Moving Forward: Negotiating Self and External Circumstances in Recovery.

Abstract

This article presents a framework for understanding the concept of recovery from serious mental illnesses and other life struggles. The framework is based on findings from a longitudinal, qualitative study that involved in-depth interviews with 28 people who experienced serious mental health challenges. The purpose of this article is to clarify the concept of recovery by presenting a grounded theory analysis of the components of recovery. The framework recognizes the experiences of struggle constructed through the words of study participants and captures four main components of recovery: a) a drive to move forward, b) a spiral of positive and negative changes, c) the context of recovery, and d) a dialectical process of ongoing negotiation between self and external circumstances. Recovery Research and ThemesThe concept of recovery from serious mental illnesses was first used by psychiatrist Abraham Low, who founded one of the first mental health self-help This document is copyrighted by the American Psychological Association or one of its allied publishers.This article is intended solely for the personal use of the individual user and is not to be disseminated broadly.

A longitudinal study of mental health consumer/survivor initiatives: Part V–Outcomes at 3‐year follow‐up

“…While it is not clear why there was a regression to baseline levels at the 18-month follow-up, these findings indicate that improvement in the context of consumer-run organizations is not a linear process. This is consistent with the emerging literature on recovery, which has emphasized that the recovery process includes setbacks, as well progress~Ochocka, Nelson, & Janzen, 2005!. Another interesting finding from this research is that only the group that participated continuously and intensively in CSIs showed benefits in terms of community integration, quality of life~daily activities!, symptom distress, and employment0 education. The continuously active group participated 10-12 hours per month during the first 16 months of the study and the last 6 months of the study, while the group that was active only at 9 and 18 months participated only 3 hours per month during the first 16 months of the study.…”

Philosophical and Ethical Perspectives on How We Could Know Recovery from Schizophrenia and Their Impact on Knowledge Development

“…More recently, Jacobson and Greenley [4] addressed a multi-dimensional concept of recovery consisting of internal conditions such as hope, healing, empowerment, and connection, as well as external conditions such as human rights, a positive culture of healing, and recovery-oriented services. Noordsy et al [24] [12]. In addition, a few tools were developed to measure subjective aspects of recovery.…”

“…This changed view about the course of schizophrenia can be accounted by not only the introduction of antipsychotic drugs, but many other factors such as a landmark study on the prognosis of schizophrenia conducted by Harding, Brooks, Ashikaga, Strauss, & Breier [3], studies on a new definition of recovery from severe mental disorders by Anthony [2] and Jacobson & Greenly [4], and numerous qualitative studies about lived experience of people with schizophrenia [5]- [12].…”

Understanding recovery: the perspective of substance misusing offenders

“…Instead, recovery has been ruminated upon in mental health circles and within substance misusing groups without a criminal background (e.g. Hänninen & Koski-Jännes, 1999;Hughes, 2007;Nettleton, Neale & Pickering, 2010;Ochocka, Nelson & Janzen, 2005;Vigilant, 2005).…”