Mental Health Association of Portland

Dear Friends,

Thank you for your support of Portland Hearing Voices! Your donations have kept us going strong for three years, free from any government or pharmaceutical company funding.  We are grateful that none of our funding sources have ever caused us to compromise our values, and we plan to continue that way.  This allows us to provide a unique and much-needed supplement and/or alternative to mainstream mental health services.

Over the past year we have trained eight new facilitators for our team and gone from two support groups a month to two a week, and we have added a weekly Women’s Survivors of Sexual Trauma support group.  In addition, we have hosted two facilitators’ trainings open to the general public, both of which were well attended and successful. Thank you to those who attended!  These trainings allowed us to expand our vision, share it with others, teach people what we do, and increase the web of support available for people experiencing extreme states of consciousness, voices and other emotional challenges.  We have also trained other groups about our approach, including Sisters of the Road, PSU social work students, and Rethinking Psychiatry conference participants.

We continue to encourage mental diversity and informed choice in treatment, and the most important element of our work remains community building for people who would otherwise be isolated.  Our groups are a bridge for many people to recreate community after long periods of isolation.  People in our groups often say this has saved their lives and/or given them a place to go when nowhere else felt safe.

You have supported all this, and we would not be where we are without you.  The money you donated in the past allowed us to pay our volunteers small stipends, keep our website going, and cover essential costs.  But now, with three support groups and a very small budget, our money is getting tight.

We hope that when you consider your holiday donations you will remember Portland Hearing Voices.  Your generosity will keep us strong, now and in the years to come.  Our work is becoming more and more needed as funds and services are cut from mainstream health care, and as an increasing number of people seek to understand their experiences in deeper, more revolutionary ways.

“The salvation of the world lies in the hands of the creatively maladjusted.” – Martin Luther King

To donate via PayPal, please go to portlandhearingvoices.net and click “Donate.” You may also send a check by postal mail, payable to Portland Hearing Voices, PO Box 3641, Portland Oregon, 97208.

We also invite you to join us at our FREE Holiday Talent Fair!

See flier below, or download a PDF: Talent Show Flier

Portland Hearing Voices Presents:

A Facilitators Training

November 5 at 10:00am until November 6 at 4:00pm in PST

Our United Villages, 3625 North Mississippi Avenue, Portland, OR 97227

• What are extreme states?

• Where do they come from and what do they mean?
• How can we support members of the community who experience voices and extreme states,

both in coping with challenges and nurturing strengths?

• What are Hearing Voices groups, and why are they making a difference in people’s lives?

This two-day training for mental health consumers, providers, and anyone who is interested, will provide you with a deeper understanding of extreme states and voices, and prepare you to start your own Hearing Voices group. Led by facilitating trainers Chaya Grossberg and Kate Hill, the training will include a brief history of the Hearing Voices movement (which started in the UK), an informed perspective on medications, the importance of spirituality, and the repercussions of trauma. Participants will develop their skills with hands-on learning experiences, including practice groups and role-playing of challenging scenarios. People on or off medications are welcome.

Cost: $140 | Scholarships available; please inquire.

Space is limited to 40 participants. Preregistration is required.

Download the Flier (PDF, 160KB)

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Facilitators for this Training:

Chaya Grossberg

Chaya Grossberg, assistant director of Portland Hearing Voices, has facilitated support groups with people experiencing extreme states of consciousness for 10 years. She has also spoken and written publicly about her own experiences and views of extreme states. She seeks to empower us as individuals with unique experiences of what we call reality.

Kate Hill

Kate Hill is currently a Portland Hearing Voices facilitator. She is also a former Mental Health Assistant and psychiatric survivor. She has been living in Portland for 20+ years, finds language in the fine and performing arts, and is pursuing an education at the Process Work Institute.

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To reserve your space, or if you have any questions, contact:
Chaya at chayamhap@yahoo.com
or Kate at miskate2u@gmail.com

By Jenny Westberg, Portland Mental Health Examiner, April 8, 2012

Studies show 2 to 10 percent of persons voice-hearers, including many with no psychiatric illness. (Image: Flickr.com/Jungmoon)

As Portland Hearing Voices nears its third anniversary, the peer-run community group is growing fast and more active than ever.

In January, director Will Hall trained seven new co-facilitators, enabling  the popular, often-packed Voices, Visions and Extreme States group to start meeting weekly; a support group for women survivors of sexual trauma started in March;  additional Voices and Visions groups are in the works, reaching throughout the city and beyond; and other ventures are taking shape.

It’s an exciting time for an organization that has exceeded all expectations since its beginning in 2009.  This upstart group of outsiders, whose very existence challenges accepted psychiatric wisdom, who champion “mental diversity” and welcome those at the extreme edge of reason, should by all rights have been a flash in the pan.  Yet Portland Hearing Voices has somehow persisted, growing in size and influence, quietly changing the world.

But if it’s surprising that Portland Hearing Voices got started at all, and more surprising they’re still around and flourishing, it was stunning when recently the group took its message of mental diversity inside the locked doors of the Portland campus of the Oregon State Hospital.

The local campus of OSH, known as “POSH,” is located in Northeast Portland at the site of the former Holladay Park Hospital.  Patients at POSH have been civilly committed or voluntarily committed by a guardian.  According to the Oregon State Hospital website, patients’ days are filled with skill-building, educational and therapeutic groups designed to prepare them for a successful transition back into the community.   On March 12, they had the opportunity to hear about a different approach to group support.

Thanks to an invitation by POSH peer recovery specialist Scott Snedecor, the morning of the 12th, Hall and four PHV co-facilitators met at the hospital to speak to a group that included patients, social workers, an occupational therapist, and a couple of very interested psychiatrists.

One of the presenters was Chaya Grossberg, a community organizer for the Mental Health Association of Portland who has been involved in Hearing Voices groups outside of Portland for approximately 10 years.  She described the visit to POSH:

“Kate, CJ, Nicole, Will and I moved the chairs into a circle.  We sat and introduced ourselves to the staff members and patients who were there, and then each of the co-facilitators talked about our experiences in Portland Hearing Voices, and shared some of our personal  stories.  Then we opened it up into a wider discussion.

“We talked a lot about how Portland Hearing Voices is peer-run, so that everyone who’s a co-facilitator also has personal experience [with voices or extreme states].  We talked about the value of that, and how it helps people feel safe to share – there’s no professional sitting there writing down what we say.”

Grossberg said it’s the presenters’ hope that POSH staff might refer patients to Portland Hearing Voices groups when they leave.   But a main goal was simply to introduce attendees to a different perspective on mental health and support.  While some people find mainstream approaches very helpful, she said, not all do.

Grossberg added that she values Portland Hearing Voices because “everyone is on an equal plane.  There aren’t any experts.   Peer support is really important to me, and one reason is the friendships I’ve made.   Also there’s a sense of being part of a larger movement, moving away from classifying people ‘crazy’ or ‘sane,’ ‘normal’ or ‘abnormal.’

“I really feel passionate about the movement toward democratizing mental health, and moving closer to true mental diversity.”

Hall said the visit was a success.  “One of our priorities is building bridges to reach people unhappy with their mental health treatment and professionals looking for ways to change.  It’s great to see so much interest in Portland, even at a locked inpatient facility.”

For Portland Hearing Voices, it was just one more daunting hurdle to leap over with ease.   It’s impossible to know what the next years hold for PHV, but based on the last three, it should be surprising — and just might change history.

Find out more about Portland Hearing Voices at PortlandHearingVoices.net (for support group information, click “Upcoming Events,”  then “Ongoing Groups”).   You can also call 413-210-2803, or email portlandhearingvoices@gmail.com.

The Centerstone Clinic is the first of its kind in Oregon, blending traditional mental health services with Peer Delivered Services. The Centerstone Clinic is for residents of Clackamas County to access help 7 days per week. It opens later this month near the Clackamas Town Center.

In addition to offering traditional crisis supports, persons can access Peer Delivered Services, which include: problem solving and crisis support, in home or community based person directed planning, WRAP® plans, in home respite support, Hearing Voices groups, transportation planning, RentWell© education, medication empowerment education, resource support, facilitating community integration and work activities.

This valuable resource will be available for people who just walk in off the street, and also will be an option that other parts of the mental health system can offer for people in need. The Clackamas County Crisis Line, Crisis Services, and Commitment Investigators will all be able to make referrals.

The Centerstone Clinic is based on the Sanctuary Model. Their website states “The Sanctuary Model® represents a theory-based, trauma-informed, evidence-supported, whole culture approach that has a clear and structured methodology for creating or changing an organizational culture”, and “The concept of ‘sanctuary’ refers to the important emphasis we place on the active and conscious development of a sense of safety within the context of a therapeutic milieu”.

Those of us who have been in a mental health crisis know how vitally important that feeling of safety is to helping us come out of our crisis. When we are in a safe and welcoming place, we are able to take those first steps on the road to our recovery.

The idea of ‘changing an organizational culture’ is also timely in these days of healthcare transformation in Oregon. Empowerment Initiatives is uniquely qualified to be in partnership with Clackamas County in the development and delivery of these new services. Empowerment Initiatives has been delivering cutting-edge services to Peers in Oregon since April 2004. They are run by people with a lived experience of mental health issues.

Empowerment Initiatives is a nationally recognized expert in Peer Brokerage Services. They currently provide Peer Supports at several of Clackamas County’s supported housing, clinics, and also work with Crisis Services.

Together, Empowerment Initiatives and Clackamas County are blending their strengths to provide new opportunities for people with a lived experience of mental health issues to find safety and recovery in their lives.

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By: Women Survivors of Sexual Trauma, for The Lund Report, February 14, 2012

A new, weekly peer-facilitated support group, Women Survivors of Sexual Trauma, will hold its first meeting Wednesday, March 7, and thereafter it will meet every Wednesday from 7-8:30 p.m. at Empowerment Initiatives, 3941 SE Hawthorne Blvd. in Portland.

The group will be open to all women, including transgender persons who identify as women, who have undergone traumatic sexual experiences.

“We refer to ‘sexual trauma’ rather than saying the group is for survivors of rape, or abuse, or words like that, because often we have such shame that we tell ourselves it wasn’t really rape, it wasn’t really incest, and so on,” said co-facilitator Jenny Westberg.

“We don’t want women excluding themselves. If you’ve had sexual experiences that were traumatic, you’re welcome in this group.”

Approximately 1 in 4 Oregon women (1 in 5 nationally) have been victims of rape and/or other forms of sexual violence, according to a recent survey by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, but locally there are few resources. The groups available through the Portland Women’s Crisis Line, for instance, rarely have immediate openings. The new group will be one more resource for Portland-area survivors.

Organizers want the group to be a safe place to share, listen, and discover common areas of experience.

“In sharing our stories, we reclaim the parts of ourselves we lost in the trauma. This has an empowering effect and it connects us to others. When we release the secretiveness and shame, we reclaim our voices.” said co-facilitator Chaya Grossberg.

The group will be free of charge, with donations appreciated.

Co-facilitators Jenny Westberg and Chaya Grossberg are survivors and mental health activists who both work with the Mental Health Association of Portland.

The group is sponsored by Portland Hearing Voices, which has been running a successful Extreme States and Voices support group for the past three years. Portland Hearing Voices director Will Hall also provided facilitation training.

Questions?

Contact: portlandhearingvoices@gmail.com
413.210.2803 — www.portlandhearingvoices.net

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Here’s the February 2012 edition of Eyes & Ears, a mental health consumer run newsletter for consumers, their friends & family and mental health professionals.

Download and read the February 2012 issue at:

Online Reading Version of Eyes & Ears – with links
Full article version of Eyes & Ears – for printing

Contact the editor at eyes.ears_newsletter@yahoo.com

Included in this issue:
* MHAP’s Kickstarter Fundraising Campaign for Eyes&Ears
* Portland Hearing Voices Expands to Weekly Meetings & also starts new Women Survivors of Sexual Trauma support group
* Part 2 of Interview with Gina of Empowerment Initiatives
* Oregon Health Transformation news
* Aaron Campbell’s $1.2 Million Settlement
* U.S. Justice Dept. to hold town hall forum Feb. 28th on Portland police use of force
* Extra on the online version with links: Discrimination, Serious Mental Illness and Health Care Professionals; Foundation for Excellence in Mental Healthcare Begins funding First Projects; Release System at State Hospital Debuts; Portland Candidates 2012; and more
* Coming Events: Rethinking Psychiatry 2012 Winter Film Festival; Introduction to Open Dialogue workshop;  Rethinking Psychiatry meeting; Money Basics; and more

Besides other news there are a variety of listings of meetings, services, support groups, job opportunities and more.

Please take a few moments to:
read about our Kickstarter Fundraising Campaign for Eyes & Ears,
and then:
Donate to Eyes & Ears on Kickstarter!

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Every Wednesday, starting March 7, 2012
7-8:30 p.m.
At Empowerment Initiatives
3941 SE Hawthorne Blvd., Portland, OR

♦ ♦ ♦

The first meeting of the Women Survivors of Sexual Trauma peer support group will be
this coming Wednesday, March 7!

The group is open to all women (including transgender persons who identify as women), who have been through traumatic sexual experiences and would like to share with others in a safe environment.

Groups will be co-facilitated by two or more peers who are also survivors,
including Jenny, Chaya, Kate, and Nicole from Portland Hearing Voices.

Join Us

Sexual trauma does not have to be rape.   It does not have to involve violence.
It does not matter who started the chain of events, or how old you were, or whether you were drunk or high.
It does not have to meet any definition except our own.
If you experienced it as trauma, it was.

Sexual trauma wounds us at the deepest level and can affect our lives for years. Many of us feel persistent shame. We may develop ways of coping that get labeled as psychiatric problems in and of themselves: cutting, binge-eating/restricting/purging, suicide attempts, being sexually compulsive or completely withdrawing from sex,
being always “on guard” and unable to trust — to name just a few.

Our group will provide a place where we can talk about our experiences if we so choose, or just listen.

Questions?

Contact portlandhearingvoices@gmail.com
www.portlandhearingvoices.net
413.210.2803

Portland Hearing Voices facilitators. Standing, left to right: Bruce, Chaya, Jake, Nicole. Seated: Kate, Casadi, Jenny. (Photo: Will Hall)

On January 22, 2012, Will Hall, founder of Portland Hearing Voices, trained 7 new facilitators to lead Portland Hearing Voices groups. Portland Hearing Voices support group has had more than 250 people involved since its founding, with visitors and regular participants learning about new ways to understand and support each other around extreme states such as voices, mania, paranoia, and unusual beliefs. It is the only group of its kind in the area and one of just a few on the west coast. Groups have been held twice a month for over a year and will now move to every week, at the same time and place:

Every Tuesday, 6:00-7:30pm, at Empowerment Initiatives, 3941 SE Hawthorne

The new format for the group has 2 facilitators, with Will Hall sometimes present for backup. All of the new facilitators have attended the support group and identify with having experienced voices, visions, and/or extreme states of consciousness. Some have facilitated the group before. Hall’s next step is to expand the regional Hearing Voices network to other locations in and around Portland. Eventually he hopes to expand this network regionally to the rest of Oregon, Washington and California.

Will Hall

Hall trained the new facilitators in basics such as the goals of the groups and essential structures. The training also covered how to handle challenging and triggering situations. After teaching the basics, Hall encouraged new facilitators to find what works for them as group leaders and to experiment with new forms while keeping the essentials. Each new facilitator has a unique story and background, so there is a diversity of style, knowledge and experience that is now coloring the Portland Hearing Voices community. The new skills and energies are sure to keep PHV inspiring, strong and ever evolving.

“Participating in the facilitator training reinforced for me the importance of witnessing experience in building community. I value the effects of being seen and heard. I left the training feeling like a completely different person,” said one participant in the training.

Check their website portlandhearingvoices.net for news and updates on future groups. Portland Hearing Voices is open to all experiencers. Family members and friends are invited to the Mental Diversity Meetup (see the PHV website for details).