GPs and Health Professionals

For Carers, GPs & Mental Health Professionals

For someone to join Talking Voices there is no need for an official referral.  If the voice hearer feels the group would be helpful to them simply suggest that they check us out on our website and/or get in touch by emailing talking.voices@yahoo.com. Our weekly online group is for anyone anywhere, the monthly face-to-face in person group meets only on the Isle of Wight. Those living on the Island can chose to come along to both the online weekly meeting and the monthly face to face meeting, or join only the online group or come along just to the monthly face to face group.

We also hope that the resources on this website might be helpful to you and those you may meet who hear voices, see visions, sense presence and feel touch that other people do not.  Feel free to download the helpful leaflets to give to patients, or suggest they might like to view a video or two, and we have gathered together some research papers about the Hearing Voices Network, hearing voices, and a couple of therapies which are proving helpful including EMDR for psychosis, and iMAgery-Focused therapy for PSychosis (iMAPS).

[Hearing Voices Groups are a place to reframe] the problem itself – not just voice hearing per se, but the anxiety, guilt, or fear that often accompanies it  – support groups help people analyze the symbolic significance of the voices … By taking a curious, interested and accepting attitude toward the whole experience hearing voices groups help people realize what functions the voices may be serving so they can consider other ways of handling these problems.^[1]

‘Talking with other members [of the group] has increased my self-awareness of what’s happening to me, my state of mind, and why I need to do certain things to help myself.  I’ve become more responsible for myself and feel less helpless. I realized now I do have some power over my situation”.  Since the most difficult part of  the experience for many people is feeling at the mercy of the voices, unable to affect or control them in any way, trying out some of these strategies can be a tremendous help. And as people start to cope more effectively  they feel less distracted or preoccupied by the voices and more in control of their own minds. ^[2]

Presentations:

We are able to meet with individual GPs and mental health care practitioners and professionals to explain about voice hearing, the Hearing Voices Network and Talking Voices Hearing Voices Group (HVG). We are available to give more in-depth presentations to groups and teams to include what it’s like to hear voices, the history and ethos of the Hearing Voices Network and Hearing Voices Groups, some reasons and causes for voice hearing, and how with the right help voice voice hearers can change lives for the better.

Maastricht Hearing Voices Interview Questionnaire

We are also able to offer training events to administer the Maastricht Hearing Voices Interview which has now become a gold standard interview for hearing voices, there are two versions, one for adults and the other for children.  It includes 12 sections:

• The nature of the experience,
• characteristics of the voices,
• personal history of voice hearing,
• voice triggers,
• what the voices say,
• explanations for the origin of the voices,
• impact of the voices on way of life,
• balance of the relationship,
• coping strategies (cognitive, behavioural, physiological),
• experiences in childhood,
• treatment history,
• social network

which leads to the Formulation: Breaking the Code & Making the Construct.

Our presentations, and training is free of cost to the NHS.

Key Values of the Hearing Voices Movement are:

1. Hearing voices can be understood as a natural part of human experience
2. Diverse explanations are accepted for the origins of voices
3. Voice-hearers are encouraged to take ownership of their experiences and define it for themselves
4. Voice-hearing can be interpreted and understood in the context of life events and interpersonal narratives
5. A process of understanding and accepting one’s voices may be more helpful for recovery than continual suppression and avoidance
6. Peer support and collaboration is empowering and beneficial for recovery

Hearing Voices Groups

Within the realm of mainstream psychiatry, hearing voices groups (HVGs) can offer a powerful alternative to dominant practices around the experience of voice hearers. In contrast to the biopsychosocial and biomedical frameworks, HVGs aim to facilitate a process of exploration and personal meaning-making through creating spaces that enable empowerment, emancipation and liberation. For many, these spaces offer a restorative forum for peer support, where diversity of experience and identity are welcomed and respected, rather than being silenced. ^[3]

Hearing Voices Books: Suitable for Mental Health Professionals

• The Practical Handbook of Hearing Voices – Therapeutic and Creative Approaches
  Isla Parker, Joachim Schnackenberg, Mark Hopfenbeck – ISBN 978-1910919910 – Published 2021
• Making Sense of Voices – A Guide for Mental Health Professionals Working with Voice Hearers
  Prof Marius Romme & Sandra Escher – (A4 Size) Published by MIND – ISBN 978-1874690863
  Possibly out of print but can sometimes be found on Abebooks.co.uk and eBay (£50 – £65)
  When ordering take care not to confuse with Living with Voices – 50 Stories of Recovery (A5 size)
  the front covers are quite similar at a distance.
• Agnes’s Jacket – A Psychologist’s Search for the Meaning of Madness – ISBN 978-1906254452
• Living with Voices – 50 Stories of Recovery
  Marius Romme and Sandra Escher – ISBN 978-1906254223
• Young People Hearing Voices: What You Need to Know and What You Can Do
  Sandra Escher, Marius Romme – ISBN – 978-1906254575
• Psychosis as a Personal Crisis: An Experience-Based Approach
  Marius Romme – ISBN 978-0415673303

The Practical Handbook of Hearing Voices – Therapeutic and Creative Approaches
From the publishers website PCCS Books:
Hearing voices, seeing visions and similar out-of-the-ordinary experiences have long intrigued and mystified humankind. The dominant scientific and medical understandings of these phenomena tend to problematise them. This ground-breaking book builds on the work of the Hearing Voices Movement and of the researchers Marius Romme and Sandra Escher in challenging this perception. The book is a collection of chapters by voice hearers, mental health professionals and researchers describing a myriad of therapeutic and creative approaches and strategies that people find helpful in relating to voices when they find them distressing. It is based on insights, understandings and knowledge derived from the first-hand experience of voice hearers and from mental health practice and research that show that the person’s relationship with the voices and what the voices say are key to understanding and living with them; that voices are not in themselves a problem and can even be helpful; that there is a strong connection between voices and unwanted emotions; that life-long medication is not the inevitable and only treatment and, most importantly perhaps, that voice hearers can live well with their voices (even if it is sometimes hard work).
The book is presented in three parts: Part one, ‘Hearing our voices’, includes voice hearers’ perspectives as to what has helped them to recover from breakdown so that they are able to live full lives, including Hearing Voices Groups and peer support. Part two, ‘Emerging social and therapeutic approaches to working with voices’, explores different non-medical and therapeutic approaches that help voice hearers to make sense of and live well with their voices. Part three, ‘Creative approaches to working with voices’, describes using creative arts, such as dance, drama and poetry, to help voice hearers relate to their voices in positive ways.

^{[1 & 2] Gail A Hornstein – Agnes’s Jacket- Chapter 4, Mavericks in Maastricht, p47 & 48
[3] Sasha Priddy and Charlotte Howard – The Practical Handbook of Hearing Voices Therapeutic and Creative Approaches 2021 Chapter 4}