scholarly journals Failure to Comply: Madness and/as Testimony

2017 ◽  
Vol 6 (3) ◽  
pp. 60 ◽  
Author(s):  
Clementine Morrigan
Keyword(s):  
Mental Illness ◽  
Sexual Violence ◽  
Disordered Eating ◽  
Successful Treatment ◽  
Suicide Attempts ◽  
The Body ◽  
Acting Out ◽  
The Everyday ◽  
Self Harm ◽  
Psychiatric Survivors

Self-harm, suicide attempts, disordered eating, addiction, and other forms of “acting out” are associated with the trauma of surviving violence. While these behaviours are pathologized as symptoms of mental illness, they can be understood, instead, as strategies of resistance against violence. When violence is ignored or normalized, the “acting out” associated with trauma can be a means of sounding an alarm that something is very wrong. This “acting out” can be understood as an embodied form of testimony. When direct resistance to violence, such as fighting back or escaping, is thwarted or impossible, traumatic “acting out” can be a way to draw attention to and resist violence. Psychiatry, instead of answering the call of trauma by addressing the underlying violence, works to silence that call. Through incarceration, sexual violence, enforced isolation, restricted motion, threats, coercive drugging, gaslighting, and other abusive tactics, psychiatry works to undermine the embodied testimony of trauma by producing compliance. The source of the problem is shifted from the original violence and located instead in the body of the traumatized person. Successful treatment is understood as the reduction or elimination of the very “symptoms” which are in reality acts of resistance to violence. Therefore, successful treatment essentially means submission. The carceral space of psychiatry continues the work of producing compliance even after the patient has left its enclosures, extending the space of the psych ward into the everyday lives of psychiatric survivors. 

scholarly journals An Exploration of Differences Between Deliberate Self-Harm with and without Suicidal Intent Amongst a Clinical Sample of Young People in Singapore: A Cross-Sectional Study

2020 ◽  
Vol 17 (4) ◽  
pp. 1429
Author(s):  
Ellaisha Samari ◽  
Shazana Shahwan ◽  
Edimansyah Abdin ◽  
YunJue Zhang ◽  
Rajeswari Sambasivam ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Mental Illness ◽  
Young People ◽  
Attempted Suicide ◽  
Suicide Attempts ◽  
Clinical Sample ◽  
Self Report ◽  
Suicidal Intent ◽  
Deliberate Self Harm ◽  
People With Mental Illness ◽  
Self Harm

This study examined differences between young people with mental illness who engage in deliberate self-harm with and without suicidal intent, as well as socio-demographic and clinical factors that are related to the increased likelihood of suicide attempt amongst self-harming young people. A total of 235 outpatients with mental illness who had engaged in deliberate self-harm were recruited from a tertiary psychiatric hospital in Singapore. Participants completed a self-report questionnaire which collected information on their socio-demographic background, self-harm history, diagnosis, depressive symptoms and childhood trauma. A total of 31.1% had reported a history of attempted suicide. Multiple logistic regression conducted found that engaging in self-harm ideation between 1 and 7 days (OR = 4.3, p = 0.30), and more than 1 week (OR = 10.5, p < 0.001) (versus no engagement in any self-harm ideation at all), were significantly associated with greater likelihood of attempted suicide. This study reports a relatively high prevalence rate of reported suicide attempts amongst young people with mental illness who engaged in self-harm. Identifying self-harm behaviors and treating it early could be the first step in managing potential suicidal behaviors among those who engage in self-harm.

Multiple Suicide-Attempts in Adolescence: Psychodynamic Understandings on the Process of Integration of Hallucinated Bodily Experiences

2017 ◽  
Vol 41 (S1) ◽  
pp. s775-s776
Author(s):  
G. Giacomini ◽  
P. Solano ◽  
M. Amore
Keyword(s):  
Suicide Attempts ◽  
Emotional Experience ◽  
The Body ◽  
Psychotherapeutic Treatment ◽  
Working Through ◽  
Gradual Process ◽  
Self Harm ◽  
Internal Objects ◽  
Competing Interest ◽  
The Mind

Introduction.Suicidal adolescents have a severely damaged body/mind relationship where issues pertaining to adolescence and psychache are tightly intertwined causing dissociation, hallucinations and concreteness. In this conundrum, the suffering mind swings from being identified and split from the body favouring self-harm and bodily together with visual hallucinations.Objectives.Investigating and working through suicidal concreteness together with the role and meaning of hallucinations in adolescents with a story of multiple suicide attempts.Aims.Achieving a first integration and appropriation of the emotional experience with the establishment of the boundaries between mind/body, inside/outside giving up hallucinations.Methods.Prolonged intensive psychodynamic work focusing on self-representation, the working through of persecutory internal objects causing rage, hostility and attacks on the affective links with the environment allowed a gradual process of integration of the self with the decrease of suicidiality.Results.The working through and containment of persecutory internal objects led to the possibility to unconsciously give up hallucinations and integrate the emotional experience in the mind together with the development of first effective boundaries between inside/outside.Conclusions.An intense work of containment and working through of persecution and rage in the early stages of the psychotherapeutic treatment of adolescent multiple attempters can significantly favour the relinquishment of hallucinatory mechanisms and self-harm as a way to cope with intolerable anguish and psychache. This favours the process of in dwelling of the psyche in the soma as described by Winnicott.Disclosure of interestThe authors have not supplied their declaration of competing interest.

Self-Harming in Depressed Patients: Pattern Analysis

2005 ◽  
Vol 39 (10) ◽  
pp. 899-906 ◽  
Author(s):  
G Parker ◽  
G Parker ◽  
Gin. Malhi ◽  
Philip Mitchell ◽  
Beth Kotze ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Depressive Disorders ◽  
Suicide Attempts ◽  
Acting Out ◽  
Personality Functioning ◽  
Depressed Patients ◽  
Three Samples ◽  
Response To Stress ◽  
Self Harm ◽  
Bipolar Patients ◽  
Drug And Alcohol

Objective: As deliberate self-harm (DSH) is a common concomitant of depressive disorders, we undertook a study examining the relevance of possible determinants and correlates of DSH. Method: Three separate samples of depressed outpatients were studied to determine consistency of identified factors across samples, with principal analyses involving gender, age and diagnosis-matched DSH and non-DSH subjects. Results: Across the samples, some 20% of subjects admitted to episodes of DSH. Women reported higher rates and there was a consistent trend for higher rates in bipolar patients. Univariate analyses examined the relevance of several sociodemographic variables, illicit drug and alcohol use, past deprivational and abusive experiences, past suicidal attempts and disordered personality functioning. Multivariate analyses consistently identified previous suicide attempts and high ‘acting out’ behaviours across the three samples, suggesting the relevance of an externalizing response to stress and poor impulse control. Conclusions: Results assist the identification and management of depressed patients who are at greater risk of DSH behaviours.

Adolescents’ self-mutilation - Relationship with dependent behaviour

2003 ◽  
Vol 62 (4) ◽  
pp. 241-249 ◽  
Author(s):  
M. Bolognini ◽  
B. Plancherel ◽  
J. Laget ◽  
P. Stéphan ◽  
O. Halfon
Keyword(s):  
Suicide Attempts ◽  
Clinical Sample ◽  
Control Sample ◽  
Clinical Population ◽  
Control Group ◽  
Clinical Group ◽  
Self Mutilation ◽  
Self Harm ◽  
Partial Overlap ◽  
The Relationship

The aim of this study, which was carried out in the French-speacking part of Switzerland, was to examine the relationship between suicide attempts and self-mutilation by adolescents and young adults. The population, aged 14-25 years (N = 308), included a clinical sample of dependent subjects (drug abuse and eating disorders) compared to a control sample. On the basis of the Mini Neuropsychiatric Interview ( Sheehan et al., 1998 ), DSM-IV criteria were used for the inclusion of the clinical population. The results concerning the occurrence of suicide attempts as well as on self-mutilation confirm most of the hypotheses postulated: suicidal attempts and self-mutilation were more common in the clinical group compared to the control group, and there was a correlation between suicide attempts and self-mutilation. However, there was only a partial overlap, attesting that suicide and self-harm might correspond to two different types of behaviour.

Attachment Organization in Suicide Prevention Research

Crisis ◽  
2014 ◽  
Vol 35 (1) ◽  
pp. 60-66 ◽  
Author(s):  
Amanda Venta ◽  
Carla Sharp
Keyword(s):  
Risk Factors ◽  
Suicidal Ideation ◽  
Suicide Attempt ◽  
Interpersonal Relationships ◽  
Suicide Ideation ◽  
Suicide Attempts ◽  
Critical Role ◽  
Self Report ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Self Harm

Background: Identifying risk factors for suicide-related thoughts and behaviors (SRTB) is essential among adolescents in whom SRTB remain a leading cause of death. Although many risk factors have already been identified, influential theories now suggest that the domain of interpersonal relationships may play a critical role in the emergence of SRTB. Because attachment has long been seen as the foundation of interpersonal functioning, we suggest that attachment insecurity warrants attention as a risk factor for SRTB. Aims: This study sought to explore relations between attachment organization and suicidal ideation, suicide attempts, and self-harm in an inpatient adolescent sample, controlling for demographic and psychopathological covariates. Method: We recruited 194 adolescents from an inpatient unit and assigned them to one of four attachment groups (secure, preoccupied, dismissing, or disorganized attachment). Interview and self-report measures were used to create four variables reflecting the presence or absence of suicidal ideation in the last year, single lifetime suicide attempt, multiple lifetime suicide attempts, and lifetime self-harm. Results: Chi-square and regression analyses did not reveal significant relations between attachment organization and SRTB, although findings did confirm previously established relations between psychopathology and SRTB, such that internalizing disorder was associated with increased self-harm, suicide ideation, and suicide attempt and externalizing disorder was associated with increased self-harm. Conclusion: The severity of this sample and methodological differences from previous studies may explain the nonsignificant findings. Nonsignificant findings may indicate that the relation between attachment organization and SRTB is moderated by other factors that should be explored in future research.

Identifying Suicide Typologies Among Trauma-Exposed Veterans

Crisis ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 41 (4) ◽  
pp. 288-295 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nadia Bounoua ◽  
Jasmeet P. Hayes ◽  
Naomi Sadeh
Keyword(s):  
Latent Profile Analysis ◽  
Suicide Attempts ◽  
Clinical Symptoms ◽  
Profile Analysis ◽  
Risky Behaviors ◽  
Self Report ◽  
Cross Sectional ◽  
Research Priority ◽  
Self Harm ◽  
And Behaviors

Abstract. Background: Suicide among veterans has increased in recent years, making the identification of those at greatest risk for self-injurious behavior a high research priority. Aims: We investigated whether affective impulsivity and risky behaviors distinguished typologies of self-injurious thoughts and behaviors in a sample of trauma-exposed veterans. Method: A total of 95 trauma-exposed veterans (ages 21–55; 87% men) completed self-report measures of self-injurious thoughts and behaviors, impulsivity, and clinical symptoms. Results: A latent profile analysis produced three classes that differed in suicidal ideation, suicide attempts and nonsuicidal self-injury (NSSI): A low class that reported little to no self-injurious thoughts or behaviors; a self-injurious thoughts (ST) class that endorsed high levels of ideation but no self-harm behaviors; and a self-injurious thoughts and behaviors (STaB) class that reported ideation, suicide attempts and NSSI. Membership in the STaB class was associated with greater affective impulsivity, disinhibition, and distress/arousal than the other two classes. Limitations: Limitations include an overrepresentation of males in our sample, the cross-sectional nature of the data, and reliance on self-report measures. Conclusion: Findings point to affective impulsivity and risky behaviors as important characteristics of veterans who engage in self-injurious behaviors.

Can’t wait to feel better: Facebook Live and the recalibration of downtime in tending to the body

2021 ◽  
pp. 016344372110034
Author(s):  
Dang Nguyen
Keyword(s):  
Everyday Life ◽  
Mobile Technology ◽  
Social Practices ◽  
The Body ◽  
Therapeutic Method ◽  
Temporal Space ◽  
The Everyday ◽  
Temporal Structures

This article explores the temporality of liveness on Facebook Live through the analytical lens of downtime. Downtime is conceptualized here as multiscale: downtime exists in between the micro action and inaction of everyday life, but also in larger episodes of personal and health crises that reorient the body toward technologies for instantaneous replenishment of meaning and activity. Living through downtime with mobile technology enables the experience of oscillation between liveness as simultaneity and liveness as instantaneity. By juxtaposing time-as-algorithmic against time-as-lived through the livestreaming practices of diện chẩn, an emergent unregulated therapeutic method, I show how different enactments of liveness on Facebook Live recalibrate downtime so that the body can reconfigure its being-in-time. The temporal reverberation of downtime and liveness creates an alternative temporal space wherein social practices that are shunned by the temporal structures of institution and society can retune and continue to thrive at the margin of these structures and at the central of the everyday.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document