Mental health
Dancing With Lucia
How psychiatric diagnosis can work against you
If we experience mental health difficulties, we can long for a psychiatric diagnosis so we can at least understand why we feel like this and how we can better manage our symptoms. While identifying and naming our struggles might initially feel like a great relief, long term it can keep us trapped.
Dancing With Lucia explores the pros and cons of diagnosis with examples from some of my most recent conversations with friends and family about their struggles, and with the story of Lucia Joyce, James Joyce’s daughter, as an example of how psychiatric conditions were managed in the past.
