Hidden In Plain Sight

By Patricia Lefave, Labelled, D.D.(P)

I know that many of you have been following the specific details of my own case in the Guelph Mirror blog. Though the names mean nothing at all to those of you who don't know me or my city, I am writing that blog for a reason.

I am trying to make the group phenomenon in this REAL to those who are participating. As bizarre as it may sound, it is NOT reality to them. This is one of the most essential pivotal points in understanding what has happened to me and to people just like me, in relation to a group (or mob) of others.
It's very simple, really but, the resistance to the truth about both us, as the observed and assessed, and them, as the observers and assessors, remains "hidden" in plain sight. I will try to boil it down here to it's simplest form in an attempt to relieve you who are the psychiatrized from some of your valid confusion over what is going on.

The first thing we know is that to state that we are confused to a psychiatrist is to push his well trained buttons. Psychiatrists view those they psychiatrize as neatly contained, genetic defective, disease processes, operating in isolation, without relationship to events or other people. I think it has developed from their loony, and frequently arrogant, need to believe they can, and even SHOULD, be able to control everyone. So immediately, the relationship between psychiatrist, and psychiatrized, is based upon a very serious imbalance of power. The psychiatrist is relating as a "superior" to an "inferior" while we are often relating as equal human to equal human. In such a situation, little, or no, real communication is present. That said, for the moment let's focus on the group phenomenon. It is surreal to say the least.

Basically, what is "split" in the first place, and tends to remain so, is reality itself. In most cases in which we get to be ; the 'schiz,' the Bi-polar disorder, the delusional disorder, schizoid, schizo-affective etc.- you know, the big "incurable" labels- their are opposing versions of reality being produced. Most of us are involved in some way with an individual who is operating with a hidden agenda of domination, which we don't now about until the damage is done and it is too late to change that, and which the group involved often NEVER knows about.

This split reality creates a paradox in that the more the victim tells the truth, the more likely he/she is to be psychiatrized for doing so. Because the group buys the version of reality the dominating protagonist is selling, and because psychiatry tends to believe consensus opinion defines reality, the truth is often as hard to find as buried treasure. Rarely is there a big X marking the spot.

So "confusion" which is from a legitimate cause in relation to our world and experience is seen by the assessors a a "symptom" of mental illness without relation to external reality, other people, or events. When the source of our confusion are invalidated, and we are given total custody of BOTH cause and effect, without relationship to external reality, we have been placed into isolation and instantly reduced to the "subject" or "object" of observation and assessment. We have been forced into psychological isolation, our input and insights into our own life situation and feelings, are no longer seen by the psychiatrist, nor the group involved as relevant.

We feel all alone, and rightly so, in a hostile "universe" which has been created for us like a special place of containment, a psychospiritual prison, without any possibility of genuine psychic contact with other humans. We are alienated but good. (I mean that both ways) These are the feelings expressed by the altered state of psychosis which expresses the horrifyingly inexpressible in symbolic form.

We are then told we must accept this fate, preferably without resistance, or any denial that the cause of our psychic state is anything other than our supposedly inherent defectiveness, and without complain. (if we know what's "good" for us)

For the purpose of this essay let's focus on the simple, obvious truth that remains unseen by the participants. It is the split premise from which the SAME incidents are being judged and assessed, which creates the paradoxical trap for the individual being psychaitrized. Often, we are using the same words, but with opposite meaning.

Since we are judging out experience from the premise of OUR reality, and the group is judging from the premise of the reality they have been TOLD is the correct one, the effect upon us, trying to relate as an individual to such a group is surreal, to put it mildly.

If you have seen any of the details of my ongoing community evaluation on the Guelph Mirror blog, you can see the group phenomenon at work. Here is a concrete example of what I mean.

Two people who are involved in the endless "diagnosing" from a distance, stand a few feet away, striking what I have come to call, The "observation pose." (psychiatric nurse wannabes) and as they watch me, looking right at them, they say,
"Apparently she thinks people are watching her all the time and judging her."
(Are you laughing ''for no reason'' here? Another of your "symptoms.") This is what is in this phenomenon psychologically:

1. The assessors have cast me in the role of the "inferior" mind, less conscious than they of the reality of the situation, when, in fact, I understand it better than they do.

2. They are unaware that THEY are "the people" watching and judging me, because they do not consider themselves to be either visible or audible to me, even though it would be perfectly obvious to a five year old.
(Now I don't mean that NONE of these people aren't hissing and snarling at me, fully conscious that I am aware that they are doing so. Every city has it's allotted share of assholes and bullies who will act out whenever the opportunity to do so, without getting caught, is presented to them. Such covert cowards live all over the world. But the majority of people who get involved are oblivious to themselves as well as to me. )

3. They hear no irony in what they have just said.

4. they have been taught by psychiatry, (which they do not question because psychiatrists present themselves as experts or authorities) that what they just said, about what they know I think, is a "symptom" in me, proving how right they are to see me as "crazy," for "thinking" that "people" like them, are doing, what they, in fact, ARE doing, which they who are assessing me for it, DO NOT SEE THEMSELVES DOING.

5. Psychiatry denies that this group phenomenon even exists, often "explaining" that it is our "perception problem" since it would not be "reasonable" for other people to behave this way.

At that point, which is a point of agreement between myself and the psychiatrist, we sit at the edge of a mutual reality, ALMOST out of the paradoxical trap, standing right at the edge of resolution together. But then, opposite conclusions drawn from opposing premises of thought are created again.

Psychiatrized patient: "Yes doctor. That's true. it's not reasonable for the group to behave that way."

Psychiatrist: "I am glad you can see that. "

Psychiatrized P: " I am glad you can too. it feels good to finally be heard by someone."

What the Psychiatrist means :
''I am glad you have enough insight to realize that a group of people would not be reasonable to be behaving the way you are describing it...therefore, they don't. therefore, you have a perception problem. ''

What the Psychiatrized patient means:
''I am glad to hear you believe the group behaved unreasonably towards me because now you understand it was the unrelenting stress of dealing with my protagonist and all the others who got involved which caused my breakdown. At last, I have been heard and understood.''

The psychiatrist then clams up feeling good that he has made his point. The psychiatrized patient feels that she has made hers too. But NO communication has actually taken place between them, despite surface appearances. It is only a brief touch in a shared reality, and understanding and will not last more than a fleeting moment in time.

The psychiatrist has been well trained in his beliefs. He hears the jargon of his profession, dancing in his head, just as surely as any cult member. He suspects nothing is wrong with what he hears. He believes he understands all of this as well as anyone could. Though I, as the psychiatrized, may have had my truth heard and understood for a brief moment, it is only an illusion. For as the object of observation, I KNOW that the behaviour of the group is not reasonable. I have always known that even if I did not understand WHY they were the way they were. It was the ongoing stress of that and my inability to get through to them or to stop them that caused my problems in the first place and that has kept the losses going and growing ever since it all began.

As the primary observer of the "object" which I have become, the psychiatrist also knows it is not reasonable for a group to behave that way, therefore he concludes, IT HAS NOT HAPPENED. For the psychiatrist is looking for reason where there was no reason in the first place and as frequently, fails to see reason where it actually exists.

Conclusion: (often arrived at after ten to fifteen minutes of listening for "noises" coming from the defective)
Since what I say happened could not have happened, I must be "delusional" and "paranoid" for "thinking" that it did. His training has taught him to believe what he believes and he also believes his understanding is superior to mine, since he has been taught that it is.
Having arrived together at the nexus of truth, the psychiatrist rejects it and continues to promote the psychiatric fiction, or "psy-fi." (as Louise Armstrong has called it)

The nexus I speak of here is defined in spirituality as the point where the spirits of good and evil meet, being neither good nor evil but having the potential to become either, depending upon how the same understanding is used. If it bothers you to think of it in ''religious'' terms, then call it something else like; a meeting between an unconscious person and a conscious one, or between vision and blindness. Whatever turns your particular ''crank.'' It is the switched roles at this point that keeps the chaos going.

The whole group, kept blind to the truth about both me and themselves, continues to "observe" me.
"It's just amazing," they say, as they have been saying for the last twelve years. " 'They' say they have never seen anything like it."
The fact is, they have never 'allowed' themselves to see "It" at all.

In their arrogant certainty they they, as a group, have a better grip on reality than I do, they can't "allow" me to see It or speak of It either . So around the circle of the paradox we still go, no doubt destined to reach the point of agreement again, like the repetition of the movie "Groundhog Day," only to pass the point of "enlightenment" and over and over again, splitting reality in two and constantly recreating an alternate "reality" which psychiatry likes better. For in THAT reality, everyone (except the individual forced into isolation) can remain "superior" and "blameless" and "off the hook."

This is why we, who are confused, often come to think all psychiatrists are psychopaths themselves and why we end up talking to the walls. The truth we tell is rarely heard, especially now in the ten minute diagnostic sessions, by those who have invented and now actively promote an alternate ''reality'' to make it all just go away, so that they don't have to face it or deal with it. Now, they are actively involving and training the public to to think, hear, and see the same way that they do.

Will there be a point in time when the denial of the obvious is no longer possible? Or will the group brainwashing become so widespread that the obvious truth will remain "hidden" in plain sight, forever? I believe in the former and I also believe it will be all of us talking about it all the time publicly that is going to make it happen. We are no longer in isolation. Just like we connected together in spirit, we are now connecting together on the web and all over the world.

Hold on my friends, wherever you may be, it is going to be a bumpy ride for awhile but we are heading for a brand new destination.