomatic of psychosis? Or are there other ways to understand them? Constructs and formulations: could this be the future? Dr Lucy Johnston This doctoral research project was the first to examine the meaning and consequences of these experiences in the lives of the bereaved. In this presentation I will focus on the impact of hearing Living Mindfully with Voices: Dr Rufus May voices in bereavement. Do they help the bereaved to cope with their loss? Can they cause the bereaved more problems? I will show through case studies that the answer lies in the nature of the Day One Parallel Sessions, 11.30 – 13.00 relationship between the bereaved and the deceased.

Parallel Session One: Spirituality and different belief systems 4. “Telepathy old as the hills?” Wendy Mickelwright

1. Where do the phenomena (voices, tastes, visions, smells, physical sensations) actually come If voice hearing is often caused by trauma could it be telepathy, what do you think? After emailing from? Two different approaches: Patrick Le Cardinal (France) with paper by Sonia Johnson, to be 900 psychologists with a simple questionnaire their replies were interesting. Recent law cases read by Karen Taylor. have also been sad, but may indicate how important it is to perhaps think of the voices as one of the billion voice hearers on the planet. (Catherine of Cambridge, Luton slavery case, Rochdale Sonia’s paper concerns different belief Systems that have been debated on in the voice-hearers group case, the Blackpool case, literature from the homeless charity (Centrepoint) or the families of 77 she facilitated in France. Norwegians). - Hearing celestial voices, asking for Saints’ protection, being helped by angels - Beliefs on reincarnation and hearing voices of: wandering souls, echoes of times Words can have strange meanings like the word compromise, insane, pagan, proof, propaganda and past, thoughts hearing (telepathy) desensitise. The voices have also replied kindly to some of my questions on the subject. For example - Cosmic consciousness and energy channels, the physical influences on voice A voice said “are you a human being?” I reply “yes” in the voices then the logic goes we are equal and hearers of the Hartman network, the elemental beings (trees, leprechauns, different as human rights people might think. Some of the voices have said very disturbing things fairies) the house guardians about the idea of control within the voices. Not to mention the idea of talking to the dead within the - What kind of influence did all this have on the voice-hearers’ lives? voices. Some of us have hallucinated for 40 years. Reading the testimonies of other voice hearers as - Sharing the different views in the group has allowed some of us to clarify and get a well as listening to other voice hearer in a Voice hearing group in Richmond Surrey and attending grasp on our phenomena and as a consequence make a distinction between what can free voices hearing courses and conferences makes you think! help and what hinders our recovery process. Parallel Session Two: Hearing Voices research Patrick will relate his work as a facilitator with Abia is a young woman from Morocco who believed that she was possessed by a ‘Sheytan’. Building the construct of this voice enabled Abia to discover 1. Schizophrenia as a self disturbance Clara Humpston (England) that another outlook on her experience in which she had responsibility and power was possible. Then the voice dialogue allowed her to contact her ‘daemon’, to challenge his lies, and to find ways The argument that schizophrenia is fundamentally a self-disturbance has attracted both to deal with him and build a new relationship. With time she finally got a better hold on her own philosophical debate and academic research, especially that of psychiatric phenomenology. By self- thoughts and feelings without losing her religious beliefs. disturbance, it normally refers to a disruption or dissolution of the pre-reflective or the most basic sense of self, leading to alienation, dissociation or even diminishment of one’s thoughts, emotions 2. Voice-Hearing Interpreted: Coping with Spirits, Demons, and/or Stress, Willa J. Casstevens and behaviour. Consequently, such disturbances could well be contributing factors in the formation and maintenance of many positive, negative and cognitive symptoms of schizophrenia, in particular This paper presents vignettes that reflect the ways three individuals integrated voice-hearing positive symptoms such as auditory hallucinations, passivity phenomena and thought interference. experiences into very different belief systems. The vignettes focus on New Age spiritual beliefs, It has also been demonstrated that self-disturbances are a key predictor for the transition from Christianity, and atheism, and identify how each world view contributed to these individuals’ the prodrome to frank psychosis. However, unfortunately a significant proportion of psychiatrists choices about incorporating and/or managing voice-hearing experiences. The concept of “person- do not yet recognise the importance of detecting and managing self-disturbances. In this paper I environment fit” refers to how well individual fit with their environments, which depends on both attempt to explain the many facets of self-disturbances by disentangling the boundaries between self and other and using my own experiences, in the hope that it may raise awareness and in turn the therapy. Limitations include the small sample size and other factors. I will conclude by discussing benefit healthcare practitioners as well as service users who may be struggling with similar yet implications for practice and future study. undetected/untreated problems and helping them towards recovery Parallel Session Three: Workers Changing Practice 2. Past, Present and Future Engagement – Yours, Mine and Ours: Outcomes of the RFWA Voices@ Work: Amanda Waegeli (Australia) 1. The importance to link closely the voice hearers groups to user and relative associations and to services, a Tuscany experience Pino Pini (AISMe), Italy The attitude that voice hearers are too unwell, lazy, disinterested or not capable of being involved in their own recovery and care, whilst not so common these days, still exists. Indeed such a view AISMe, the Italian Mental Health Association, since its foundation in 1993, is involved in facilitating is frequently dubbed “a lack of engagement”. However, dedicated mental health workers still find user self help groups development. The Prato AISMe’s hearing voices group, probably the first in Italy, themselves routinely discussing and contemplating just how to excite, involve and “motivate” voice was established in 1998. Mental Health Europe and the European Network of Users and Survivors hearers to “engage”. Drawing on the work done within the Richmond Fellowship Voices at Work of (ENUSP), in the early 90s stimulated AISMe to approach Marius Romme& Sandra project as a peer voice hearer Amanda, successfully engaged with 25 voice hearers in working towards Escher and the hearing voices movement. Despite some historical common roots at European level, employment. Amanda will offer in this workshop a new spin on the notion of “lack of engagement” we find there are both similarities and differences between the “general” self help groups and the and elaborate on the work necessary to build trust, rapport, relationship, and hope with a person “more specific” hearing voices groups, almost in Tuscany where we work mostly. We wish to present who has often felt let down time and time again, and left wondering ‘why they should bother’. This our reflection on this topic. We think that the voice hearers movement can help a lot the process of workshop discusses the mystery of why some voice hearers choose to engage and others refuse, deinstitutionalisation of people with mental health problems who quite often are victims of services and explore what lies beneath these choices. With real testimonies from participants of the Voices too wedded to therapeutic approaches, mostly medically oriented. An alliance between the growing at Work project, sharing what was different and what enticed their recent engagement. The project Italian user movement and the hearing voices groups seems very useful. We will present also the highlighted the dire need for a greater understanding of who exactly needs to motivate themselves up to date AISMe’s project “Joint Experiences and Mental Health Systems” looking for best ways to to engage, and the different levels of engagement required, the time and resources necessary to do deal with user networks, mental health associations, services and local communities both in Italy so and the simultaneous pressure to attend to the importance of choice and self determination, and abroad. Some AISMe’s voice hearers are involved in such project. while trying to demonstrate belief in the person, going the extra mile and being mindful of the real possibility people can be disempowered and disengaged by attempts of caretaking and rescue. 2. Leading by Following: The power of the hearing voices approach to transform a mental health team, Loretta Foster (Australia) 3. Experienced Focused Counselling with Voice Hearers: early feedback from randomized controlled studies Joachim Schnackenberg (Germany) The hearing voices approach really does have the potential to change lives. Even by association, or with three degrees of separation. It’s changed my life – and I don’t work with voice hearers and have This session will highlight early results from a randomised controlled pilot study in Experience had very little training in using the approach. But I do manage a team of mental health workers Focused Counselling (EFC) with voice hearers (Making Sense of Voices). Participants in the study who use it and passionately believe in it. And I’ve seen what it’s done for us as a team. In this were voice hearers of different diagnostic backgrounds who were trained in EFC as part of a 3-level presentation I’ll try to describe the impact of the hearing voices approach on participants, staff and basic training programme. EFC was implemented with a trusted mental health professional who the manager of the mental health team at Gateway Community Health in Victoria, Australia. It can worked with the voice hearer and their voice hearing experience according to the Romme and Escher be a challenge to ‘lead’ a team when they are leaping ahead into whole new fields of practice, and approach. The study consisted f both interviews with participants, as well as the completion of experiencing interactions with participants and their voices which are frequently complex, often validated questionnaires and scales to see if any changes had occurred as a result of the intervention. exhilarating, and sometimes downright terrifying. But it has also been an incredibly liberating and The study came to an end at the beginning of July 2012 and this paper will therefore present rich experience, which has created beautiful connections for us - with our participants, with people preliminary findings only. from around the world, and also with each other. I’d love to share this experience with you.

4. Is Person-centred-Experiential Therapy helpful to adults who hear voices? 3. The MHC Experience: Transforming a private secure unit to be recovery orientated and embracing Wendy Traynor the hearing voices approach Susan Ruggari (Wales)

This doctoral research is composed of three studies which build on the evidence base for the use 4. Working as a voice hearer at a crisis centre, Marian B. Goldstein (Denmark) of person-centred-experiential (PCE) therapy with adult clients who hear voices, or have unusual thoughts or experiences The presentation will look at the work of “Akuttilbuddet”, the Acute Crisis Centre at Lyngby- Taarbaek Kommune in Denmark, which is part of a government project initiated to reduce (re-) The first study used twenty semi-structured qualitative interviews with person-centred practitioners hospitalisation of psychiatrically labelled people. My focus will especially be on my own participation who worked with clients who have experienced complex processes. The second study is a systematic, in this project as somebody who is a voice hearer and has experienced crisis herself. How do I bring mixed method case study using the Hermeneutic Single Case Efficacy Design (HSCED; Elliott 2002). my knowledge of and personal experience with alternative ways of dealing with hearing voices The third study involves data collected from a sample of fifteen participants who experienced voices and other unusual experiences into my work with clients and into the exchange with colleagues. or unusual processes and who had received PCE therapy as clients. What are the challenges that both I personally and the project in general do face in trying to change the mainstream perception of and approach to emotional crisis, the experience of hearing voices I will discuss the entire project with focus on the third study. All fifteen clients in this study have included, and what are our results so far. The presentation will include concrete examples from our received a standard qualitative interview (the Change Interview) looking at client changes to date everyday work at the centre. and helpful and unhelpful factors in the PCE therapy and in clients’ lives. Grounded theory analyses are currently in progress and the results will be presented. The research shows a wide range of outcomes including positive changes relating to reduced social anxiety which may be attributed to Parallel Session Four: Peoples Recovery Stories: assisted in the development of a highly successful state wide network of more than 20 hearing voices groups; employed seven people with lived experience; conducted research into the impact of 1. Robin Timmers: My recovery story (trauma’s hearing voices, drugs, psychosis, voluntary & groups; provided individual peer support for voices, trained more than 500 people, delivered talks forced hospitalization and medication, isolation cell, homelessness -> psychological and societal to thousands to people; held two major conferences about voices, attracted over $400,000 in grants, recovery, coming off med’s and drugs, becoming an expert by experience, , won a national mental health achievement award, and received positive media coverage about our training mental health care workers and students, psychology study, brain imaging research into work. voice hearing, reducing force in psychiatry). Session includes short video representation of Robins’ life story. Paul Baker co-founded the Hearing Voices Network in the UK, that has now become three national networks with many hearing voices groups across the nations. He is currently working with the 2. Mette Askov : I started to hear voices when I was 8 years old because my mother got very ill, and I Hearing Voices Network in Wales to further develop its work and profile. Paul also helped to found had to take responsibility for myself and my 5 year younger sister. The following 7 years, it was nice and develop INTERVOICE and was the coordinator until 2010, he is now active in helping to develop voices who supported me in my everyday life. When I became a teenager, the voices changed from online support groups and spreading the word internationally. being positive to being negative. To cope with that, I started smoking hash, which developed into a daily abuse. One night I became so psychotic that it scared the hell out of me. Therefore I stopped my Workshop Two: Training on Making Sense of Voices Pete Bullimore and Chris Tandy (England) abuse. Then the voices became more and more intense, and that ended with me being hospitalised in a psychiatric award. The next following years I went in and out of psychiatric hospitals. The voices This interactive workshop will present the key aims and central themes behind a training initiative kept pulling me down, and I was psychotic and depressed from time to time. I got the diagnosis for making sense of voices and visions. Paranoid Schizophrenic, and I was told again and again that it was a chronic disease that I should This two day training initiative has been recently co-developed by Pete Bullimore and Kieran Fahy / deal with for the rest of my life. The doctors also told me not to talk about the voices since it would Chris Tandy (Education and Practice Consultants at the IMH Nottingham). The target audience for only make them worse. I was heavily medicated and so sedated that I wasn’t really there. When this training is all mental health workers, criminal justice and third sector agencies who work with asked a question, my responding time could last up to 5 minutes. Then I move into a psychiatric people who experience voices. institution and there I met Lone who became my string back to life. Then I want to talk about this A brief overview of the core aims and learning objectives of this training initiative will be presented process until the point I’m at now. Much more about how to cope with the voices and also cope with alongside a rationale for offering practical strategies (assessment and interventions) that work for paranoia. More about how the way to see and deal with voices also can be used in other difficulties people who experience voices and visions. in life. To be a part of the voice hearing environment meant and means the world to me. Now I’m The need to challenge misconceptions and myths used to explain psychosis will be presented and coming of medication and my future seems very bright :-) an exploration of traditional ways and pitfalls of understanding and treating psychosis will be reviewed. 3. Berta Britz: I would like to speak about my recovery journey. I have heard voices for over forty Respectful, ethical and pragmatic approaches to voice hearing and visions will be discussed along years. I underwent treatment in mental hospitals since I was seventeen. Part of my recovery with new ways of talking to and working with people who experience voices and visions. includes my identity as a “career mental patient” and my career as a professional social worker. Currently I am a peer support specialist, an expert by experience. I feel I integrate my identity as Afternoon Workshops 14.00 – 15.30 an expert by experience and as an expert by training. I’ve discovered that just as I can’t deny my voices, I find that I can’t deny my professional identity; however, as an expert by experience, I am Workshop One: Living with or without voices Anders Schakov able to use my whole self without trying to pretend that I don’t hear voices or carry the experience of very damaging treatment. The trauma I survived as a child was re-enacted in my experience of Past: My life story: In the beginning I will give a brief presentation of myself. How I used to cope treatment. I lived without hope for many years. with hearing voices and how I cope living without any voices. Currently I facilitate a hearing voices group for adults and one for young people. I do peer support Present: Making sense of our selves: Today I see and treat myself as a person with many personalities, in our local state hospital, supervise certified peer specialists, do training and consultation, and which I believe, are similar to hearing voices. To gain a better understanding of myself I now notice coordinate a speaker’s bureau. My hopes are to start voices education in a prison, a hearing voices which of the personalities are active. It helps me through problems and difficult situations. group there, and a hearing voices network. Discussion: I would like to get people to discuss how life isn’t fantastic just because you do not hear voices any longer and how voices can be beneficial. But I do also have an understanding of people 4. Simon Davies: Morning Workshops 11.30 - 13.00 who want to get rid of them. In the end I would like to have a debate on different challenges that can occur due to not hearing voices anymore; loneliness, emotional expression and living without Workshop One: Setting Up and Running Hearing Voices Networks: Indigo Daya and Paul Baker their guidance. (Australia and Spain/UK) Workshop Two: Working creatively to communicate with voices Rachel Waddingham (England) Networks are more than peer support groups. Networks provide the means of taking the principles and practices of the hearing voices approach out into wider society. People who hear voices and people When I first came to the hearing voices approach, the idea of talking with my voices seemed crazy. who live and work with them can act collectively as ambassadors, engaging with local communities, After all, I believed I was ill (schizophrenic) and that the voices were merely meaningless products of services and the media to change perceptions about the meaning of voices and spreading hopeful my disease. At that time, The Three and The Alien (the voices) terrorised me. The Three picked apart and positive messages. my self esteem, and The Alien threatened to make me kill people. Stuck within the mental health This interactive workshop will give participants the opportunity to share their experiences, determine system, my only coping strategy was high doses of medication. goals and solve practical problems in setting up and further developing groups and networks. After attending a Hearing Voices Group, and lots of workshops, I discovered that this didn’t have to The facilitators are: be the end of the story. I recognised recovery was possible, even though I didn’t fully believe it for Indigo Daya from Voices Vic, the hearing voices network in Victoria, Australia. Voices Vic has myself. This approach to voices and visions was so sensible, I soon became a group facilitator and felt privileged to support others through their own journeys. Despite being able to ‘talk the talk’, I Power to Our Journeys Group will send messages to the INTERVOICE Conference participants. still struggled to ‘walk the walk’. I helped people to communicate with their voices long before I felt Stories will also be shared from the Dulwich Centre Alternative Community Mental Health Project willing to listen to my own. Withdrawing from medication has required me to, clumsily at times, – ‘Companions on a journey. find ways of changing my relationship with my voices. Friday, September 21st Day Two This presentation shares some of the creative strategies I have used to communicate with, and relate to, the different voices I hear. It includes calming terrified child voices using artwork and Morning Keynote Speeches: visualisation, using storyboards and comic strips to map out difficult conversations with aggressive voices and talking into what seems like a void (keeping communication lines open even when they Voices At Work in Australia Joe Calleja (Australia) speak over me and don’t engage). This approach has helped me develop flexibility in the way I see and relate to the voices, enabling us to develop an ‘avengers-style’. Alliance which is challenging, This key note reviews how the hearing voices approach became established in Australia and considers strained at times, but provides space for those voices I used to hate. Hopefully, attendees will share the lessons learnt during the formation and development of the hearing voices networks throughout some of their own the country and particularly the implications and consequences for the work, priorities and culture of the Richmond Fellowship (WA). Workshop Three: Lessons Learned from the Peer Movement in the United States, Oryx Cohen and Will Hall (USA) Keynote Speech: Recovery – a human right? Michaela Amering (Austria) While the complex, as well as polarized, discussions about recovery are both fruitful and necessary, Oryx Cohen and Will Hall, co-founders of Freedom Center, will detail their experiences with the I would like to suggest that in order to meet the challenges outlined by these debates we might peer movement in the United States. Included in the presentation will be a brief history of the peer profit from a simple formulation for our efforts. To guarantee the human rights of people who come movement in the United States, the principles of peer support, and interactive exercises. Cohen in contact with psychiatry could be the main focus for all of us in the international mental health and Hall will share stories of the peer movement from the time they co-founded Freedom Center up community, be it as peers, clinicians, family and friends, advocates, therapists or in our research to the present. Relevant contemporary questions will be addressed such as: What Happens When work as scientists. Such a focus might have far reaching implications. the Movement Gets Funded? How Can Peer Support Principles be used to Strengthen the Hearing Voices Network? Can Family Members and Allies Engage in Peer Support? Time will be given for Afternoon Keynote Speech: questions and dialogue. Young People Who Hear Voices – The future looks bright Kellie Comans (Australia)

Workshop Four: Older People and Hearing Voices: A Cumbrian NHS Service which has responded Parallel Sessions 11.30 – 13.00 to voice hearers both with and without dementia David Storm (England) Parallel Session One: Spirituality and different belief systems (to be run as workshops) Traditionally with Older People’s mental health services hearing voices is often seen as part of an often long standing mental illness or a symptom of a persons’ dementia, with little regard given to 1. An Introduction to astrology as a tool for self awareness, Carole Dugdale (England) the persons experience or alternative explanations of their voice hearing. An introduction to astrology as a tool for self-awareness in identifying the contradictory nature within our personalities. An interactive workshop exploring the fundamental astrological principles Within the Carlisle area, Cumbria Partnership NHS Foundation Trust Older People’s services offer within us all. No previous astrological or spiritual knowledge required! an alternative approach to working with older people who hear voices. We are born at a given moment in a given place and like vintage years of wine we have the qualities of the year and of the season in which we are born. Astrology does not lay claim to anything else. - C.G.Jung. This includes working closely with the person and their family to explore the origins of the voice hearing, rather than seeing this as simply a symptom of illness. Also working closely with individuals 2. Oracles Dreams and Footprints in the Sand Ivan Barry (England) to enable them to accept their voice hearing experience, look for alternative ways to help and support them manage this experience to enable them to continue to lead a fulfilling life. A travelogue and illustrated odyssey through Ancient Egypt’s sacred sites and on through the desert to the Oracle Temple of Amun/Zeuss in Siwa. What happens when we pay attention to signs and The workshop will describe some of the work the service has completed and explore future ways symbols that manifest in front of us as we travel this life? of ensuring older people who hear voices are able to retain their identity. This includes designing services for people with dementia who hear voices, enabling a more positive and person centred What might happen if we act on dreams, visions and voices? And how did a coffee cup, a missed bus, approach to be built round their needs. an exiled Jungian analyst and a strange nocturnal dream lead me to the oasis in the west and onto a meeting with the ghost of Alexander the Great under a full desert moon? Workshop Five: Reclaiming lives from hostile voices: Narrative Therapy Approaches David This is a fun sharing travel trip and a great example of how following your visions and voices may Denborough lead to some remarkable experiences and meetings with remarkable people. Just where DOES reality begin and end There is a long history of narrative therapy approaches being used by voice hearers to assist in reclaiming their lives from the effects of hostile voices. This practical workshop will describe Parallel Session Two: Hearing Voices Research a number of narrative therapy practices that can be used in voice hearing groups, by individual voice hearers, and/or by professionals working with voice hearers. This workshop will also include 1. International Perspectives on Voice Hearing Research, Summer Schrader (USA) documents and a song, from the ‘Power to Our Journeys Group’ – a hearing voices group facilitated It seems like American psychiatry has been historically less receptive to voice hearing research. in Adelaide by Michael White in the 1990s using a narrative therapy approach. Members of the One hypothesis for this is that European researchers have been more inspired by consumer rights because Britain’s anti-psychiatric movement was more militant than America’s. recession in Italy; (2) We will present the outcomes of the developing scientific committee, which involves an interdisciplinary team of academic scientists, user researchers and professionals. The In particular, the recent plethora of AVH research from the UK and Netherlands could be partly development of our research analyzing the psychological elements driving the recovery process influenced by the Hearing Voices Movement’s greater visibility in those countries. Although voice will be shortly presented. This work has been based on socio-cognitive theories and on published hearing has yet to be widely accepted by popular culture, publicity about nonclinical voice hearing biographies of voice hearers. As outlined in Pocobello and el Sehity (2011), recovery from severe has influenced research. mental illness implies believe revision processes - which are the cognitive base of surprise: “recovery is possible!” - which permit emotions such as admiration, hope and pride to sustain the recovery Very little has been written about how voice hearing research differs between countries. In 1972, process. Psychological elements such as trust, ownership, acceptance and responsibility build the Guy Edwards found that British psychiatrists differentiated between phenomenological subtypes socio-cognitive base of recovery. The research agenda of the scientific committee is presented for of auditory hallucinations (AH) more frequently than their American counterparts. The British the purpose of possible international collaborations. physicians were also less likely to diagnose people as schizophrenic simply based on the presence of AH. How has this changed within the last 40 years? 5. Links between trauma, dissociation and voices: Evidence from quantitative and qualitative studies of the Liverpool Psychosis Research Team, Maria Haarmans & Filippo Varese (England) Over the next few months, I will interview a wide range of individuals who conduct anthropological, psychological, and neuroscience research related to voice hearing. I will ask them if they agree that Increasing evidence points to the involvement of trauma and dissociation in the aetiology of voices. the USA seems to publish less AVH research than other countries, and ask them if they have any This presentation synthesizes recent findings from both quantitative and qualitative investigations theories on why this may be the case. examining the complex relationships among these phenomena. Presenters will focus on: (i) a recent meta-analysis of studies investigating the association between childhood adversity and psychotic Edwards, Guy. 1972. “Diagnosis of Schizophrenia: An Anglo-American Comparison.” British Journal experiences; (ii) a recent epidemiological study looking at the association between specific types of of Psychiatry 120:385-90. childhood trauma and specific psychotic experiences (in particular voices); (iii) studies pointing to the importance of dissociation as the mechanism which might explain the observed link between 2. Hearing the Voice, Angela Woods and Charles Fernyhough (England) trauma and voices in the above studies. Quantitative findings will be expanded upon by a recent qualitative inquiry which utilizes a social constructionist grounded theory approach to explore ‘Hearing the Voice’ is an interdisciplinary research project based at Durham University. The project how gender (the array of socially constructed roles and relationships, personality traits, attitudes, team includes academics from cognitive neuroscience, cultural studies, English literature, medical behaviours, values, relative power and influence that society ascribes to two sexes on a differential humanities, philosophy, psychiatry, psychology and theology; clinicians and arts-and-health basis) and sex (the biological characteristics, such as anatomy and physiology, that distinguish males practitioners; and voice-hearers, service users and other ‘experts by experience.’ Marius Romme, and females) interact with other diversity indicators and early adversity/trauma, in contributing to Sandra Escher and Gail Hornstein have worked with us at Durham to develop the project, which is expression of and response to psychotic phenomena. Implications of findings for gender-specific funded through a Wellcome Trust Strategic Award from October 2012 - 2015. More information is and trauma-informed psychological interventions and the prevention of psychosis will also be available from our web site: http://hearingthevoice.org/ discussed.

In the first part of our talk, we will briefly introduce ‘Hearing the Voice’ and outline some of our Parallel Session Three: Young People and Hearing Voices plans over the next few years. However, our main aim is to learn from voice-hearers about specific research priorities and methodologies, and to explore the ways in which our project can support 1. Working with young people throughout their journeys to self defined recovery Claire Chapman existing and planned research in the field. The bulk of our allotted time we hope will be spent in (England)

3. “I must be a beast, an absolute beast, to be on section”: ‘Schizophrenia’, identity and We are a small early intervention team committed to working with young people throughout their ‘normality’ Eleanor Cross (England) journeys to self-defined recovery. We have been actively fundraising for the last 3 years to provide activities that service users have asked for which are not paid for by the NHS. We organise week Recent years have seen the growth of a small but compelling body of work calling for a radical change long trips to the Lake District twice a year where service users work with the Outward Bound Trust in thinking about schizophrenia and the use of the Mental Health Act (1983). Cognate with that doing a range of outdoor activities. Our young people tell us that this has a massive effect on their tradition, this research presents a discursive analysis of interactions between the researcher and ten self-confidence and esteem and that they feel much more positive about futures afterwards. members of the Hearing Voices Network diagnosed as ‘schizophrenic’ with experience of involuntary admission to psychiatric hospital. Particular attention is paid to the interactional management of We also have a range of social groups (again asked for by our young people) which are often platforms the ‘toxic’ identity of ‘sectioned schizophrenic’. In managing the task of providing a moral account for service users to create their own friendship circles. of themselves as ‘ordinary’, ‘rational’ and ‘competent’, it is found that participants could not, on occasion, but help their utterances becoming disjointed, dysfluent and ‘schizophrenic’. In the Our young people and their families tell us they appreciate our willingness to ‘think outside of absence of biological markers for ‘schizophrenia’, this study calls for more attention to construing the box’ and step away from our statutory roles, allowing them to feel they are seen as people such difficulties in relational terms. In the light of the Human Rights Act of (1998), a number of not symptoms. This often means extra work outside of paid time for staff but the commitment to moral, if not legal, objections to the detention of the ‘mentally ill’ under the MHA are rehearsed. making a real difference is such that everyone is happy to give themselves wholeheartedly.

4. The Italian Voice hearers movement: networking and research outcomes, Marcello Macario & 2. Working with young people who hear voices to challenge stigma: Voice Collective Project, Raffaella Pocobello (Italy) Claire Powell, Development worker, and a young person (England)

Aim of the contribution is twofold (1) We will give an update on the situation of the Italian network Voice Collective is a London-wide project that supports children & young people who hear voices of voice hearers: the network has grown significantly despite or maybe due to the heavy economic (and their families). After recognising that many of the young people we meet are struggling with bullying and exclusion at school, we began to investigate ways of challenging the stigma they face. and hope that it creates a new and more participatory recovery dynamic.

This presentation shares the range of strategies we have used to help young people feel empowered The programme is being run by Voices Vic as a single-blind randomised control trial in partnership at home and school - including training for teachers, ‘get your voice heard’ workshops for young with Monash Alfred Psychiatry Research Centre, which sounds very intimidating, but actually will people who hear voices, workshops for young people who don’t necessarily hear voices, anti-stigma help us to build more profile and evidence for the impact and importance of voices work. cards and a brief animation created by the young people we work with. Using examples, we will identify the elements that have been most successful so that attendees can take aspects of our work 2. ‘I leave my voices in my cell on Fridays’: Hearing Voices Groups in Prisons: Hearing Voices to their own area. Prison Project Catherine Whitaker (England)

3. Working with Voices: Reframing, Reconnecting, Recovering, Ros Thomas and Sarah Sewell Since launching our first Hearing Voices Group in a London prison in May 2011, we have begun (Australia) to develop a network of groups in prisons and secure mental health units. Getting groups up and running in prisons has been both challenging and extremely rewarding. Despite initial cynicism The presentation aims to introduce attendees to one of the fresh and innovative approaches we are from staff about people’s potential to engage in peer support, members have often relished the using in our Young People’s Discovery Program that assists our young people in making sense of opportunity to share their experiences in a safe space and provide support for one another. their experience and reframing their lives. This presentation shares the journey of the groups we run in prisons, drawing out the main challenges In 2008 Ros attended a Recovery from Psychosis Conference in Perth WA, sponsored by Richmond as well as things that have been most useful along the way. Topics include: creating, and sustaining, Fellowship WA. Since that time workers and participants of our day program have been exploring enthusiasm (getting prisons to work with us), changing the culture (working with prisons to address and training and gaining confidence in using the Hearing Voices Approach. stigma and giving officers the tools to support people in distress); planning groups (and managing staff anxieties), facilitating groups in partnership (creating safe spaces in unsafe places); working In June 2011, two young voice hearers and two workers from Gateway Community Health’s with ‘hot topics’ (power, anger, hopelessness, loss & guilt); benefits (to members, staff and the day program attended four day voice dialogue training with Ron Coleman, Eleanor Longden prison itself). and Dr Dirk Corstens at Voices Vic., Prahan Mission. This experience was truly inspirational and transformational. 3. Talk for Health: therapy without therapists, Nicky Forsythe (England) Talk for Health is a new approach to mental health, based on teaching people how to talk and listen Ros as the voice dialogue ‘facilitator’ and Sarah as a voice ‘hearer’ will share what we learned from in a therapeutic way. Participants who have done the Talk for Health programme benefit from talking with Sarah’s voices and sharing how that has been transformational for both of us. effective therapeutic encounters with each other, over the long term, without a therapist. Talk for Health rests on the evidence that therapeutic talk is extraordinarily effective, yet doesn’t depend on This presentation aims to provide attendees with a overview of how we came to be talking with professionals or sophisticated techniques. The paper will outline this evidence, the content of the voices. Talk for Health programme, and its results. • Ros will share how attending voice dialogue training enhanced her practice. • Sarah will share her story. Talk for Health was developed by Psychotherapist and researcher Nicky Forsythe. Since 1998, Nicky • Sarah and Ros will share our journey of first discovering and then, transforming our has been exploring the boundaries between therapy, therapeutic talk and everyday chat and, in relationships with her voices. 2008 she developed Talk for Health as a form of ‘therapy without therapists’. Nicky’s vision is that • We will also share some of the valuable information that her voices gave us. therapeutic talk should be as freely available in society as tap water.

This information has enabled Sarah to reframe her experience, empowering her to reconnect with In the last year, programmes have been run with NSUN and the Personalisation Forum Group in her strengths and give Sarah the self-awareness and confidence to move forward in her recovery, Doncaster. These included people with diagnoses of Schizophrenia, Bipolar Disorder and Asperger’s thus demonstrating the benefits of using the Hearing Voices Approach. syndrome. An NHS-sponsored Talk for Health programme will run in Summer/Autumn 2012.

We believe it is an example of how reframing mental health creates a new state of mind and 4. Mixing Music and Coping with Voices, Zanell Neethling (Anonymous Z), England demonstrates the benefits of using the Hearing Voices Approach to achieve this. We hope to inspire. I mix music, a DJ, on turntables with records and CD’s. It has been the best coping strategy I have ever experienced for ‘hearing voices’. I have a set of equipment available to bring and set up. I could Parallel Session Four: Peer Support and Self Help show others how it works (I have a paper based theory explanation on ‘how to mix’ as well from a very good source, which I can handout even), explain the benefits (not only are you listening to the 1. Individual Peer Support Programme: Merging the hearing voices approach with intentional music, but you also have to concentrate on counting beats, mixing sounds together and making the peer support Indigo Daya (Australia) ‘set’ smooth. The volume can go alot louder than the usual mp3 player or sound system, very useful if having ‘very loud voices’, and it is in the earphones and on the speakers (so your also listening Find out about ‘Voice Exchange’, an innovative new recovery programme for individual voice hearers at two places at the same time). At worst, if the music and volume doesn’t help to ‘drown out the that is about to start in Melbourne, Australia. voices’, alas you will at least be listening to some good music and concentrating somewhere else.

The programme has employed and trained two voice hearers as peer workers, and another as a peer Morning Workshops, 11.30 - 13.00 researcher. We plan to work in mutually beneficial 1:1 peer relationships which give people the chance to share their story, profile their voices, and start to improve their relationship with voices. Workshop One: Coming Off Psychiatric Medications: A Harm Reduction Approach Will Hall We are particularly interested in incorporating ideas from Intentional Peer Support into our work, (USA) Coming off medications is almost a taboo topic, but working collaboration is key -- because and in the traditional Kenyan cultures. medication response is subjective and socially constructed, not just biochemical. How do we educate without provoking or being anti-meds? How do medications work? What is best use? How do we The film takes 45 minutes. The second half of the workshop will be used for questions and balance risks and benefits, and what are basic guidelines for reducing and withdrawal? Based on discussion. more than 8 years experience and the peer Harm Reduction Guide to Coming Off Psychiatric Drugs, published by The Icarus Project and Freedom Center. Workshop Three: Peer Support and Self Help Marissa Lambert and Karen Machin (England) This highly interactive workshop will continue to address the question ‘Who is a Peer?’ put forward in Workshop Two: Working with male survivors of sexual abuse Jim Campbell and Ron Coleman our proposal for a paper abstract. The workshop will embrace experiential learning through practical (Scotland) group work and discussion. This will build on the existing skills, knowledge and experiences of the Evidence suggests that a large proportion of people who hear voices come from traumatic participants. experiences, which includes sexual abuse. Drawing on the recently published book Reclaiming Our Lives: A workbook for males who have experienced sexual abuse, by Jim Campbell and Ron Coleman, It will require participants to work in small groups to consider their own emotions and experiences this workshop will present the recovery journey and experiences of the two authors. Workshop in relation to a variety of stories that are based on similarities and differences of distress. participants will learn about some of the techniques that the book outlines in helping male survivors The workshop will offer participants a safe, relaxed and comfortable atmosphere for discussion of sexual abuse to reclaim their lives and recover. And explore ways male survivors can be helped. which respects different perspectives. This is based on our delivery of the National accredited Peer Providing an interactive experience, this workshop provides an opportunity for participants to try Worker training module, which has given us the opportunity to work with over 150 peers, including some of the techniques for themselves, sharing their thoughts, experiences and ideas. people who have experience of voice-hearing.

Afternoon Workshops, 14.00 – 14.15 Participants will be encouraged to identify important aspects of supporting someone who has different experiences from themselves, including the benefits and challenges. This will introduce Workshop One: Listening to Ambassadors of Forbidden Truths Rufus May, Sophie Ashton and participants to one aspect of the Peer Support training and how this shared learning can be used. Topdog (England) Workshop Five: A Quiet Revolution: To introduce people to the potential and possibilities for We can change the relationship with terrifying voices if we find ways to listen to the unmet needs change and influencing new ideas in their services Matthew Morris and David Williams they are pointing towards. This workshop will describe ways to listen to the important messages aggressive voices are bringing. We will describe how to firstly set boundaries with aggressive voices Since 2009, a small group of staff working in the NHS having been trying to influence the work of and then our experiences of dialoguing with and learning from them. It can be helpful to create a staff, towards accepting voices and working collaboratively with psychosis in Suffolk. safe space to explore forbidden emotions and stories that aggressive voices are related to. Rufus and Sophie will reflect on their experiences of this truth and reconciliation process and include This has included two conferences mainly aimed at staff and attended by 450 people, internal contributions from ‘Topdog’, one of Sophie’s voices. This is emotionally powerful work that training for staff “An Introduction to Working with Voices” which has now had 300 staff attend, and needs to be handled carefully. We will consider how to creatively manage strong emotions related further training staff in attachment theory and the link with trauma and psychosis. to interpersonal dilemmas in people’s pasts. We will also look at how to create shifts away from survival strategies that are no longer necessary. Apart from the conferences which you could describe as noisy, the aim has been to introduce and embed new theories and possibilities for practice without attracting too much conflict and controversy Workshop Two: Is It Normal To Be Different? Presentation of a documentary film about a and by planning a quiet revolution, things can change quicker and with real integration. network of two alternative mental health projects in Kenya Caroline Von Taysen and Kanja Aims: To introduce people to the potential and possibilities for change and influencing new ideas Waithira in their services.

Presentation of a documentary film about a network of two alternative mental health self help To present what we have done and how it has been received. projects in Kenya called “Normal Difference Mind Health“ and subsequent discussion with the audience and the film-makers. To raise the interesting dilemma that it has placed on the organisation in supporting innovation whilst challenging the traditional power bases. “It is Normal to be Different“ shows the work of two alternative mental health projects in Kenya, situated in ghettos in Nairobi and Kisumu. It was made over three years in close collaboration with To raise the feedback that there is a very willing and receptive audience for new ideas and that by the Kenyan founders of the projects who will also be presenting the workshop. being mindful of staffs feelings, their own lived experiences and traumas, they are eager to find new ways of helping people. The film shows how the groups are working in an environment determined by poverty and by a lack of mental health services and highlights the recovery story of Blaze, a voice hearing hip hop artist. To let people know that staff have expressed their frustration and sometimes guilt at the way they work and want to find better ways of engaging with people who they know aren’t always helped by The project’s main focus is on offering different artistic activities in a safe setting, where it is possible what they currently offer. to talk about one’s experiences freely without fear of stigmatization. It is through artistic expression (music, dance, poetry, etc) that a healing process is initiated and accompanied by the group. The To suggest, discuss and plan ways in which others may take ideas forward and begin similar events second focus is to offer platforms (f.ex. shows and exhibitions), where the artists can show their and training in their areas. works publicly and generate an income through selling them. Workshop Six: Give time to your experience with voices. It deserves it! Marina Lykovounioto. The third focus is on exploring the different approaches towards mental health in the Western world The Hearing Voices Working To Recovery Network presents “25 Years On” DVD NOW ON SALE - £20

Volume Two: From Psychiatry to Society

A short history of the development of the international hearing voices network

This is the inspiring story of the birth and development of what has become known as the hearing voices approach.

The film shows how the pioneering work to find ways to assist people who hear overwhelming voices, to understand and live with their experience, has developed over the last 25 years. It is based on the personal perspectives and memories of members and supporters of the International Hearing Voices Network, including voice hearers and mental health professionals

Beginning in the early days in , Netherlands in 1987, it tells of the development of the hearing voices network across Europe and the formation of INTERVOICE the international coordinating body for the network.

The film includes candid interviews with (in order of appearance): Ron Coleman, Paul Baker, Marius Romme, Dirk Corstens, Jacqui Dillon, Jorn Eriksen, Ami Rohintz, Liz Ellis, Sandra Escher.

This film is the first part of a series of videos about the people and the ideas that have created this new way of thinking about assisting people to live with their voices.

Produced by Working To Recovery Ltd, 2012 DVD Production: Double Vision www.doublevisiongroup.co.uk Filmed on location in Milan and Savona, Italy

Sponsored by and dedicated to Hywel Davies, Patron of the international hearing voices network

2012 Copyright Working To Recovery Ltd Working to Recovery Limited, 28 Habost, Port of Ness, Lewis, HS2 0TG Tel: 01851 810060 Mobile: 07884 268192 Email: [email protected] www.workingtorecovery.co.uk

Cover design by: www.thepuffinroom.co.uk www.workingtorecovery.co.uk