In Ronchin, a speaking group supports people who hear voices

Drive out the window, you are only a less-than-hen. Didier* wakes up suddenly. In his sleep, voices have given him the order to take action. A simple nightmare? Not quite. These voices, he also hears them awake, almost daily. For ordinary people, Didier’s story is scary.

And yet, in the premises of the mutual support group (GEM), an associative structure of Ronchin (North), in the Lille suburbs, no one around the table. Didier’s story echoes that of some of the participants, gathered in a speaking group in which all share the same disorder.

If a large majority of participants are followed for psychiatric problems (schizophrenia, bipolarity, etc.), often appeared following a trauma, refuse them that a “crazy” label. They prefer to be recognized as “spenders of voices” and have come closer to the French network on the agreement of voice (Rev), attached to an international movement present in more than twenty countries.

A soothing alternative

In Ronchin, the speech group created in 2018 meets twice a month. A deliverance for Rachel: for about twenty years, composing with his inner torture was a constant fight. A life punctuated by highs and especially very low. “It started in 1997, I worked in England. I was taken from delusional puffs, with non-stop voices in my head. Suicidal voices. I have known interviews and relapses. I gradually was isolated from society. Tears in eyes, Rachel says that she needed to spend her life again. Give an example that at the end of a chaotic course, we could get out of it. Because today, she “farts fire”.

In particular thanks to the speech group, through which she found psychological and human support. A soothing alternative, in contrast to the approach of certain caregivers. “For the majority of psychiatrists, hearing voices is irrational, to treat absolutely. So they stuff us with drugs that shoot us. But they always come back, ”continues the young woman. Didier admits that he sometimes has “lying to himself. When my psychiatrist tells me that I look good, I answer her that everything is fine. Just to avoid psychiatry. »»

Learn to master your disorder

President of Rev France, Vincent Demassiet learned to master his disorder. The fifties today leads a happy existence and militates by giving training to hospital staff. “In psychiatry, we work more on illness than on the person and their trauma. However, this is on that we should put the package, ”he believes.

An analysis shared by Patrick Landman, psychiatrist, psychoanalyst, and founder of Stop DSM, a collective against the classification of mental and militant diseases for a medical approach on a case -by -case basis. “You have to help the person to emancipate themselves from mental illness, to accommodate their voices or hallucinations, and to live almost normally with. This is the key to recovery. »»

Complement to medicine

A logic in which these groups are precisely written. “These moments of sharing make us understand each other that we are not crazy, that we are simply governed by our subconscious,” says Rachel. However, these speech spaces cannot replace rigorous medical treatment. They provide well-being, like a psychological balm, but remain complementary to psychiatric and drug follow-up. A bit like the natural medicines that help relieve but never replace background care. Almost all participants always follow treatment.

Mickaël* has been isolated lately. For fear of darkness, he dares not leave his home after dark. He got into the habit of cloistering in his room, the place where he channels his voices most easily. To these have also added visions: men appear to him, symbolizing passages of his childhood, when, small, he was brutalized. The trauma reappears. To make these gravediggers flee, Mickaël found the parade. He launched a song by Johnny Hallyday, “who illustrates his life”: Requiem for a madman.

*These people wanted to keep anonymous.