Richard Lewis
@rlewistherapy.bsky.social
Psychotherapist. Counsellor (MNCPS). Author. Researcher. Science writer (MISTC). Broadcaster. Former Parisian trapped in post-Brexit UK. Distress is not a defect. https://richard-lewis.co.uk
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Richard Lewis
@rlewistherapy.bsky.social
· Nov 12
The model in mental health is changing. The era of "faulty brain chemistry" is over, the hypotheses debunked, the drugs needlessly dangerous. We're moving to a more compassionate understanding that bad things happen to people and they suffer emotionally and physically as a result
Language matters. We hear so much about the need to “regulate” or “stabilise” emotions, rather than “integrate” “encompass” “befriend” “interpret” or “honour”.
November 20, 2025 at 9:40 PM
Language matters. We hear so much about the need to “regulate” or “stabilise” emotions, rather than “integrate” “encompass” “befriend” “interpret” or “honour”.
Reposted by Richard Lewis
We can understand the pain or history that drives an abuser's behavior, without excusing it or taking on responsibility for things they did to us.
Sympathy & empathy can be tools-- but it's real important we not let them blur the lines for what was & wasn't acceptable behavior.
Sympathy & empathy can be tools-- but it's real important we not let them blur the lines for what was & wasn't acceptable behavior.
August 7, 2025 at 5:51 PM
We can understand the pain or history that drives an abuser's behavior, without excusing it or taking on responsibility for things they did to us.
Sympathy & empathy can be tools-- but it's real important we not let them blur the lines for what was & wasn't acceptable behavior.
Sympathy & empathy can be tools-- but it's real important we not let them blur the lines for what was & wasn't acceptable behavior.
You’re not “rotting” in bed. You’re resting. Your worth isn’t tied to your output or willingness to perform through your pain or exhaustion. So please rest.
May 9, 2025 at 6:30 AM
You’re not “rotting” in bed. You’re resting. Your worth isn’t tied to your output or willingness to perform through your pain or exhaustion. So please rest.
What's happening to Prince Harry currently is a graphic illustration of what happens to any survivor or scapegoat who tries to speak out on systems that harmed them. But despite the hostility aimed at him and his chosen family, I hope the Prince will continue to speak.
May 7, 2025 at 4:06 PM
What's happening to Prince Harry currently is a graphic illustration of what happens to any survivor or scapegoat who tries to speak out on systems that harmed them. But despite the hostility aimed at him and his chosen family, I hope the Prince will continue to speak.
As we head once again into #MentalHealthAwarenessMonth, use our online checker to see if you could be suffering from Nuclear War: medium.com/@richard-lew...
Are you suffering from Nuclear War?
As we head into Mental Health Awareness Week, let’s remove the stigma from Nuclear War
medium.com
April 30, 2025 at 4:51 PM
As we head once again into #MentalHealthAwarenessMonth, use our online checker to see if you could be suffering from Nuclear War: medium.com/@richard-lew...
Finally, the winner of the 2025 Weasel Words Pageant. This just just off the scale shocking.
False Information in UK Package Inserts for Antidepressants About a Chemical Imbalance
by Peter C. Gøtzsche, MD
To state something that is blatantly false is not a “paradigm,” it is a lie, plain and simple.
by Peter C. Gøtzsche, MD
To state something that is blatantly false is not a “paradigm,” it is a lie, plain and simple.
False Information in UK Package Inserts for Antidepressants About a Chemical Imbalance
To state something that is blatantly false is not a “paradigm,” it is a lie, plain and simple.
buff.ly
April 3, 2025 at 6:33 PM
Finally, the winner of the 2025 Weasel Words Pageant. This just just off the scale shocking.
Any time someone calls you a late bloomer, you want to tell them how much of your life was lost just surviving the soil you were born into.
March 28, 2025 at 9:27 AM
Any time someone calls you a late bloomer, you want to tell them how much of your life was lost just surviving the soil you were born into.
HBR finds that workplace mental health problems are systemic rather than individualised. No shit. If only HBR could also talk to psychiatry hbr.org/2024/10/why-...
Why Workplace Well-Being Programs Don’t Achieve Better Outcomes
By 2026, global corporate spending on wellness programs is set to top $94.6 billion, yet anticipated improvements in well-being are not being realized, and, in fact, mental health needs are continuing...
hbr.org
March 20, 2025 at 12:10 PM
HBR finds that workplace mental health problems are systemic rather than individualised. No shit. If only HBR could also talk to psychiatry hbr.org/2024/10/why-...
The idea that over-diagnosis of mental disorders is down to a profession that actively campaigns against the medical model is, one feels, wilfully ignorant www.pulsetoday.co.uk/news/clinica...
Minister announces crackdown on private sector therapists at Pulse conference
The Government will crack down on ‘unregulated private sector’ therapists and counsellors, the primary care minister announced at Pulse Live.
www.pulsetoday.co.uk
March 20, 2025 at 10:04 AM
The idea that over-diagnosis of mental disorders is down to a profession that actively campaigns against the medical model is, one feels, wilfully ignorant www.pulsetoday.co.uk/news/clinica...
As a 3-5 year old growing up in UK I had a recurring dream in which I was part of a convoy of people moving on foot from one place to another, destination unknown, sometimes walking through squat whitewashed dwellings or camping on beaches. I recently asked an AI to recreate the image from my memory
March 19, 2025 at 5:08 PM
As a 3-5 year old growing up in UK I had a recurring dream in which I was part of a convoy of people moving on foot from one place to another, destination unknown, sometimes walking through squat whitewashed dwellings or camping on beaches. I recently asked an AI to recreate the image from my memory
Anyone else low-key wonder if waking life is just the data-capture phase for the real life, which is lived in sleep via the collective consciousness? #wednesdaythoughts
March 19, 2025 at 1:37 PM
Anyone else low-key wonder if waking life is just the data-capture phase for the real life, which is lived in sleep via the collective consciousness? #wednesdaythoughts
If someone isn’t trying to shut you down are you even speaking the truth?
March 18, 2025 at 9:25 PM
If someone isn’t trying to shut you down are you even speaking the truth?
Reposted by Richard Lewis
If you’re a person who has spent a lot of their life in survival mode, it’s likely you need the reminder: You don’t owe people near what you think you do.
March 16, 2025 at 7:13 PM
If you’re a person who has spent a lot of their life in survival mode, it’s likely you need the reminder: You don’t owe people near what you think you do.
Reposted by Richard Lewis
We need more fun and joy in our lives.
March 16, 2025 at 8:02 PM
We need more fun and joy in our lives.
Reposted by Richard Lewis
It's annoying to almost everybody to be misunderstood or misrepresented-- but to trauma survivors it can be uniquely triggering. We have experience w/ abusers purposefully twisting what we say to manipulate both us & others around us. Our nervous system recognizes that trick.
March 17, 2025 at 4:25 PM
It's annoying to almost everybody to be misunderstood or misrepresented-- but to trauma survivors it can be uniquely triggering. We have experience w/ abusers purposefully twisting what we say to manipulate both us & others around us. Our nervous system recognizes that trick.
Reposted by Richard Lewis
The fact that they exploited their power over you, whether you were a child or an adult, to hurt you is shameful-- toward them, not you.
March 16, 2025 at 11:36 PM
The fact that they exploited their power over you, whether you were a child or an adult, to hurt you is shameful-- toward them, not you.
« Capricorn: you need to buck up, everyone’s going through a tough time, it’s not just you. » I see my parents started writing my horoscopes 🤷♂️
March 17, 2025 at 3:28 PM
« Capricorn: you need to buck up, everyone’s going through a tough time, it’s not just you. » I see my parents started writing my horoscopes 🤷♂️
Reposted by Richard Lewis
'As soon as one theory is discredited, the advocates of the biological paradigm turn to another, putting forward a new set of ropey, inconclusive and ambiguous studies as putative evidence' (from Chemically Imbalanced). Article by Bruce Levine www.madinamerica.com/2025/03/do-c...
Do Critics of Biological Psychiatry Have an Alternative to a Life of “Whack-A-Mole”?
Psychiatry has offered many biological theories, but the ones that stick are the effective marketing devices for money-making drugs.
www.madinamerica.com
March 15, 2025 at 4:38 PM
'As soon as one theory is discredited, the advocates of the biological paradigm turn to another, putting forward a new set of ropey, inconclusive and ambiguous studies as putative evidence' (from Chemically Imbalanced). Article by Bruce Levine www.madinamerica.com/2025/03/do-c...
Reposted by Richard Lewis
I won't tell you it's risk free to assert yourself. It's not. There are absolutely people who will try to silence & punish you for asserting yourself. There are absolutely risks associated w/ boundaries & self expression.
What I will tell you is: those risks are worth taking.
What I will tell you is: those risks are worth taking.
March 14, 2025 at 1:20 AM
I won't tell you it's risk free to assert yourself. It's not. There are absolutely people who will try to silence & punish you for asserting yourself. There are absolutely risks associated w/ boundaries & self expression.
What I will tell you is: those risks are worth taking.
What I will tell you is: those risks are worth taking.
It's not on you to save the people who hurt you, no matter how much you need them to love you. As people get older, they either do the work to take accountability and make right with those around them, or they double down on the wrong position. In that case it's often safer to love them from afar.
March 14, 2025 at 2:55 PM
It's not on you to save the people who hurt you, no matter how much you need them to love you. As people get older, they either do the work to take accountability and make right with those around them, or they double down on the wrong position. In that case it's often safer to love them from afar.
Reposted by Richard Lewis
Mourn. Don't be ashamed. Don't let anyone shame you for the desire or need to mourn.
Whether "they" think your attachment to what or who you lost is legitimate or valid or understandable doesn't matter. Literally couldn't matter less.
You get to mourn.
Whether "they" think your attachment to what or who you lost is legitimate or valid or understandable doesn't matter. Literally couldn't matter less.
You get to mourn.
March 12, 2025 at 4:47 PM
Mourn. Don't be ashamed. Don't let anyone shame you for the desire or need to mourn.
Whether "they" think your attachment to what or who you lost is legitimate or valid or understandable doesn't matter. Literally couldn't matter less.
You get to mourn.
Whether "they" think your attachment to what or who you lost is legitimate or valid or understandable doesn't matter. Literally couldn't matter less.
You get to mourn.
Reposted by Richard Lewis
The Defeat Depression Campaign (& other awareness campaigns) set out to persuade the public that emotional reactions were medical conditions requiring drug treatment. Surveys showed previously people viewed emotions as meaningful reactions and were sceptical of using drugs.
March 9, 2025 at 6:17 PM
The Defeat Depression Campaign (& other awareness campaigns) set out to persuade the public that emotional reactions were medical conditions requiring drug treatment. Surveys showed previously people viewed emotions as meaningful reactions and were sceptical of using drugs.
Attachment styles are all the rage right now, but the trend seems not to be towards self reflection and an understanding of how attachment injury can be healed, but rather to reify attachment styles as discrete and immutable identities, a movement that to my mind creates less freedom, not more.
March 8, 2025 at 5:03 PM
Attachment styles are all the rage right now, but the trend seems not to be towards self reflection and an understanding of how attachment injury can be healed, but rather to reify attachment styles as discrete and immutable identities, a movement that to my mind creates less freedom, not more.
Reposted by Richard Lewis
1. Another ketamine study that changed the outcome post-hoc. It is the 5th in a row.
jamanetwork.com/journals/jam...
jamanetwork.com/journals/jam...
IV Ketamine for Treatment of Chronic PTSD
In a proof-of-concept, randomized, double-blind, crossover trial comparing ketamine with an active placebo control, midazolam, conducted at a single site, Feder and coauthors test the efficacy and saf...
jamanetwork.com
March 7, 2025 at 7:34 AM
1. Another ketamine study that changed the outcome post-hoc. It is the 5th in a row.
jamanetwork.com/journals/jam...
jamanetwork.com/journals/jam...
Reposted by Richard Lewis
Safe secure affordable housing is a mental health intervention.
March 7, 2025 at 7:37 AM
Safe secure affordable housing is a mental health intervention.