Within the field of the health humanities, there has been a propensity to claim that medical expertise and lived experience equally contribute to our understanding of symptoms and the etiology of illness. Family memoirs, written by a parent or relative who is living with someone who has been diagnosed with an illness, offer a different…
Tag: mental health
The Emotional Labour of Medical History
Recently, a professor questioned my use of the word “madness” when describing the mental states of patients in asylums in nineteenth-century Britain. The comment surprised me, as many renowned historians and recent publications use madness to describe mental health in nineteenth-century contexts.[1] Despite my confidence in my word choice, I panicked, worried that I had…
“The Truth is That ‘Agreed Upon’ Part”: Community Building, Collective Knowledge, and the Medico-Cultural Power of Graphic Medicine
In a panel on ‘Altered Realities’ at SPX 2024 that included comic book artists Christie Furnas, Peter Kuper, Laura Pérez, and Nate Powell, Furnas claimed that “the concept of truth” always depends on one’s perception (SPX 2024). In a graphic work conveying multiple realities, Furnas explains, “the truth comes from how people receive” what is…
Writing and Reading Mental Illness Narratives with Lucid Hope
Hope has been widely recognized as playing a crucial role in the recovery process of people living with mental illness. When the possibility of recovery in the future becomes imaginable, patients can also (re)experience pleasure and satisfaction in the present (Schrank et al. 230–34). Yet the universal potential of hope for recovery remains difficult to…
But who cares for the carer?
A few months ago, I offered a Graphic Medicine workshop at an event geared towards those who provide care to their loved ones impacted by cancer. The premise: for caregivers to use art, color, and words to reflect on their support systems and consider ways of broadening and deepening the connections which those systems comprise….
The Rupture of Silence: The Body, Language, and The Power Dynamics in Health with Monica Ong
In “The Vulnerable and the Political,” Estelle Ferrarese talks about the affinity between care and the management of vulnerability. Both become political as they pertain to individual and social bodies. “The distribution of care,” Ferrarese says, “depends on patterns of domination and historical organizations that may stem from the sedimentation of gendered roles…” (237). Social…
In the Chair, On the Couch: Haircuts and Mental Health
It’s sort of hard to remain current with haircuts as a resident. I usually like to go every six weeks or so to keep my coif from becoming too sheep-dog for clinical medicine. But sometimes, I push it a little longer, with the justification that, “Well, if mustaches are in, so too must other trends…
Kaqchikel Maya Hearts
Kaqchikel Maya Hearts Throughout history, the heart has long captivated attention. From heartbreak to heart attacks, there is a range of conditions deriving from the heart, encompassing a wide array of physiological and emotional states. Turning our attention to language, the heart is often used in emotional health expressions. However, moving beyond Western contexts, the…
Mental Load: On Mental Health and Anti-Fatness
In a segment from the 2010 documentary Fat, Sick & Nearly Dead, Dr. Joel Fuhrman states that “It wouldn’t be so terrible if people were well-educated and well-informed, they didn’t have to die and they could make that choice if they want to commit suicide with food” (Cross). This dichotomy is maintained throughout the film,…
Bits, Fragments, and Splinters: On the Difficulty of Writing an Article About Mental Health in Wartime Ukraine
This is the account of an attempt to write an article on the management of psychological disorders in wartime Ukraine. The attempt looks like a failure. But isn’t it fair to account for one’s failures, especially in academia ? Isn’t that the only way to understand them, in order to turn them into something else ?