Chapter 12 - Treatment Themes in Narrative Identity

Summary

In Chapter 12, we develop subthemes concerning how our participants narrated treatment as a cost of their illness and how it contributed to well-being. We highlight how insights into the impact of treatment on narrative identity may aid healthcare professionals in providing the best possible support for individuals with mental illness. Generally, few stories seemed to follow a structure where increased well-being followed automatically from symptom remission, pointing to the need for psychiatric care that directly targets well-being. Being diagnosed was narrated with both positive and negative identity implications. Some participants evidenced subthemes revolving around inadequate access to help and negative treatment events, including hospitalizations and side effects of medicine. These subthemes may ground identity conclusions such as “I am harmed by treatment” and “no one cares.” When treatment contributed to well-being, subthemes featured the growing and agentic self: individuals striving to improve in treatment and noting their growth. Further subthemes concerned helpful relationships with staff, grounding identity implications such as “I am understood and supported by staff,” that may shape engagement with treatment and support personal recovery.