Laura Zera

Stories to Connect Cultures

You and Mental Health: Peer-Led Recovery

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When dealing with a mental illness, sometimes you feel like you come up against a fork in the road; turning left leads to doctors and pills and turning right means you go it ‘alone,’ utilizing a support network of family and friends. Talk therapy can be wonderful, but can also be subject to health insurance restrictions and/or is downright expensive if you don’t have insurance coverage. And while medication is an effective treatment for some, it doesn’t work for everybody and/or you might even see it as a last resort. The alternative of trying to push on through a mental illness on your own might be just the ticket for you, but what if it doesn’t work?

There’s another route, too, and it goes by the name peer-led recovery.Continue Reading

Mental Health: Is DSM-5’s Approval Bad?

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It’s hard to believe that it has been a year already since I first wrote about the DSM (the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders) in a post called “What It Is and Why You Should Care.” The diagnostic criteria for the fifth edition were just approved by the American Psychological Association (APA) Board of Trustees this past weekend, in preparation for this edition’s publication in May 2013.

In my earlier post, I expressed concern over the growth in the list of diagnoses that appeared with each new edition of the DSM, and whether there was a correlation to the overall growth in mental illness diagnosis and medication treatment. Obviously, that’s a pretty tough case to make, but it did generate some really great conversation in the blog post’s comments. There are other folks out there besides me who are worried that the DSM’s evolution is having a trickle-down effect, the outcome being a society prone to over-medicate people who are experiencing normal emotions, e.g. the temper tantrums of a child, bereavement grief, etc.

Unfortunately, the DSM-5 diagnostic criteria were approved in pretty much the same state as they were when these concerns were raised in 2011 and earlier.Continue Reading

The Next Big Thing: What, Do You Have a Hairball?

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Zip-a-dee-doo-dah, I’m going to share about my work-in-progress today, having been tagged by Jeri Walker-Bickett for something called The Next Big Thing. First, a girl can only hope. I’d even be thrilled with The Next Moderately Well-Received Thing. Second, can I get in trouble for using the phrase “Zip-a-dee-doo-dah?” I’m developing copyright paranoia. Anyway, thanks to Jeri for getting me to play. This promotion idea originates from the SheWrites website, and what follows are my answers to ten interview questions. At the end, you’ll find links to other authors I’ve invited to take part.

What is the working title of your book? It’s Crazy for You, but I definitely envision a title change. I like the working title, but there are too many things out there already with the same name. If anybody has any snappy ideas, please send them my way. If your idea gets used, I’ll pay you what Nike paid the graphic designer who came up with the swoosh, which is enough to buy one-third of one pair of Nike runners. You’re welcome. (But seriously, if something comes to you in a flash, I’d love to hear it. Love to.)Continue Reading

Travel: An Introvert’s Weekend Getaway

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Before we talk specifics about getaways, first let’s address how you can tell if you’re an introvert. My simple gauge: when you spend time in direct interaction with people, does it give you more energy, or leave you needing to recharge your batteries in a quiet place?

I’m an introvert. I love people—love, love, love them—but when I’m done, I am done. I don’t want to talk to anybody. And when I’m overdone, I lose the capacity to hold on to thoughts and make decisions. My husband and two needy pets (both must sit on my lap at the same time kind of needy) start to feel like a crowd, and I wish extremely uncharitable things for Horking Man (neighbor who stands on his porch 24×7, smokes, then coughs like he is dying—and he may be—coughs some more, works up a loogie from the depths of his black lungs and, with great relish, spits it over the railing.)Continue Reading

Mental Health: Unregulated Group Homes

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For-profit companies are setting up group homes that deliver mental health services yet craft their delivery in such a way that they avoid state and federal regulation. Several such homes are operating just a handful of miles from where I live, run by a company named Hanbleceya. The Seattle Times newspaper has done a couple of detailed stories on them — one on how Hanbleceya operates and one on their mistreatment of a resident — and also shared a red flag-raising quote from Ron Honberg, the director for policy and legal affairs for the National Alliance on Mental Illness. “There has been a proliferation across the country of a new breed of unregulated boarding homes that provide long-term mental-health treatment… these homes often are operated by staffers who have little training or education in mental health, “ Honberg said.Continue Reading

Mental Health: Nova Scotia’s Gr.9 Curriculum

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School has started again and so I’m starting to work on my presentation for high school students that I originally talked about here. Thanks to a U.K. group called the Youth Mental Health Network, I stumbled across a story about a new mental health curriculum that is being rolled out for ninth graders across the province of Nova Scotia, Canada. Awesome stuff. The link for it is found here at Teen Mental Health.Continue Reading