2016 Recovery Workforce Summit Ted-like Talks

What is a Ted-like Talk?

Ted-Like Talks are idea-focused, and on a wide range of subjects to foster learning, inspiration and wonder and thus, provoke conversation among the community. Three (3) Ted-Like Talk presentations (each talk being a total of 20 minutes) are grouped together in one 90 minute session block, allowing for roughly 30 minutes of Q&A following the three presentations.

The Power of Personal Narrative in Recovery: How Stories of Trauma and “Overcoming” Shape Culture, Meaning, and the Way Forward

Mary Blake, Co-Chair, Women and Trauma Federal Partners Committee, Public Health Advisor, SAMHSA/CMHS/DSSI/Community Support Programs Branch

As the field of behavioral health moves at an exponential pace to integrate trauma-informed care, the question of “what happened to you?” instead of “what is wrong you?” has gained currency and cachet as a new way to frame engagement with people receiving services. The power of the trauma story as a story of overcoming has been recognized throughout the ages, from the mythological stories of the Greek and Roman traditions, to the narratives that underlie much of Jewish tradition. This talk will stimulate new thinking about the power of the trauma narrative as a continually unfolding story of human overcoming and its implications for transforming how we think about the development of trauma-informed organizations, workforces and peer support.

Reclaiming the Narrative: History, Science and a New Paradigm of Care

Robert Whitaker, Author, Journalist 

In 1980, when the American Psychiatric Association published the third edition of is Diagnostic and Statistical Manual, it created a new narrative for our society. Psychiatric disorders were conceived of as diseases of the brain, often due to chemical imbalances, which could then be corrected by medications, like “insulin for diabetes.”  However, that narrative now stands revealed by science as a false narrative, and one too that has done great harm. In every society that has adopted the disease model, the burden of mental illness has soared. We need a new narrative in psychiatry, one that emphasizes our resilience, our common humanity, and our duty to create a more just society, which will better nurture us all.

Recovery as a Social Movement

Lisa Razzano, PhD, CPRP

This TED-like talk will explore concepts of mental health and recovery within the context of social movements. In particular, discussion will focus on the characterization of mental health and psychiatry within social contexts, noting the transition from a medical model of illness to one of self-determination and recovery.

Creating Extraordinary Results for Recovery: Cutting Edge Resilience Tools and Techniques

Allie Middleton, JD, LCSW E-RYT, Founder/Principal, Integrative Leadership Practices 

What do we need to learn as supervisors to seed and nourish a community-based practice model of (self-and other-) care? What is the missing ‘spark’ in our conversations and actions? In this session you will be introduced to research-based embodied presence practices that enable easeful yet extraordinary creativity in your current role or context. You will learn innovative awareness-based leadership practices to encourage good solutions for global resilience and recovery work. In this interactive workshop we take practical steps to engage in mindful actions to expand personal and collective capacity, generating extraordinary results for yourself and your recovery colleagues.

Fatness: Transforming a Fail to a Future

Anne Sullivan-Soydan, ScD, CPRP, Assistant Professor, OT Department at Sargent College of Health and Rehabilitation Sciences, Boston University

People with psychiatric disabilities experience overall poor health, and many experience other health co-morbidities and chronic diseases, both diagnosed and undiagnosed. Taken together with the lack of individualized approaches to nutrition and activity and the weight gain created by many psychotropic medications, they are at a much higher risk for overweight and obesity and its related health conditions. They are in good company with the general population of U.S., currently in the midst of an obesity epidemic. This presentation will describe the experience of living with fatness, its stigma and other consequences, and will provide tips and resources for prevention, coping, and recovery. Designed to fully integrate with two other TED-like talks (submitted separately by Nemec and possibly Spagnolo), themes related to health and wellness will be highlighted. 

Heroin and Coffee--a story about the safe injection facility in Oslo, Norway

Therese Sonesson, MSW, Harm Reduction Coordinator, Community Access

Unintentional drug overdose is the leading cause of accidental death in the country. We should be in the forefront in understanding and advocating for new solutions and approaches to address this emerging and urgent issue.   In this talk I will share how I experienced my first drug overdose reversal, and what it was like for me to be part of over 40 more after that. I will discuss what it is like to talk with someone who’s life you have just saved, and what it is like to promote health among those most marginalized in our community.     I will talk about why I think it is important that we keep saving lives, even though we might end up reversing an overdose on the same person several times. I will talk about my frustration with the moral politics that dictate much of the drug policy in this country, as opposed to research and evidence based practices.   As a Swede coming to this country to work in social services I will talk about how I experience the culture of punishment as a way to promote change, and what alternatives I see to promote health and save lives.

Into the Workforce and Out of the Mental Health system

Len Stratham, MS, CPRP, Project Manager, Employment and Economic Self Sufficiency, NYAPRS

This TED-like talk will spark conversation around the issue of unemployment in the disability community.  The unemployment rate is not our biggest problem...the lack of participation in the workforce is.  This Talk will take an honest look at what we need to do as a community to change this unsettling dynamic. Focusing on poverty and its relationship to mental health (and the significant data on this subject), this presentation will be a "call to arms" to empower both providers and individuals with lived experience to begin the conversation we need to have:  Why are we settling only for public benefits?  Like the most popular Ted Talks, this presentation will be filled with stories, data, and personal experience.

Organizational Spirit

Lori Ashcraft, PhD, Director, Resilience Inc.

Spirit! Every organization has a spirit, but we often don’t know how to nurture it, grow it, and use it to sustain our strength. Those who have learned how to “catch the spirit” can create and innovate beyond all expectations. Catching and building a strong sustaining spirit in our teams, programs and organizations is something we can all do. We simply need to understand how to connect and nurture the organizational spirit. This talk will start you on the journey of connecting and building a strong organizational spirit to help you and your teams transform your outcomes.

The Hero's Journey: An Innovative Approach to Exploring the Recovery Process and Empowering The Hero Within

JoAnn Dorio Burton, CPRP, Community Programs Administrator,Windhorse Community Services

Pat Deegan encourages us all to "suspend (our) perception of people as chronic mental patients and try to see the individual as a hero."  Inspired by Pat Deegan and the stories of countless heroes both fictional and non-fictional, the Hero’s Journey curriculum, developed by JoAnn Dorio Burton and Kristin Becker, takes participants on their own hero's journey.  By exploring parallels between the hero's journey and the recovery journey it is possible to shift perception from that of a victim to that of a hero.  Suddenly harrowing experiences are seen as bolstering rather that destructive, and a remarkable inner strength is brought to life.  The journeyman is transformed.  This Ted-like talk will give participants a sampling of the Hero’s Journey curriculum, why it was developed and how it can be used as a creative tool to help people in recovery.

The Safing Center: Treating Veterans Who Use or Experience Intimate Partner Violence

Christopher Mackowiak, PhD, Psychologist, Edith Nourse Rogers Memorial VA Hospital

In this presentation, I will discuss my position as program manager of the Safing Center.  I am a VA psychologist whose focus is on treating veterans who use or experience intimate partner violence (IPV).  I will share some data about why IPV is a health crisis, and why veteran rates are even greater.  Traditional models are limited in success and stigmatizing to individuals who seek help or are mandated to treatment.  I will discuss how the unique approach of the Safing Center uses a PSR and holistic approach to address IPV using Contextual Intimate Partner Violence Therapy, and will provide some preliminary findings about effectiveness of this approach.

What Are People Rehabilitating from, Anyway?

Amos, Worth, LICSW, Program Manager, Crescent House, Bedford VAMC

Psych Rehab practitioners work every day with people who have experienced "mental Illness." But do we really know what that means? Is it a brain problem? A crisis of meaning? The presenter will review recent research from a variety of fields, including mental health, nutrition, physiology, and pharmacology to suggest that mental illness as commonly understood, does not exist. A sketch of an alternative understanding will be presented. This sketch will suggest that some interventions which have been undervalued or ignored could be vital for preventing or treating symptoms of 'mental illness.'

Who Gets to Define “Peer Support?”

Darby Penney, MLS, Senior Research Associate, Advocates for Human Potential, Inc.

There has been a recent, rapid expansion of “peer support specialist” and similar positions within mental health programs.  These jobs are often designed by professionals unfamiliar with the history, principles and practices of peer support, which is a grassroots, non-hierarchical approach rooted in mutual aid and consciousness-raising. Research shows that this often places these peer staff in untenable workplace situations and may impede access to genuine peer support. This presentation will provide describe how administrators, managers, supervisors and non-peer colleagues can facilitate the successful integration of genuine peer support into their agencies’ offerings.

Can We Think About "Rehabilitation" Without ConsideringRelationships?: Lessons from Infant Mental Health

Gerry Costa, PhD, Developmental Psychologist and Founding Director, Center for Autism and Early Childhood Mental Health Speaker

Infant mental health is an interdisciplinary field concerned with the optimal development of infants and children in all developmental domains within the context of their relationships.  The brain is best conceptualized as a "verb", not a "noun", and the growing field of interpersonal neurobiology reveals how our brains are co-constructed through the nature of human emotional interactions.  Nowhere are these lessons clearer than during the first three years of life, when both mind and brain health is established. This talk will establish a context for why "how" we help is as important as "what" we do.