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The purpose of this paper is to provide a profile of Shelley Seaton.

Shelley gives a short background to her life story and is then interviewed by Jerome.

Shelley tells us about a number of life events that impacted on her mental health issues, starting with childhood bullying and also abusive relationships.

The case study approach privileges the person’s lived experience. It also lets us see the unique complexity of each person’s story.

Shelley received little help in the form of counselling either at school or when she experienced post-natal depression.

When mental health problems start in childhood, schools have a vital role to play. While the bullying stopped when Shelley’s Mum went to the school, the damage was already done. She was given no support to help her through this.

Patricia Deegan has asked, “Could you have survived what this person has survived?” (Deegan, 1996, p. 95). Shelley’s story is a tale of survival.

The purpose of this opinion piece is to present a case for the potential of positive autoethnography (PosAE) as a new autoethnographic approach.

This work resulted from on-going discussions between the authors as to the practicalities and benefits of associating the qualitative approach of autoethnography with the field of positive psychology.

PosAE is proposed to encourage writers to actively reflect on the importance for themselves, and their readers, of including positive narrative elements, prospective visions and exploratory trajectories in their work.

This research builds on existing research that has included positive psychology in autoethnography. As positive psychology is grounded in empirical research, the authors are suggesting that PosAE is allied to pragmatic autoethnography.

PosAE offers to facilitate positive thought, affect and strategies that could improve well-being. For example, some people struggling with serious health issues, and those helping them, may find it useful for articulating conditions and envisioning, even experiencing, positive change.

With so many lives impacted by mental health issues globally, and with rapidly changing societies struggling to provide stability and purpose, an autoethnography that provides tools such as PERMA (Positive emotions, Engagement, Positive Relationships, Meaning, Accomplishments/Achievements) to communicate the positive seems timely.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first time the creation of an autoethnographic approach explicitly linked to positive psychology has been proposed.

The purpose of this paper is to provide a profile of Jana Rozenhalova.

Jana provides a short summary of her life and is then interviewed by Jerome.

Jana tells us about her long struggles with eating disorders and provides us with the metaphor that it is like being a broken cup glued back together again. You have to be very careful it does not break again.

Jana’s story is one, yet it offers us unique insights. She comments at one point, “[…] if it was not for the eating disorders […] I would not be me”.

Jana notes that while she could see many reasons behind her eating disorders, they did not really matter. What mattered was that she could overcome them.

While Jana first thought hope was an empty word, she now realises in retrospect that she was more hopeful than anyone she knew. As Patricia Deegan (1996) puts it, “Hope is not just a nice sounding euphemism. Hope and biological life are inextricably intertwined” (p. 93).

Jana concludes her account saying she would like to be able to look back at her life and feel that she had lived up to her potential. Most of us would also be happy with that outcome.

The purpose of this paper is to provide a profile of Lígia Cardoso Baldé.

Lígia gives a biographical description of her life and is then interviewed by Jerome.

Lígia talks about the stress of being a young single parent with a disabled son. She talks about how she built up her resilience over several years.

The story Lígia tells is one of battling against all the odds. Her account shows how she had to manage without much external support, even from family.

Research has long demonstrated an association between life events and stress. Lígia tells us about the various stressors that confronted her at different stages of her life journey.

All of us can make a difference in peoples’ lives if we make the effort. Lígia talks about two doctors who knew the medical implications of her son’s condition, but who also recognised her emotional needs and addressed those as well.

Lígia’s story is inspiring at so many levels. She has successfully adjusted to a different culture, to a different language and has had to establish a new social support network. Now she is not just surviving, but slowly thriving.

The purpose of this paper is to provide a profile of Jo Mullen.

Jo provides a short background to her life and is then interviewed by Jerome.

Jo tells us about the teaching resources that she has developed to increase understanding of Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD).

While this is a single case study, it contains numerous helpful insights of how Jo has developed and presented her work, along with two mental health nurses, and of the high quality educational interventions she has produced.

Jo presents a model of co-production, where service partner and mental health professional are equals.

It would be helpful if mental health services invested in supporting talented individuals like Jo, to develop and disseminate the tools she has created.

Thus far Jo has written her own personal account of what it is like to cope with BPD, a bigger training resource, “Wot R U Like?” and a board game, Personapoly, to help individuals solve social and personal problems.

The purpose of this paper is to compare the stories of Syd Barrett musician, with Andrew Voyce, and their respective recovery journeys.

The authors use collaborative autoethnography to share their own perspectives on Syd Barrett and to contrast his story with that of Andrew, a co-author.

Both Syd and Andrew experienced serious mental distress. While Syd had only limited contact with mental health services, Andrew’s contact was extensive, with a 20-year history of admissions and discharges. In the end, when the psychiatric services listened to Andrew’s concerns and acted on them, he was able to enter into the journey of recovery.

The authors are restricted in the amount of available information on Syd Barrett, especially that related to mental health problems. The story of Andrew shows how recovery is possible even after years of serious mental illness.

Andrew’s story shows why professionals should never give up on people, with even the most seemingly severe and intractable problems. Could services have done more for Syd?

Mental illness still attracts huge stigma. Today there is a much more open culture. Would Syd have come out about his own struggles with mental health had society been more open?

Bringing together two stories of mental distress enables the authors to explore the concept of recovery.

The purpose of this study is to examine the Values in Action (VIA) character strengths profile of people in addiction recovery, to identify which strengths are meaningfully represented in this population. This was compared with the generalised profile of a normative population to identify the differentiating features. Reasons for the profile variance and the significance this has for addiction recovery have also been explored.

An independent group design was adopted using purposive sampling. This saw participants (n = 100) complete the VIA Inventory of Strengths-P assessment to establish a character strengths profile for people in addiction recovery. To identify the differences in this profile, a mean score and rank order comparison was conducted, using data taken from a normative population. Additional exploratory analysis was conducted to establish if there were any significant differences in the character strength profile of males and females.

In descending order, the top five ranked strengths were kindness, humour, honesty, fairness and teamwork. The lesser five strengths in the profile were spirituality, zest, perseverance, prudence and self-regulation. A distinguishing feature was the presence of humour as a top five strength for people in addiction recovery. The existence of teamwork also deviated from the generalised normative population. There were two strengths shown to have a meaningfully higher score for females, teamwork and love. This did not change the strengths present in the overall top five for males or females, however.

This study contributes useful knowledge to the understanding of character strengths in addiction recovery. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first time character strengths have been examined in a sample of people in addiction recovery.

The purpose of this study is to evaluate a new programme of work designed to improve the recovery and well-being of people in early addiction recovery. The programme, known as positive addiction recovery therapy (PART), is attentive to the recovery process through the G-CHIME (growth, connectedness, hope, identity, meaning in life and empowerment) model of addiction recovery. It also uses the values in action character strengths and includes a set of relapse prevention techniques.

An experimental design using repeated measures has been adopted. Measures for recovery capital, well-being and level of flourishing were selected and pre- and post-data collected. Primary data analysis was conducted using the non-parametric Wilcoxon signed-rank test. Participants (n = 30) were required to be in early addiction recovery, classified as having been abstinent for between three and six months.

The results showed a statistically significant improvement in participant well-being. This was also true for recovery capital and flourishing. Whilst a meaningful increase was seen in all measures, exploratory analysis found females responded better to the PART programme.

This study emphasises the importance of adopting a holistic therapeutic approach, one that considers multifaceted components of recovery such as those outlined in the G-CHIME model.

This study evaluates a new programme of work designed to improve the recovery outcome and mental well-being of people who are in early addiction recovery.

The purpose of this paper is to provide a profile of Charlotte Wall.

In this case study, Charlotte provides a short account of her background and is then interviewed by Jerome.

Charlotte took comfort in being given a diagnosis of bipolar; it helped explain a lot of her problems.

It is easier to identify with a single case study and person’s story than anonymised group research data. Each have their place in helping us understand mental health problems.

Transitions are not always bad. Charlotte talks about how her life changed for the better when she went to sixth form college. The onward transition to university has also been a positive experience for her. This needs to be remembered.

As everyone is currently living through the Covid-19 pandemic, Charlotte’s perspective on the importance of social support for mental well-being is critical. Thankfully, she has loving parents and a partner. There are others less fortunate.

Charlotte shows us how she embraced her diagnosis of bipolar and her “weirdness”.

The purpose of this paper is to provide a profile of Rob Wright.

Using a case study approach, Rob gives a short account of his background and is then interviewed by Jerome.

Rob’s is an amazing account of surviving a harrowing upbringing, which fortunately few of us reading this piece will have had to endure.

Rob’s story perfectly illustrates why first-person accounts are so powerful. It is hard to imagine a statistical paper having the same impact as this description of one person’s lived experience.

Suicide is the greatest danger for anyone with a long-term mental health problem. Rob has faced this decision many times and has courageously battled on.

Rachel’s simple, yet profound mantra, of “someone to love, something to do, somewhere to live,” is vital for all of our well-being. As Rob also points out, you still need money to put into the electric meter!

Some people have tough upbringings and some have cruel upbringings. Rob had both. His survival is a testament to the uncrushable nature of the human spirit.