tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8589752395682369151.post5373882152636481662..comments2023-01-28T08:11:28.869+00:00Comments on Secular Psychiatry: Halloween PsychologyUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger1125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8589752395682369151.post-35697718756693793322009-11-06T15:45:52.009+00:002009-11-06T15:45:52.009+00:00Nice post, Helen. I hadn't realised that Witch...Nice post, Helen. I hadn't realised that Witch was Old scottish for wise woman.<br /><br />When I told my story to Peter Redgrove, the Jungian lay analyst in Falmouth in November 1988, he was the only man who actually made me feel good about myself and he said, 'I think you will go through hell and then you will be a wise woman and you will be able to do teh same work I do; on the principle of the wounded healing the wounded'. <br /><br />Then he said he could do no more for me. It was an inspiration to think that although he thought I was going to suffer I would be able to help someone else one day.<br /><br />It was not until I read 'The Wise Wound',that I realised what he was saying. Chapter VI is particularly relevant in which Redgrove and his wife Penelope Shuttle argue that modern psychiatric diagnoses imposed on women follow the same forms and diagnostic traditions as those used in the witchhunts: 'Witchhunts: nine million menstrual murders'. <br /><br /><br />Borderline, histrionic and 'emotionally unstable' personality disorders are al diagnoses of this kind in my view and I find the state we are in where a young woman is allowed to die by doctors to be despicable. <br /><br />One of the people who really helped me was a 'wise woman' friend of mine in about 1997 who is a solicitor and spent a considerable time persuading me that I was not too stupid to do A levels. I eventually got a first class degree.<br /><br />I now discover that the professionals knew all along that I was being persecuted and that I was of 'above average intelligence' and articulate but no-one told me. If you are told that you are stupid and worthless from an early age it is very depressing and traumatising.<br /><br />As far as misogeny goes, it is very interesting that that a Guardian Critic said Redgrove was sometimes unfairly seen as a shaman, an old warlock going crazily on about menstruation compared to his friend Ted Hughes.<br /><br />Interesting that if you are a man who takes a real interest in women you get misogeny directed at you as well. Crazy to show an interest in understanding women.<br /><br />As I like to point out to people, look what happened to Sylvia Plath and Aurelia Hughes - one does not want to be judgemental but....Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com