The dissolving of schizophrenia

Journal entry. September 17, 2014

Location: Our Place Society, 919 Pandora Ave, Victoria, BC V8V 3N4, Canada

My role was as the Chief Operator of visual Connection Mapping / Developer / Helper to clients. The conversations, and most of the Visual Connection Mapping drawings that were conducted and created are private and confidential. Often I would do a self-reflection with the intention to bring tough topics to light. My motivation was to bear witness to the psychological pain of the clients and to reflect and try to help through any means I could, such as writing about my feelings and experiences myself in order to help other people.

Title: The dissolving of schizophrenia, the visual disappearance of schizophrenia

Schizophrenia is the result of a capitalism system. Are all the so called illnesses the result of our environment? The stress of trying to survive within a capitalist society? Schizophrenia, I used to understand as a mental illness but as I look around Our Place Society I see individuals as unique and I no longer see mental illness.

Each individual has their own narrative and their own logic. There are virtually zero signs of symptoms such as hallucinations, paranoia and dissociations. There are virtually zero signs of treatment resistant psychosis. All individuals are human beings, who are intelligent and strong in their own beliefs. What makes this different than the lives of other people? The capitalist system in the drop in center at Our Place Society is alive amd well and the idea of being better than the next guy is what separates each individual. But is not that the way on all layers of society?

 

Essay on Treatment Resistant Psychosis

Above is a picture of me, the Chief Operator / Developer of Visual Connection Mapping and The Communication Model, current date Sept. 16, 2017

Title: Essay on Treatment Resistant Psychosis from Sept 02, 2014

Treatment Resistant Psychosis is a medical condition. It is the result of not receiving adequate care through the Canadian Medical System. Treatment Resistant Psychosis consists of the symptoms of schizophrenia but it is not schizophrenia as schizophrenia is a medical term that means that an individual has had their symptoms of schizophrenia treated in the Canadian Medical Hospital. The actual name schizophrenia refers to the diagnosis that a medical professional has given an individual with the intention to treat, rehabilitate and conquer all of the both positive and negative symptoms of schizophrenia. In contrast treatment resistant psychosis is the outward and inward symptoms of untreated schizophrenia. Over the decades the non-treated symptoms of schizophrenia do not receive a medical containment and this results in the individuals with treatment resistant psychosis visiting the drop in center at Our Place Society on Pandora Avenue in Victoria, British Columbia where I help individuals with treatment resistant psychosis.

 

 

 

 

What produces guilt?

Ein Zustand, der so ausweglos ist, ist verschuldend.

(A situation that is inextricable is guilt-producing).

Walter Benjamin

What is Visual Connection Mapping?

Part 1:  Introduction – What is Visual Connection Mapping?

Since April 2014 I have been going to the University of Victoria’s MacPherson Library to find answers as to how to best solve homelessness in Victoria City. My journey took me through many different avenues, from Philosophy to Medical books and from the Jewish Holocaust to Modern Germany today and then right back to Victoria City, at the Our Place Society where individuals whom are marginalized seemed to find themselves. What I found in my search is that in the past in the times of around 1890 there was a growing dystopia towards the marginalized. This seemed to be escalating and it hit its height in World War II. After World War II it was written that good triumphed over evil but on deeper analysis of the facts, I wonder if that was really the case at all, as political systems seemed to be ambivalent. Ambivalence is a symptom of schizophrenia according to the 4 A’s of Bleuer. Affect, Autism, Associations and Ambivalence.

What I realized was the effects of the ambivalent factor trickle down into almost all Western civilized countries such as West Europe and the Americas. This symptom of schizophrenia has somehow ended up in Victoria City and I believe it is what is pervasive amoungst the individuals who visit the Our Place Society drop-in center on Wednesday mornings when Visual Connection Mapping is conducted. The symptom of ambivalence is a medical term used in the context of being part of a Medical Model, serious mental illness sickness, and it is the most serious of illnesses, namely schizophrenia. Could it be possible that the whole of Western Society has contracted the dominant symptom of schizophrenia, namely ambivalence? What would the outcome of Western civilization be if that was the case? Would it mean a re-evaluation of all citizens lives? Would it mean that every citizen would need to be treated for the schizophrenic symptom of ambivalence? Or would it mean business-as-usual and denying that this observation ever came to light and hence burying this fact for ever and ever?

The next question that I was encountered with was who are the saints and who are the devils? Are the homeless people the saints because they are really victims and really part of Victoria’s Mental Health Medical System, and patients of the Medical Model. Or are the doctors and counselors the devils as they practiced an unauthentic one-way reciprocated communication asserting their authoritarian power over the patients – within the context of the Involuntary Treatment clause regarding schizophrenia in the Mental Health Act.

As a sophisticated society, how far have we actually come? Are we not stuck in the 1940’s mode of conduct? Where fear tactics and assertions of perceived justice over-ride the human rights of marginalized individuals. The ambivalent factor is something that did not just appear in the 1890’s onwards but has been around since the beginning of time. Within the Old Testament within the text of Jeremiah, there is a constant cry of mercy and a feeling of pain caused by the punishment Jeremiah is experiencing. Is not God good? Should not God help Jeremiah instead of punish? What kind of a God is Jeremiah’s God anyway? Within the context of being at Our Place Society and seeing the disparities with my own eyes I have often felt that God was punishing these individuals and condemning. What I was witnessing was so far from any kind of logic that I could not get my head around it. I started reading the Bible in order to understand. I came to two conclusions, one the God was man and second that the Old Testament was joint to the New Testament and could not be interpreted as separate and that from confusion in the Old Testament came light and clarity in the New Testament. I then remembered my

Roman Catholic ancestry and my Roman Catholic University education and then many components seemed to line up for me again. I started to view homelessness in the stage of the Old Testament where psychological development needed to further evolve itself in order to break free from the torment and psychological distress. In order to try to help individuals in this predicament I reached for a communication device that could capture and at the same time transcend psychological distress and that was the birth of the Visual Connection Mapping technique.

Visual Connection Mapping was all about the individual, their own unique existence and it was about mapping their existence into a diagram so that they could physically see the concrete design of their verbal creation. Visual Connection Mapping is so much more than lines on a paper, it is the soul of the other person, their words mapped out like geographical lines defining a new country. Visual Connection Mapping goes very deep into the abyss of a human being and draws out something that has not been brought to light before. It is a human phenomenon and it is not a calculated perceived idea, it is the opposite of that. It is the free-flow of line frequencies and dimensions of feelings and experiences that often get missed in a regular conversation. It is the capturing and the noting down of intricate psychological details that go beyond the 20/20 vision of a regular eye-sighted individual. Visual Connection Mapping taps into the unconscious nature of an individual in a very non-coercive way. It does not provoke, investigate and analyze instead its nature is all-encompassing compassion and empathy. Visual Connection Mapping is psychosis friendly. It is pro-psychotic and it is intended to work as a paradox. The more acceptance of symptoms one is, the more the symptomologies start to fade into the background and the more and more the unique personality comes to light. The Visual Connection Mapping is not some kind of quick fix to end all human pain and suffering instead it is an element to help cope with pain and suffering temporarily. It is a human composition. Often it is two human beings trying to help each other versus one individual being the helper and the other the client. The intention of Visual Connection Mapping is to dissolve stigma and replace it with understanding which is intended to lead to self-empowerment and the finding of oneself through understanding ones true nature and through ones own Existentialism.

Unintended consequence of peer run organizations

In the summer of 2016 I stopped working as a trained mental health and addictions practitioner as a volunteer in the organizations, Pandora Arts Collective Society, Our Place Society and the British Columbia Schizophrenia Society Victoria in Victoria city, Vancouver Island, British Columbia Canada.  At the Pandora Arts Collective Society I was a studio liaison bridging the gap between studio participants and community members on the board of directors. At Our Place Society I analyzed symptoms of schizophrenia by working one on one with individuals in the drop-in center and at the British Columbia Schizophrenia Society Victoria I engaged with a group while observing the group process of people with schizophrenia.  To me, each of the three organizations had one common theme and that was schizophrenia. Out of experience I noticed that each individual that I engaged with was unique, and on a macro-level – each organization I was inside was unique as well. On reflection of my four years of hands-on experience and working shoulder to shoulder with individuals with a diagnosed DSM psychiatric label of schizophrenia in Victoria, Vancouver Island, British Columbia Canada I would like to mention two main components. First, it is in my humble opinion that psychotherapy needs to be re-introduced into the Victoria City Medical system and second, it is in my semi-professional expert opinion that, it is not the clients with schizophrenia who are resistant to changing, but rather the management of the organizations which take care of the clients with schizophrenia who are resistant to change. This phenomenon hinders positive personal development in clients and can lead to an increase of symptoms of psychosis and schizophrenia. I believe this to be an  unintended consequence of a community run, peer run and non-medically run organization.

(If you request any information regarding my findings, please contact me by e-mail and I will be happy to communicate in more depth on this topic).

Note: Visual Connection Mapping will continue in the private sector.

 

Tent city Canada: Sedated in a cocoon sleeping state

Tent city in Victoria seems to be a poverty stricken situation when in actual fact the city of Victoria has been trying for decades to help these people. The Canadian government funds the hospital settings, where there are lots of mental health and addictions services provided to people with and without income for free. We live in a democratic system where the majority of the tax-payers often over-ride the minorities. This is the kind of political system the majority of Canadians want. Democracy is freedom. Some theorists believe that the homeless want to be homeless. Others believe it is a medical condition, perhaps schizophrenia, or perhaps addictions or a combination of both. There are laws in British Columbia which place people with schizophrenia and addictions into both a law system and a medical system. These two systems lead to a government Canadian financial / disability system as well. The individual becomes taken care of by the state. Tent city is the birth of all of these elements combined together. The physical appearance of tent city looks like a cocoon, it is like all the inhabitants are sedated and in a sleeping state, wanting to arise again.

April 2016: Visit to Tent City Victoria, BC

Tent City Victoria

On April 20th, 2016 I walked to the Tent City in Victoria on Quadra ST. It is situated between the court house and a church in a garden. The garden is now filled with tents. I am not sure what I was expecting to find there, but felt it was necessary to see for myself what was going on there. Perhaps I felt it was a bit of pyscho-education and I hoped it would bring me some awareness. What I found was a mass of tarps covered over dome shaped tents of all different sizes. The tarps seemed to hide the actual uniqueness of the tents and it seemed to create one whole. In the center of the tent city there is a pathway made out of white carpet leading down into the core of the center. In the center there is a meeting area built of makeshift wood pieces and a burning fire. I walked right into the belly of the beast and stood there stunned. Then from behind me, a man who was sitting on a chair said, “you cannot just stand there! Talk to us.” I was still stunned and really did not have much to say. I said I was a freelance independent outreach worker and had just come from Our Place Society where I had been doing visual connection mapping for three years. I then reached into my bag and showed him the visual connection mapping portfolio with all the drawings in it. Funny enough, he said, “you need to talk to those people” and he pointed to another freelance independent outreach worker and an artist who was drawing a native wolf on red paper. Before moving on, I asked the man, “who is supervising this place?” And he responded that no one is supervising this place, but that it was self-governed. Later on I thought to myself, how can the tent city be self-governed? Even anarchy governments have leaders.

Art Exhibition April 2015 in Victoria City – expressing psychotraumatic feelings

This video clip is about an art exhibition which has every painting meaning an emotion. The exhibition was built around the Flight MH 17 flying above the Ukraine which went down unexpectedly. This is an ode to the passengers and their families. This is a very tragic event and it is the hope that family-members and friends of those who perished will be okay in the world.

Using Cognitive Behavioral Therapy on the Term Schizophrenia First Person Account

Click on links to read the article published in the Oxford Journal Press, the Schizophrenia Bulletin, Feb. 2015

Schizophr Bull-2015-van der Pol-schbul-sbv008

http://schizophreniabulletin.oxfordjournals.org/content/early/2015/02/09/schbul.sbv008.full?keytype=ref&ijkey=8tRzrC4LdoG2AqZ

Published this article, February 2015 in the Schizophrenia Bulletin. Hearing a voice. Pretty deep article. Please enjoy. Provide feedback if you would like. The reason for writing this article is to help others and to bring deep personal subject-matter to light versus using revisionism to suppress and repress it. First Person Account.

Using Cognitive Behavioral Therapy on the Term Schizophrenia

http://schizophreniabulletin.oxfordjournals.org/content/early/2015/02/09/schbul.sbv008.full?keytype=ref&ijkey=8tRzrC4LdoG2AqZ

This is a First Person Account of Psychosis. It is the intention that this account will help people with their own psychosis and understanding of it. This article is intended to be a helpful tool.

Victoria British Columbia Canada