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The literary statement of mentally ill individuals as a testimony of a fight for normality (its ethical aspect)
VEDRALOVÁ, Aneta
Goal of this bachelor thesis is to describe dominant ethical aspects of a return of a mentally ill person back to normal life and to point out by this the importance of social support in the process of recovery. As a specific of this thesis I consider a fact that my source of data were not just semi-structured interviews but also the content analysis of books written by two women, who have personal experience with psychotic form of illness. To result effective achievement of a main research goal, the thesis is divided into two parts, into theoretical part and into empirical part. The theoretical part is a vast treatise about schizophrenic disease written in a way so the reader would better experience life from the point of view of a mentally ill person. It includes the description of schizophrenia, its possible manifestations, social impacts, treatment or prognosis. In addition to that, a part dedicated to the treatment of schizophrenia describes a type of treatment that is not very often used in the Czech Republic called narrative therapy. Another equally important section of the theoretical part is the treatise about stigma of mental illness and its possible elimination by activities of anti-stigmatizing nature. Theory is then finished by outlining the issue of normality. The empirical part of my bachelor thesis is trying to reach set goal with the help of qualitative strategy. It is happening through the analysis of loose transcription of two semi-structured interviews, but also through the content analysis of two books. One of them is called Ve stínech za zrcadlem aneb o životě s psychózou which was written by Markéta Bednářová, and the other one is called Homo psychoticus written by Markéta Dohnalová. It is clear from the research that mentally ill individual must (besides the disease itself) fight with the negative attitude of society, that treats him discriminatory, while he is trying to get back to his normal functioning. For example, mentally ill people have problems to keep a job, or even to find one that suits their abilities and possibilities. Successful recovery is also sometimes prevented by the treatment of schizophrenia, which is quite a paradox. The ill people are not willing to use medicine with soothing and other undesirable effects which sadly often leads to relapse and repeated hospitalization. Another problem to successful return can also be family. It is important for the ill individual to return back to stable and safe environment which serves as a protection and prevention from possible relapse of the disease. The ill individual is often hindrance to himself. Self-stigmatization goes hand in hand with the loss of self-confidence, with the change of identity and with the consequent stagnation in the label of mental illness. It comes to the internalization of prejudices, which the society holds against people ill with schizophrenia and the ill individual gives up all efforts on his full integration back to the society. In a fight against stigmatization and primarily self-stigmatization, it seems to be effective to reveal one's diagnosis and to talk about it openly. This is what Markéta Bednářová and Markéta Dohnalová, who both believe that writing a book about a fight against their disease is an effective form of autotherapy and also a bridge to mental health, did. This bachelor thesis could arouse further interest about therapy for people ill with schizophrenia through writing of their life story, and it could also serve as an accompanying material while teaching social work with the intention to describe the concepts of stigmatization of mental illness to students. And beside that it can evoke further interest in support of social services which try to ease the return of an ill individual back to the society. And finally, this bachelor theses itself could be a bearer of anti-stigmatizing influence.
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