Searching for Normal
A New Approach to Understanding Mental Health, Distress, and Neurodiversity
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Searching for Normal
Narrated by:
Philip Ishak Arditti
Buy for $27.90
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Narrated by:
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Philip Ishak Arditti
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By:
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Sami Timimi
What the general public are being told about the nature of mental health is misleading and may be harming our collective sense of well-being. Mental health ideology may be the biggest and most powerful cause of mental health problems today. Dr. Sami Timimi explains why he believes this to be the case and what we can, at an individual and collective level, do about it.
More and more people are being diagnosed with ADHD and mental disorders.
Young people are being medicalised for behaviours that might be as entirely normal in other parts of the world.
Distress has been commodified over many decades by pharmaceutical companies, the media, and the psychiatric establishment.
So how can we know when distress is normal and when it is something that needs to be treated?
In Searching for Normal, Dr. Timimi explores the political and cultural context of these phenomena and proposes an alternative, a deeply humane approach that looks at the person as a whole--their family context, their culture, their personal resilience--and advocates for a reframing of how we think about and treat distress.
Critic reviews
"Sami Timimi is one of the most brave and wise voices in Britain. Everyone interested in thinking in a deeper way about what’s ailing us – and what isn’t ailing us! – should read this terrific, thought-provoking book." — Johann Hari, author of Stolen Focus
"A brilliant book. I said “Hurrah!” and “Yes!” to every point Sami Timimi makes. A welcome antidote to the dangerous cult of overdiagnosis and the commodification of normal distress." — Philippa Perry, author of The Book You Wish Your Parents Had Read (and Your Children Will Be Glad That You Did)
"Searching for Normal is so good I have been quoting its insights to friends ever since I finished it... A terrific book, timely and wise, thoughtful and thought-provoking." ― Sunday Times
"Searching for Normal is a really important book that compellingly dismantles the house of cards that is the medical approach to mental distress. Using a mass of research evidence, it exposes how the current mental-health system traps and disempowers people and makes us all sicker. The book also offers hope that if we reclaim our common-sense understanding of emotions and behaviour, we can help each other to develop our strengths and overcome our difficulties" ― Joanna Moncrieff, author of Chemically Imbalanced
"Searching for Normal is a provocative and insightful critique of how we’ve come to understand and treat mental illness. It compels us not to blame (and try to fix) our brains for mental distress, but to point the finger at inequality, poverty and a culture of excessive competition and comparison" ― Matthew Smith, author of Hyperactive
"Searching for Normal asks two hugely important questions: why has there been such a surge in mental-health diagnoses in the current century; and how helpful are the treatments and labels given by the medical profession to those in distress? The answers given by Sami Timimi in this radical and meticulously argued book overturn much of the received wisdom about mental health, and shine a fascinating light on the dysfunctional relationship between modern capitalism and human emotion" ― William Sutcliffe, BACP-registered therapist and author
"[Searching For Normal] offers a refreshing and radical view as a counterpoint to the mainstream narrative and the increasing medicalisation of mental health… provoking, questioning and revelatory" ― Morning Star
"A brilliant book. I said “Hurrah!” and “Yes!” to every point Sami Timimi makes. A welcome antidote to the dangerous cult of overdiagnosis and the commodification of normal distress." — Philippa Perry, author of The Book You Wish Your Parents Had Read (and Your Children Will Be Glad That You Did)
"Searching for Normal is so good I have been quoting its insights to friends ever since I finished it... A terrific book, timely and wise, thoughtful and thought-provoking." ― Sunday Times
"Searching for Normal is a really important book that compellingly dismantles the house of cards that is the medical approach to mental distress. Using a mass of research evidence, it exposes how the current mental-health system traps and disempowers people and makes us all sicker. The book also offers hope that if we reclaim our common-sense understanding of emotions and behaviour, we can help each other to develop our strengths and overcome our difficulties" ― Joanna Moncrieff, author of Chemically Imbalanced
"Searching for Normal is a provocative and insightful critique of how we’ve come to understand and treat mental illness. It compels us not to blame (and try to fix) our brains for mental distress, but to point the finger at inequality, poverty and a culture of excessive competition and comparison" ― Matthew Smith, author of Hyperactive
"Searching for Normal asks two hugely important questions: why has there been such a surge in mental-health diagnoses in the current century; and how helpful are the treatments and labels given by the medical profession to those in distress? The answers given by Sami Timimi in this radical and meticulously argued book overturn much of the received wisdom about mental health, and shine a fascinating light on the dysfunctional relationship between modern capitalism and human emotion" ― William Sutcliffe, BACP-registered therapist and author
"[Searching For Normal] offers a refreshing and radical view as a counterpoint to the mainstream narrative and the increasing medicalisation of mental health… provoking, questioning and revelatory" ― Morning Star
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