This dissertation of Alke Wisselink focuses on ‘the good life’ of people with psychosis susceptibility, who, according to psychiatry, have ‘severe mental illnesses.’ The question is: What constitutes ‘the good life’ for people with psychosis, according to themselves and those around them—their relatives, care workers, and us as researchers? The stories told in this dissertation are set primarily in various housing contexts, such as sheltered homes.
Relational themes addressed include: Polyphony and conflict among researchers in academic psychiatry; Approaching research participants as a friend; Quality contact with/as people with psychosis; and; The multilogical search to balance three oppositional value pairs for “the good life” of people with psychosis, namely (in)stability, (in)dependence, and (in)activity.
In the discussion, the fieldwork stories and findings are related to the theoretical debates on inclusion and recovery. At the heart of the dissertation is a call for friendly reciprocity, for seeing Both Sides, Now. This means: paying attention to all interests in a power asymmetry, not shying away from “communicative friction,” making space for lifestyles that deviate from narrow societal norms, conceptualizing social inclusion as a two-way-process, and recovery as mutual recovery.
Based on this thesis, I propose that we collaboratively work towards a companionship-based psychiatry, and on allyships in between the mainstream and the margins of society, where informal reciprocal relationships with people with (diagnoses of) severe mental illnesses form the basis.
