Dramatherapy - Volume 40, Issue 2, 2019

This piece of writing has focused on the first stage of creating a co-production arts wing of the Recovery College and is written with the intention of demonstrating the practical value of a dramatherapy and ‘experts by experience’ collaboration. It includes an introduction to ‘recovery’ and the contemporary NHS guidelines for a Recovery College. The first four classes of co-production in action with a dramatherapist are described with feedback from students. Followed by a sharing of the evolution of this process into three new courses leading to a workshop, performance and exhibition on World Mental Health Day. It also includes a BASIC Ph evaluation analysis of group work through the three courses run in collaboration with a dramatherapist at the Recovery College. The following questions are addressed by the evaluation – Can dramatherapy effectively support the co-production process? Can these co-production situations be creatively defined and described by their participants? The conclusions are that dramatherapy lends itself to collaborative work. Service users share languages of resilience and, through forming social networks, improve in confidence and self-esteem.

Using heuristic inquiry (HI), this article focuses on the ritual form of the Sesame approach to dramatherapy. It draws on the author’s practice of facilitating dramatherapy group sessions in a psychiatric unit, working with young people who have suffered severe mental health difficulties and pose a risk to themselves and/or others. The majority had a history of trauma and had previously expressed suicidal ideation. Through exploring the author’s own embodied reflexivity, the article examines the role of dramatherapy in young people’s psychiatric care and the importance of a relational approach.