An Association of Patients
Dear Sir,?May I suggest the forming of an Association of Patients on the lines of the Diabetic Association for those who have gone through Mental Hospitals and have recovered ?
This would be in no way connected with bodies which aim at revealing the defects in institutional treatment, and expressions of regret about what had happened in the past would be barred. The Association would aim at producing a hopeful and constructive outlook on the future by mutual encouragement and by the enlightenment which might come from the patients’ point of view stated objectively. It is to be hoped that it would include medical men.
At present those of us who have been in hospitals for mental treatment in the past, have to overcome a sense of shame in admitting this fact. It is difficult to retain faith in our own personality, particularly if we have to express views which are not widely held. Though there has been some progress in educating public opinion by societies such as the N.A.M.H., there is still an attitude towards mental illness which sets it apart from all physical ailments to the detriment of healing processes. The Association I suggest, would take the whole problem right out into the light of day and end the shamefaced hole-in-corner procedure, too common in the past. As my own doctor said to me, “it is a privilege to have gone through such an experience and come out an integrated man These words are rather too generous but they contain a measure of truth.
We have many things to be rightly ashamed of in the conduct which brought the need for mental treatment?just as those who eat too much or take too much or too little exercise, should be ashamed when these methods of living bring on physical illness. But we have no reason for shame?only rather for pride?that we have had treatment for mental illness which made us able to return to the world of men and women, there to play our part in the developing human species whose future?can one doubt it?is one of hopeful promise.
Yours etc., David Peat. Borrers Piatt, Ditehling, Sussex.
It is clear that the present desire for religion is great, whether in a confessional form, as a liberal faith, or in the belief in values transcending Man … Modern Science can only fulfil its promises of help through awareness that it can never entirely meet the deepest need of man, a need met only by the humble surrender to the ” unknown Science can develop its full power only when imbued with religious consciousness in the widest sense.
Professor Dr H. C. Rumke, Report given at Second Mental Health Assembly, Geneva, 1949.
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