KINGSTON – Facing $6 million in budget cuts, Providence Care is telling staff today of one of the biggest job losses in the history of the former Kingston Psychiatric hospital. The Ontario Public Service Employees Union has been told the … Continue reading →
Continue readingTag: mental health
Politics, Re-Spun: Fearing Kate MacEachern: The Latest Canadian Military Blunder
Kate MacEachern and helping others: not on the DND agenda, yet. Canada’s continued neglect and abuse of our military personnel and veterans continues to enrage me. An epidemic of untreated PTSD has become a new normal. And until citizens compel the government to take responsibility for this neglect–and fix it–they
Continue readingOPSEU Diablogue: Mental Health: Anti-stigma campaigns produce unintended consequences
There is no question that stigma is an obstacle to those seeking help for mental illness. The question is, once mental illness is accepted in the same way as any other medical malady, will there be sufficient resources in place … Continue reading →
Continue readingknitnut.net: Seamy Underbelly, Part II
Visiting the Downtown Eastside (DTES) has churned up some contradictions for me, and resolving those contradictions requires re-thinking some questions I thought I already knew the answers to: 1) To what extent do people choose to live in the DTES, and to what extent are they stuck there? 2) Does
Continue readingA. Picazo: Yes – Let’s Talk
Though dismissed by some as a cynical marketing ploy, Bell’s Let’s Talk campaign not only succeeded in raising $4.8 million for mental health initiatives, but also provided a forum for canadians to share their stories, reach out for help, and address the stigma associated with mental illness. That conversation, seeing
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Tuesday Morning Links
This and that for your Tuesday reading. – Yves Engler discusses the importance of a “social wage” – and how the minimum standard of living we’re prepared to tolerate affects the well-being of all kinds of workers: These attacks against the poor and unemployed should be opposed by anyone who
Continue readingOPSEU Diablogue: Friday Kingston mental health workers to highlight volatile situation brought on by cuts
The formal recommendations around addressing the challenges of mental health always seem to get it right. So why is it that we never get beyond the nice words from politicians who claim to understand? This Friday mental health professionals and … Continue reading →
Continue readingMy journey with AIDS...and more!: Coming out as the end of a beginning
This morning on CTV’s Canada AM Kevin Newman, of Question Period fame, was promoting a very important segment on this weekend’s W5 program (Saturday at 7 p.m. ET) and, in the accompanying online article he wrote, “Coming out is toward the end of the process for our gay children” –
Continue readingDeath By Trolley: Don’t We All Hear Voices? A Mindfulness-Informed View of Schizophrenia and the “Normal” Mind
The hallmark of schizophrenia is perceiving things that are not there. Auditory hallucinations, including “hearing voices”, is particularly common. What if this clinically distinguishing feature of schizophrenia differs from the cognitively distinguishing feature? What if, cognitively speaking, what distinguishes schizophrenia is not the presence of voices, but rather how one
Continue readingDeath By Trolley: The Grad School Gospels – Part 3: Academe Can’t Be Your Everything
The Grad School Gospels is a series of posts inspired by Dirk Hayhurst‘s The Bullpen Gospels. In the Bullpen Gospels, Hayhurst tells stories from his struggle to self-actualize through professional baseball. Inspired by Hayhurst and the many commonalities I noticed between the minor league track to the Majors, as he
Continue readingDeath By Trolley: This New Year’s, Resolve to Stop Chasing Happiness
Many wisdom traditions encourage a path or process orientation rather than a destination or product orientation to living well. Happiness makes for a poor goal. It’s not particularly well-defined. What is happiness? How much happiness is enough to be happy with – to not eventually be let down by? The
Continue readingDeath By Trolley: The Grad School Gospels – Part 2: Passion, Fear and Indifference
In The Grad School Gospels: On Professional Baseball, Academia, and My Shared Experience with Dirk Hayhurst, I juxtaposed Hayhurst‘s pro baseball journey – which he recounts in his first book, The Bullpen Gospels – with my journey through academic psychology. Several factors conspired to make our situations alike. We both
Continue readingDented Blue Mercedes: Trans Depathologization: the spark of change.
I watch a lot of news stories unfold, reading left-wing, centrist and right-wing media alike. In the course of a news story, issues ignite, blaze hotly and then smoulder into memory. After awhile, one develops some sense of when a campaign will spread like a prairie fire or when it
Continue readingknitnut.net: The lowdown on substance use
Last night I attended a free session at our local mental health facility. It was called Getting the Low Down on Substance Use, and was presented by Michael Coughlin, a registered nurse with the Royal’s Substance Use and Concurrent Disorders program. I was interested because I have a young friend
Continue readingOPSEU Diablogue: Mental Health CEOs outliers when it comes to executive pay
What is it about being a CEO of a psychiatric hospital in Ontario that warrants much greater compensation than executives of similar-sized general hospitals? Last month we took a look at who was making more than double the Premier’s salary. … Continue reading →
Continue readingOPSEU Diablogue: Briefs: Women with mental illness disproportionaley more likely to end up in jail
Women with mental illness are disproportionately more likely to find jail than health care help according to the associate chief of psychiatry at the Royal Ottawa Health Care Group. Speaking to the Ottawa Citizen editorial board, Dr. AG Ahmed says … Continue reading →
Continue readingCanadian Progressive: Canadians Put Politics Aside for Suicide Prevention Day
by Amelia Wood Whether you identify yourself as a conservative, liberal or something in between, there’s no denying the fact that you or someone you know has likely been affected by the tragic epidemic that is suicide. Recognized as one of the biggest issues plaguing modern Canada today, suicide is
Continue readingMy journey with AIDS...and more!: There are at least a few, if not many, important people with whom I need to have my own conversation about…
…this! It’s certainly not too early to think about Mental Illness Awareness Week When I read the Ottawa Citizen article (linked above) I immediately thought, “Mom will have read that yesterday,” and what an opening it would give me to discuss my own mental health history with her. Not long
Continue readingMy journey with AIDS...and more!: Oh look! It’s happened again!
I’m delighted to be at the top of the list, perhaps it’s random, of 16 Five Star Rated AIDS Information Sites & Blogs – and I’ve found a few fellow travelers in the process!
Continue readingknitnut.net: Ottawa Citizen outs mentally ill man
On Saturday the Ottawa Citizen ran a story called Pleas to help mentally ill son ignored, mother says. It was in Hugh Adami’s column, The Public Citizen. Complete with names and a photograph, this article provides detailed personal information about a 22-year-old man who lives in Ottawa’s shelter system. The
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