Fountain House: portraits of lives reclaimed from mental illness

488 Pages·1996·0.94 MB·English

by  Mary Flannery, Mark Glickman

Fountain House : Portraits of Lives
title:
Reclaimed From Mental Illness
author: Flannery, Mary.; Glickman, Mark.
publisher: Hazelden Publishing
isbn10 | asin: 156838128X
print isbn13: 9781568381282
ebook isbn13: 9780585300207
language: English
Mentally ill--New York (State)--New York-
-Rehabilitation, Fountain House
subject
Foundation, Halfway houses--New York
(State)--New York.
publication date: 1996
lcc: RC439.55.F53 1996eb
ddc: 362.2/2/097471
Mentally ill--New York (State)--New York-
Mentally ill--New York (State)--New York-
-Rehabilitation, Fountain House
subject:
Foundation, Halfway houses--New York
(State)--New York.
Page i
Fountain House
Page iii
Fountain House
Portraits of Lives Reclaimed from Mental Illness
Mary Flannery
and
Mark Glickman
with a foreword by
E. Fuller Torrey, M.D.
Page iv
Hazelden Center City, Minnesota 55012-0176 1-800-328-9000 (Toll
Free U.S., Canada, and the Virgin Islands) 1-612-257-4010 (Outside
the U.S. and Canada) 1-612-257-1331 (24-hour
FAX)http://www.Hazelden.org(World Wide Web site on Internet)
©1996 by Mary Flannery and Mark Glickman All rights reserved
Printed in the United States of America No portion of this publication
may be reproduced in any manner without the written permission of
the publisher
ISBN: 1-56838-128-X
00 99 98 97 96 6 5 4 3 2 1
Book design by Will H. Powers Cover design by David Spohn Cover
photograph by John Roth, New Frontier Club Typesetting by Stanton
Publication Services, Inc.
Editor's note
Hazelden offers a variety of information on chemical dependency and
related areas. Our publications do not necessarily represent Hazelden's
programs, nor do they officially speak for any Twelve Step
organization.
All stories in this book are based on actual experiences. The names of
Fountain House members and some details of their stories have been
changed for privacy reasons.
Page v
To Fran
Mary-Claire, John, Rosemary, Dan
and
To Cynthia
Page vii
Contents
Dedication V
Foreword IX
by E. Fuller Torrey, M.D.
Acknowledgments XI
Introduction 1
1 3
Each Rung I Climb Up, I Fall Down Three
2 17
Please Don't Knock. Walk Right In
3 32
Too Young to Know Anything Could Go Wrong
4 50
It Can Change Your Life
5 65
I Was Standing On My Self-Esteem
6 81
How Can I Escape?
7 93
I Think I Am an Alcoholic
8 112
What Do I Do Next?
9 128
But Still, By God, They're Working
10 145
You Don't Know Who I'm Going to Be Someday
11 164
Membership Is Voluntary and Without Time Limits
12 177
There Are Many "Fire Souls" in This Room
Appendix A: Directory of Clubhouse Programs 197
Appendix B: Standards for Clubhouse Programs 218
Page ix
Foreword
The clubhouse model, of which Fountain House is the prototype, has
emerged as one of the most effective means of psychiatric
rehabilitation and a book describing it is long overdue. The house
which became Fountain House was purchased in 1948, almost a half
century ago, yet no article describing the program was published until
1982 and clubhouse standards were not set until 1991. Fountain
House, in short, has been one of the best-kept secrets in the field of
psychiatric rehabilitation except among a small coterie of individuals
who have been fortunate enough to visit it. Many of these people then
started their own clubhouses.
During the almost fifty years that Fountain House has existed, the
need for its services has increased enormously. In 1955, when
Fountain House was just getting off the ground, there were over
558,000 seriously mentally ill individuals in state psychiatric
hospitals. Fountain House was in fact started by a small group of these
individuals who had been discharged from New York's Rockland
State Hospital. Today there are only approximately 71,000 individuals
left in those hospitals. Subtracting 71,000 from 558,000 means that
approximately 487,000 seriously mentally ill individuals who would
have been hospitalized forty years ago are living in the community
today. But that does not tell the whole story because the 558,000
hospitalized individuals was based on the 1955 United States
population of 164 million people. Today the population is 260 million,
so if we had the same proportion of people in the state psychiatric
hospitals today, the number would be over 821,000. The real
magnitude of deinstitutionalization then, is 821,000 minus 71,000 or
approximately 750,000 people. That is the same number of people as
who live in San Francisco or Baltimore. The need for Fountain House
replicas is therefore enormous. Clubhouses provide seriously mentally
ill individuals with a supportive network,