Resources

Below is a list of resources we have found useful and aligned with our work. We are not affiliated with, nor do we endorse any particular organization.

MindFreedom International

MindFreedom International (MFI) is an independent nonprofit that unites 100’s of grassroots groups and thousands of members to peacefully take action for human rights in the mental health system. While we are open to the public, a majority of our members identify themselves as “psychiatric survivors”, that is, individuals who have personally experienced human rights violations in the mental health system. All who support human rights are welcome to join. MFI members and leaders include mental health professionals, advocates, attorneys and family members.

Main goals:

  • Win human rights campaigns in mental health, such as opposing coerced, forced and fraudulent mental health procedures.
  • Challenge abuse by the psychiatric drug industry.
  • Support the self-determination and voice of psychiatric survivors and mental health consumers.
  • Promote safe, humane and effective options in mental health.

Website: www.mindfreedom.org

M.O.M.S.

The M.O.M.S. Movement is the Movement Of Mothers-and-Others Standing-up-together Raising the Village and Taking Back our Children from psychiatric drugging, from mental institutions, from the state, from institutionalized insanity. We also educate people about suppressed research and information on the use of psychiatric meds.

Website: www.MentalHealthRights.org

Returning Veterans Project

Free counseling and other health services for returning veterans and their families.
Website: http://www.returningveterans.org/

The Foundation for Excellence in Mental Health Care

Our Vision: All People have hope, knowledge, tools, and community available to them to recover from mental health and trauma challenges.

Our Mission: To promote better mental health outcomes. We do so by identifying, developing, and sharing knowledge with the public about mental health care that best helps people recover and live well in society. We promote improvements in mental health care by sponsoring research and the development of programs designed to help people thrive–physically, mentally, socially and spiritually.

Website:  http://www.mentalhealthexcellence.org/

Will Hall

Mental Diversity Counseling and Teaching. I offer counseling out of my Portland Oregon office, as well as internationally via phone and Skype, and work with individuals, couples, family members, and groups. I often have sliding scale openings to accommodate limited incomes, but because my work does not include diagnosis or mainstream psychological treatment I don’t accept insurance.

Website: http://willhall.net/

Recovery from “Schizophrenia” and other “psychotic disorders”

New understandings of the mind and of madness can open new doors to full recovery – thoughts from way outside the straightjacket of the “medical model.” By Ron Unger LCSW

Website: http://recoveryfromschizophrenia.org/

ISEPP – International Society for Ethical Psychiatry and Psychology

ISEPP is a research and educational network devoted to educating professionals and the public concerning the impact of mental health theories on public policy and the effects of therapeutic practices upon individual well-being, personal freedom, the family, and community values.

Our main purpose is to examine and disseminate information concerning the impact of psychiatric theory and practice upon personal freedom, liberty, and a moral/spiritual conception of humanity.

Website: http://psychintegrity.org

Sisters of the Road

Sisters of the Road is committed to building community power with people who society has oppressed because of their socioeconomic status. We believe in the work the Rethinking Psychiatry movement is doing. Sisters is doing powerful political work around housing, health, and civil rights – all of which affect people surviving mental health issues.

Website: www.SistersoftheRoad.org

Project ABLE

The goal of Project ABLE is to promote consumer-led programs that empower consumers to lead healthy lives as active members of their communities. empowered consumers recognize their strengths and exercise their ability to make choices that shape their lives. The vision of Project ABLE is to provide the organizational structure through which consumers can create, direct, and deliver peer-to-peer services.

Website: www.ProjectAble.org

Citizens Commission on Human Rights (CCHR)

CCHR is a non-profit, non-political, non-religious mental health watchdog, responsible for helping to enact more than 150 laws protecting individuals from abusive or coercive practices.  CCHR has worked for more than 40 years for full informed consent in the field of mental health, and the right to all the information regarding psychiatric diagnoses and treatment, not just the information coming from those with a vested interest in keeping patients in the dark.

Website: www.cchroregon.org

Natural Healing for Bipolar Disorder

Exploring nutritional therapies and research, bipolar biotypes, brain biochemistry, health issues, role of neurotoxins, and other relevant topics. Also, upcoming conferences and lectures, and links to orthomolecular resources. Comments and ideas welcome, join in!

Website: http://naturalhealingforbipolardisorder.blogspot.com/

Oregon College of Oriental Medicine

The Oregon College of Oriental Medicine (OCOM) is a non-profit, educational facility and healthcare clinic. OCOM strives to provide students with the opportunity to gain valuable clinical experience while treating patients with acupuncture, oriental therapeutic massage, and herbal therapy. OCOM clinics serve the greater Portland community as an affordable, alternative medicine resource.

Website: www.ocom.edu

FolkTime

FolkTime offers peer-to-peer communities in three locations: NE Portland, Oregon City, and Sandy, OR. All locations are open four days a week and provide social activities, speakers, field trips and a nutritious lunch. There is no charge for attendance, but a referral is necessary. FolkTime is a place where people build long-lasting relationships that foster wellness and recovery. Members meet monthly to create a calendar of activities that include music, art, writing and more.

Website: www.FolkTime.org

Law Project for Psychiatric Rights

The Law Project for Psychiatric Rights is a public interest law firm devoted to the defense of people facing the horrors of forced psychiatric drugging and electroshock.  We are further dedicated to exposing the truth about these drugs and the courts being misled into ordering people to be drugged and subjected to other brain and body damaging interventions against their will.  Currently, due to massive growth in psychiatric drugging of children and youth and the current targeting of them for even more psychiatric drugging, PsychRights has made attacking this problem a priority.  Children are virtually always forced to take these drugs because it is the adults in their lives who are making the decision.  This is an unfolding national tragedy of immense proportions.  Extensive information about all of this is available on our web site.

Website: http://psychrights.org/index.htm

EASA – Early Assessment and Support Alliance

A state-wide early psychosis treatment program, EASA’s mission is to keep young people with the early signs of major mental illnesses on their normal life path and not develop the identity of a mental health patient. We provide free comprehensive holistic services to individuals 12-25 years old who are within the first year of a potentially serious psychotic condition.

Services include: Education, Individual and family counseling, assistance with school and/or work goals, resource acquisition, psychiatric services, peer supports, wellness and nutrition support.

ESA has demonstrated that it is possible to improve and prevent the course of severe mental illness through early detection and intervention. EASA works when referrals happen early in the process.

Website: www.easacommunity.org

Portland Hearing Voices

Portland Hearing Voices is a community group to promote mental diversity. We create public education, discussion groups, training, and community support related to hear voices, seeing visions, and having unusual beliefs and sensory experiences often labeled as psychosis, bipolar, mania, paranoia, schizophrenia, and other mental disorders. We aim to reduce fear and misunderstanding, question stereotypes, promote holistic health options, overcome isolation, and create a more inclusive community.

Website: www.PortlandHearingVoices.net

Oregon Consumer/Survivor Coalition

The Oregon Mental Health Consumer/Psychiatric Survivor Coalition (OCSC) is a coalition of 12 consumer/survivor led organizations from throughout Oregon working together to establish a statewide network of people who identify as having a psychiatric diagnosis, and/or who feel labeled by one; to share ideas; provide mutual support; work toward common goals; strengthen peer-run organizations; and advocate for positive change in the mental health system.

Website: www.mindfreedom.org/as/act/us/or/ocsc

Disability Rights Oregon

As Oregon’s designated protection and advocacy system for more than 30 years, Disability Rights Oregon (DRO) has a unique role: to uphold the legal rights of people with disabilities. DRO promotes opportunity, access and choice for individuals with disabilities by assisting them with legal problems directly related to their disabilities.

We do this in a variety of ways including:

  • Promoting awareness among people with disabilities of their rights under the law.
  • Providing information, tools and referrals that empower individuals to advocate on their own behalf,
  • Investigating and, when appropriate, addressing reports of abuse and/or neglect,
  • Representing individuals in cases where legal expertise is needed,
  • Pursuing policy changes that benefit many people with disabilities, both now and into the future,
  • Litigation when necessary.

Mission: Our mission is to promote and defend the rights of individuals with disabilities.

Vision: We envision a society in which persons with disabilities have equality of opportunity, full participation and the ability to exercise meaningful choice

Website: www.droregon.org

National University of Natural Medicine

Established in 1956, National University of Natural Medicine is the oldest accredited naturopathic medical university in North America and a leader in natural medicine education and evidence-based research. As one of the most respected universities of natural medicine in the world, our participation in international medical education and research is routinely solicited. We believe in the healing power of nature, and that food is medicine.

NUNM offers a tightly knit, inspiring learning environment and a vital, groundbreaking research community that encompasses our classrooms, health centers and beyond. Our dynamic campus offers all our students the opportunity to become agents of change in the world of health. You can be on the frontier of new ways of looking at nutrition, mental health and more. As a medical student, you will work with diverse patient populations in our community clinics and gain an appreciation of different practice settings. Our health centers and acclaimed Helfgott Research Institute will be central to your coursework. At NUNM, we are all about education, research and service―it’s what our students want and patients need.

Website: www.nunm.edu

A Healthy State of Mind, LLC

A Healthy State of Mind is a naturopathic mental health care private practice. We provide naturopathic mental health care and general medical care. Our goal is to offer holistic mental health care to those suffering from mental illness.

Website: www.ahealthystateofmind.com