In this episode we talk to Dr Ray Middleton on the consequences of medicalising psychological suffering into “mental disorders”. Ray is an independent trainer, speaker and writer, and a long-standing critic of the western diagnostic model of psychiatry. He is a lead trainer in the Power Threat Meaning Framework - a radically different approach to psychological suffering, which abandons diagnoses altogether, and offers an alternative to seeing oneself as "disordered" or "mentally ill".  In this episode, Ray shares how his own experiences as a psychiatric patient in the 1990s led to his current work.  Instagram: @makingsenseofchaos Twitter: @msoc_pod TRIGGER WARNING: This episode describes heavy content.    SUPPORTS Lifeline - 13 11 14 Beyond Blue - 1300 22 4636   _____________________________ About Dr Ray Middleton:    Dr Ray Middleton is an independent trainer in strengths based non-diagnostic approaches to distress, including Trauma Informed Practice and the Power Threat Meaning Framework approach. Ray has a PhD on dialogical/narrative approaches to complex trauma and recently authored a book chapter on innovative trauma informed approaches to people who are homeless.  Previously, Ray has set up and managed personality disorder services, been a senior care co-coordinator in an early intervention in psychosis service and systemic practitioner within systemic family therapy.  For training enquiries:  - Contact Ray at [email protected] or via his website; www.ladder4life.com