Listening to the person in distress
An excerpt from Gail Hornstein on First-Person Narratives of Madness: An interview with Eric Maisel, Psychology Today, 16 April 2016
EM: If you had a loved one in emotional or mental distress, what would you suggest that he or she do or try?
GH: First, I would ask if I could sit quietly with them so we could try together to get a better sense of what was going on. If the person is able to articulate what they need or what might help to ease their distress at that moment, I would try to do this, so long as it was feasible and did no harm to anyone else.
In the longer term, I would make sure that the person understood the full range of options available to them, and I’d point them toward resources that might be especially useful to their particular needs and challenges. Even the most seriously distressed people are able – far more than my training as a psychologist would have led me to believe – to articulate the meanings of their actions and feelings and to identify specific ways of reducing their distress, so long as they are in a supportive, non-judgmental context.
… What is truly essential is listening to the person in distress and crafting responses that actually help.
