Come hang out with great folks and share your dreams for how we can find alternatives to corporate psychiatry!

JOIN US!
To plan/plot/imagine what
Rethinking Psychiatry
will be next year.

Summer retreat?
     Consensus training?
          Anti-racism / anti-oppression study together?
               Continue putting on monthly events, or fewer, or bigger, or different?
                    Collaborate with other groups?

Wednesday, July 15, 2020
7-9pm PDT


Click HERE to join!
(You have to have Zoom downloaded first.)  

Questions? Email us at RethinkingPsychiatry@gmail.com.

WE HOPE TO SEE YOU THERE!

Peer Galaxy: Your Portal to Telephone and Online Peer Support & Wellness Activities

Wednesday, June 3rd, 2020, 7-9pm on Zoom!

Laura Rose and Kevin Fitts introduce us to the galaxy of peer support and wellness events in the Peer Galaxy website!

Who is Peer Galaxy for? Anyone seeking recovery from pandemic stress, emotional distress, grief, mental health, addictions, co-occurring substance use challenges and/or trauma.

“We’re here when you need us, in real time, with free activities around the clock!”

Connecting with an individual having lived experience who can listen, understand, relate to and grow with us wherever we are in our journey is what we call PEER SUPPORT.

Peer Galaxy is brand new and already in April 2020 the PeerGalaxy Calendar featured:
* 1,500+ opportunities,
* 50+ per day on average,
* including 9 telephone peer support lines
* operating up to 17 hours per day,
* 7 days per week,
* 18 hours per day, from 6am – 12am,
* some organizations employing dozens of peer support specialists at once,
* all accessibility friendly with their new accessibility tool!

Visit the PEERGALAXY CALENDAR to find live telephone and online peer support, virtual groups, special events and wellness activities almost any time of the day–and if there is nothing live, there are videos you can access. Also check out the COVID-19 RESOURCES.

A small sample of PeerGalaxy events include support groups, chair yoga, Tai-Chi, breathwork, guided art, ecstatic dance, and the Surviving Race Project-at the Intersection of Injustice, Disability and Human Rights.

Laura Rose

Laura Rose is a lady of many hats with a long career of providing creative and technical business services in the public and private sector. Developer of PeerGalaxy, Laura Rose has served as a consultant for many of Oregon’s peer run organizations, programs, and other nonprofits at the local, statewide, national and international level. She has been recognized as a dedicated consumer and family advocate who informs public policy, budgeting, and systems improvement at every level.

Kevin Fitts

In addition to his responsibilities as Executive Director of the Oregon Mental Health Consumers Association (OMHCA), Kevin Fitts serves on the State of Oregon Consumer Advisory Council (OCAC), State of Oregon Addictions and Mental Health Planning and Advisory Committee (AMHPAC), Unity Center for Behavioral Health Advisory Committee, Multnomah County Adult Mental Health and Substance Abuse Advisory Council Executive Committee (AMHSAAC), and “A Home for Everyone” Coordinating Council. There are other committees and boards, too, but you get the general idea. Kevin has a lot of energy and a lot of knowledge from a variety of roles in mental health services over the years.

Streamed Live!

There will NOT be an in-person meeting this month.
We are truly sorry.
Please take care of yourself and each other.

Wednesday, June 3, 2020, 7-9 PM

Rethinking Psychiatry will livestream this event starting Wednesday, June 3, 7-9pm, and will post the recording on Rethinking Psychiatry’s YouTube channel, website and FB after.

TO ATTEND LIVE: there is NO NEED to sign up for a Zoom account (but you can and it is free).

However, YOU DO NEED TO DOWNLOAD THE APP OR GET IT FROM THE PLAYSTORE.
(It only takes a couple of minutes.)
You will be directed there once you click the “HERE” link, below.

NOTE ON CONFIDENTIALITY FOR THE EVENT:

  • Participants’ names will be viewable to one another for the live event. If you do not want your name seen, sign up with a pen name (ex. Happy Camper, or Lucky Dog) or “rename” yourself (click on the participant list once in the event).
  • Participants will enter the event with their videos turned off, and have the choice to keep them off to remain anonymous to one another for the live event, OR turn them on and be seen by one another.
  • NO PARTICIPANTS will be seen on the recording that we will post either way.
  • Participants can submit questions by chat if they don’t want to be heard on the recording OR “raise their hand” and we will unmute them to ask a question.

*********

To join the event (we recommend doing this a few minutes early):

Click HERE to join via internet on any device with internal or external webcam and mic.
Meeting ID: 881 7564 1129
Paasword: 410117
OR
Call 253-215-8782 to join by phone in OR or WA, audio only.
(For numbers for other locations, click HERE.)
Meeting ID: 881 7564 1129
Paasword: 410117

We are NOT gathering at the Montavilla United Methodist Church building, due to COVID-19. We are so sorry we will miss you there.
We will have the recording up for viewing after the presentation.

For questions contact: RethinkingPsychiatry@gmail.com or message us on our Facebook Page.

Click here to download flyer.


Our Collective Mental Health during the Covid-19 Pandemic–May 6

Streamed Live!

There will NOT be an in-person meeting this month.
We are truly sorry.
Please take care of yourself and each other.

  • As our collective mental health takes a hit during the COVID-19 pandemic, let’s gather to discuss how to manage this struggle with harm reduction techniques and radical mental health perspectives in mind.
  • We will consider ways to meet ourselves where we’re at rather than feel pressured to perform productivity & wellness
  • We will discuss ways to ground ourselves in our values and practices of mutual aid to support our collective well-being in this challenging time.

Dr. Karen Hixson , LPC

Karen Hixson has been a mental health counselor in Portland, Oregon since 2002 with a focus on social justice and anti-oppression based perspectives. She has also been organizing with her local mental health comrades in Empathy Riot! since the 2016 election.

Karen Hixson’s webiste
Empathy Riot’s website

Wednesday, May 6, 2020, 7-9 PM

Rethinking Psychiatry will livestream this event starting Wednesday, May 6, 7-9pm, and will post the recording on our website and FB after.

TO ATTEND LIVE: there is NO NEED to sign up for a Zoom account (but you can and it is free).

However, YOU DO NEED TO DOWNLOAD THE APP OR GET IT FROM THE PLAYSTORE.
(It only takes a couple of minutes.)
You will be directed there once you click the “HERE” link, below.

NOTE ON CONFIDENTIALITY FOR THE EVENT:

  • Participants’ names will be viewable to one another. If you do not want your name seen, sign up with a pen name (ex. Happy Camper, or Lucky Dog).
  • Participants will enter the event with their videos turned off, and have the choice to keep them off to remain anonymous, OR turn them on and be seen by one another.
  • NO PARTICIPANTS will be seen on the recording that we will post either way.
  • Participants can submit questions by chat if they don’t want to be heard on the recording OR “raise their hand” and we will unmute them to ask a question.

*********

To join the event (we recommend doing this a few minutes early):

Click HERE to join via internet on any device with internal or external webcam and mic.
Meeting ID: 897 4495 9016
Paasword: 958018
OR
Call 253-215-8782 to join by phone in OR or WA, audio only.
(For numbers for other locations, click HERE.)
Meeting ID: 897 4495 9016
Paasword: 958018

We are NOT gathering at the Montavilla United Methodist Church building, due to COVID-19. We are so sorry we will miss you there.
We will have the recording up for viewing after the presentation.

For questions contact: RethinkingPsychiatry@gmail.com or message us on our Facebook Page.

Click here to download flyer.


Wednesday, April 1, 2020, 7-9 PM

Transcending Oppression

Streamed Live from Seattle!

There will NOT be an in-person meeting this month.
We are truly sorry.
Please take care of yourself and each other.

  • How the mental health & legal systems keep other oppressions in place.

  • The interlocking nature of all oppressions.

  • Learn another tool to address, dismantle and transcend oppression.

Eleta K. Wright , MSW

Born into an Air Force family stationed in Japan, Eleta spent her early years outside the American racial landscape–only to be thrust into it as her family traveled to the northwest from the American south days before the assassination of Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. 

Eleta credits this early life experience for the formation of her life avocation: The building of bridges across difference. From her early teens, she has been dedicated to reaching across aisles, healing wounds, and reacquainting people with their latent humanity. Eleta’s approach to liberation work addresses multiple axes of oppression, paired with an approach that centers healing and reconciliation.

During a career that has spanned three decades, she has brought this approach to organizations such as: Washington State University, Seattle Rape Relief, Alternatives to Violence of the Palouse, New Beginnings, and the Black Church Project. She served as the chair of the Racial Justice and Heterosexism Awareness Committees at Washington State University, President of the Washington State Coalition Against Domestic Violence, and was a founder of Black Men Against Domestic Violence in Snohomish County.  Currently she serves on the Healthcare for the Homeless Network Governance Council and is a member of the leadership team of Liberation United Church of Christ, Seattle.

Founder:
M.I.N.E. Meaningful Interpersonal Necessary Enrichment www.ewconsultingtraining.com

Wednesday, April 1, 2020, 7-9 PM

Rethinking Psychiatry will livestream this event starting Wednesday, April 1 (NOT fooling!), 7-9pm, from the Seattle area, and will post the recording on our website and FB after.

TO ATTEND LIVE: there is NO NEED to sign up for a Zoom account (but you can and it is free).

However, YOU DO NEED TO DOWNLOAD THE APP OR GET IT FROM THE PLAYSTORE.
(It only takes a couple of minutes.)
You will be directed there once you click the “HERE” link, below.

NOTE ON CONFIDENTIALITY FOR THE EVENT:

  • Participants’ names will be viewable to one another. If you do not want your name seen, sign up with a pen name (ex. Happy Camper, or Lucky Dog).
  • Participants will enter the event with their videos turned off, and have the choice to keep them off to remain anonymous, OR turn them on and be seen by one another.
  • NO PARTICIPANTS will be seen on the recording that we will post either way.
  • Participants can submit questions by chat if they don’t want to be heard on the recording OR “raise their hand” and we will unmute them to ask a question.

*********

To join the event (we recommend doing this a few minutes early):

Click HERE to join via internet on any device with internal or external webcam and mic.
Meeting ID: 913 057 419
OR
Call 253-215-8782 to join by phone in OR or WA, audio only.
(For numbers for other locations, click HERE.)
Meeting ID: 913 057 419

We are NOT gathering at the Montavilla United Methodist Church building, due to COVID-19. We are so sorry we will miss you there.
We will have the recording up for viewing after the presentation.

For questions contact: RethinkingPsychiatry@gmail.com or message us on our Facebook Page.

Click here to download flyer.


Wednesday, March 4, 2020

Rachel Levy presents ~
Beyond the Buzzwords: What does Trauma-Informed Care really mean?

How can organizations and individuals be truly trauma-informed?

______

Rachel Levy 
is a social worker who works for a crisis line in Portland.  She has always been passionate about social justice issues, and she believes strongly in the need for more person-centered and holistic options for mental health care.  Rachel  has been a member of Rethinking Psychiatry for nearly a decade.  She has written several articles for Mad in America, here.

______

Wednesday, March 4, 2020, 7-9 PM
232 SE 80th Avenue, Portland, OR 97215 wheelchair accessible
(Montavilla United Methodist Church)

Click here for map

FREE! (Donations Welcome $0 – $20 suggested)

Refreshments will be provided, including
plenty of vegan and gluten-free options!

For questions contact: RethinkingPsychiatry@gmail.com or message us on our Facebook Page.

Click here to download flyer.

Click here to download handout.


Mental Health and Prisons

______

Wednesday, February 5, 2020

Braunwynn Franklin presents:

  • What does being mentally altered look like in prison?
  • Who gets prison,
    who gets mental health treatment,
    and who gets real help?
  • There is hope with work!
Braunwynn Franklin to talk on Mental Health in Prisons
Braunwynn Franklin

Braunwynn Franklin has been a peer specialist and advocate for more than 10 years. She has a heart for social justice change in the prison/justice system and supporting people to gain a better quality of life mentally, spiritually and physically. She has a Bachelors Degree in Healthcare Administration and is a native of Detroit, Michigan.

Braunwynn facilitates NAMI Peer-to-Peer groups and is a Master Trainer in the Living Well with Chronic Disease from Stanford. Braunwynn is the Co-Champion of the Trauma-Informed Systems Committee of the Oregon Consumer Advisory Council.

Wednesday, February 5, 2020, 7-9 PM
232 SE 80th Avenue, Portland, OR 97215 wheelchair accessible
(Montavilla United Methodist Church)

Click here for map

FREE! (Donations Welcome $0 – $20 suggested)

Refreshments will be provided, including
plenty of vegan and gluten-free options!

For questions contact: RethinkingPsychiatry@gmail.com or message us on our Facebook Page.

Click here to download flyer.


John Herold Talk on Gaslighting

______

Wednesday, December 4, 2019

John Herold, MA presents:

I’m Crazy Because They Say So:
Gaslighting in “Mental Health”

  • Diagnosis: useful or manipulative?
  • Gaslighting techniques
  • How to fight them
John Herold and companions

John Herold, MA is a speaker, facilitator and trainer from Gig Harbor, Washington. He has experienced altered and extreme states of consciousness and was involuntarily hospitalized in 2012. John is the founder of Puget Sound Hearing Voices, now in its fifth year of weekly meetings. He is passionate about spreading non-pathologizing ways of understanding experiences that often get called mental illness. John completed a master’s program in Process Work in 2017 and is the recipient of a grant from the Foundation for Excellence in Mental Health Care to support the growth of the Hearing Voices Network in the Pacific Rim. Learn more about John’s work at www.johnherold.net and www.pugetsoundhearingvoices.org.  

Wednesday, December 4, 2019, 7-9 PM
232 SE 80th Avenue, Portland, OR 97215 wheelchair accessible
(Montavilla United Methodist Church)

Click here for map

FREE! (Donations Welcome $0 – $20 suggested)

Refreshments will be provided, including
plenty of vegan and gluten-free options!

For questions contact: RethinkingPsychiatry@gmail.com or message us on our Facebook Page.

Click here to download flyer. Click here to download handbills.


Wednesday, November 6, 2019

Watch the film that inspired the term “gaslighting:” Gaslight (1944)

FREE POPCORN provided!

Wednesday, November 6, 2019, 7-9 PM
232 SE 80th Avenue, Portland, OR 97215
(Montavilla United Methodist Church)

Click here to download flyer. Click here to download handbills.

FREE! (Donations Welcome $0 – $20 suggested)

Refreshments will be provided, including
plenty of vegan and gluten-free options!

Intentional Peer Support (IPS) & Trauma – Oct 2, 2019

The presenters, Danielle Grondin & Rosemary, sitting on steps
Danielle Grondin & Rosemary

Intentional Peer Support & Trauma with Danielle Grondin
Danielle will guide us through an interactive session on Intentional Peer Support and how we can understand our experience of trauma with mindfulness and self-care. This session will be useful for working with our own experiences and for providing support to others when trauma is a part of our lives.

Danielle Grondin is honored to be part of the peer movement. Her schooling focused on Sociology and Civic Leadership, while her lived experience illuminated the strengths and shortcomings of our current systems of care. Danielle has been in educator roles for over a decade and is passionate about social justice, intersectionality, sustainability, and holistic healing modalities. As the Director of Training at FolkTime, Danielle specializes in Intentional Peer Support. She is also trained as a Youth & Young Adult Peer Support Specialist, a Hearing Voices Facilitator, and a Certified Yoga Instructor. Danielle is a pet parent to two fuzzy animals, loves the outdoors, and enjoys spending quality time with her family and friends.

Rosemary is honored to also be part of the peer movement. Her schooling focused on being too cute and cuddly for words, and not barking too much, but just enough. She enjoys filet mingon, chasing squirrels, and having her belly rubbed.

Wednesday, October 2, 2019, 7-9 PM
232 SE 80th Avenue, Portland, OR 97215
(Montavilla United Methodist Church)

Click here for map

FREE! (Donations Welcome $0 – $20 suggested)

Refreshments will be provided, including
plenty of vegan and gluten-free options!

For questions contact: RethinkingPsychiatry@gmail.com or message us on our Facebook Page.

Click here to download flyer. Click here to download handbills.

From Mental Patient to Activist: A Brief History of the Psychiatric Survivor Movement – Sep 4, 2019


At Rethinking Psychiatry’s first community event of the season, a panel of psychiatric survivor-activists will share with us a brief history of the psychiatric survivor movement!


The three panelists are Laura Van Tosh, from Seattle, Founder of the Mental Health Policy Roundtable; Kevin Fitts, Executive Director of the Oregon Mental Health Consumers Association; and Rebecca Edens, President of the Oregon Consumer Psychiatric Survivor Coalition.

Van Tosh, Fitts and Edens will discuss the psychiatric survivor liberation movement from the late 19th century to today, both historically and from their on-the-ground perspectives, having helped make that history.

Their talk will be followed by a question-and-answer period.

Laura Van Tosh

Laura Van Tosh is a peer who has held policy positions at the National Association of State Mental Health Program Directors, University of Maryland, and the State of Oregon Health Authority. She is the founder of the Mental Health Policy Roundtable that met in Washington, D.C. for 8 years, and started a local version of the policy roundtable in King County, WA. The roundtable brings newcomers and veterans of policy together in a neutral environment of learning. Laura has written extensively about peer operated behavioral health care services and homelessness and has worked inside three state psychiatric hospitals. Her work is born from her experience as a patient turned activist and she has been involved with the peer movement since 1985.

Kevin Fitts

In addition to his responsibilities as Executive Director of the Oregon Mental Health Consumers Association (OMHCA), Kevin Fitts serves on the State of Oregon Consumer Advisory Council (OCAC), State of Oregon Addictions and Mental Health Planning and Advisory Committee (AMHPAC), Unity Center for Behavioral Health Advisory Committee, Multnomah County Adult Mental Health and Substance Abuse Advisory Council Executive Committee (AMHSAAC), and “A Home for Everyone” Coordinating Council. There are other committees and boards, too, but you get the general idea. Kevin has a lot of energy and a lot of knowledge from a variety of roles in mental health services over the years.

Rebecca Edens

Rebecca Edens, President of the Oregon Consumer / Psychiatric Survivor Coalition (OCSC), is a “Mindfreedom” fighter, advocate/activist, and is committed to securing the human rights and cognitive liberty of people labeled “mentally ill.” She is constantly reminding us that people cannot even begin their “discovery” process when suffering significant human rights violations. We all should be opposing oppressive psychiatric practices, even psychiatrists. Especially when the science says these practices are killing us.

Wednesday, September 4, 2019, 7-9 PM
232 SE 80th Avenue, Portland, OR 97215
(Montavilla United Methodist Church)

Click here for map

FREE! (Donations Welcome $0 – $20 suggested)

Refreshments will be provided, including
plenty of vegan and gluten-free options!

For questions contact: RethinkingPsychiatry@gmail.com or message us on our Facebook Page.

Click here to download flyer. Click here to download handbills.

Reclaiming Self-Care, with Molly DuMars of Reimagining Recovery

Does “self-care” feel like a co-opted concept to make us feel better about our trauma-inducing society?

According to Audre Lorde, “Caring for myself is not self-indulgence, it is self-preservation, and that is an act of political warfare.”

Molly DuMars will lead us in exploring and reclaiming a more radical, trauma-informed, social justice oriented self-care!

Please join us for our last event of the season before our summer break!

Molly DuMars of Reimagining Recovery
Molly DuMars of
Reimagining Recovery

Wednesday, June 5, 2019, 7-9 PM
232 SE 80th Avenue, Portland, OR 97215
(Montavilla United Methodist Church)

Click here for map

FREE! (Donations Welcome $0 – $20 suggested)

Refreshments will be provided, including
plenty of vegan and gluten-free options!

For questions contact: RethinkingPsychiatry@gmail.com or message us on our Facebook Page.

Click here to download flyer. Click here to download handbills.