Maggie Cox wrote -
How sad the book wasn’t finished Richard, has any of it published, perhaps as an article?
It must have been almost twenty five years ago that the work of Professor Marius Romme became known in the UK, workshops were held, and the Hearing Voices Movement began. Marius wrote books together with Sandra Escher, the first, Accepting Voices, was published by the charity Mind who were keen to promote their work. Sandra went on to do ground breaking work with children who heard voices. Their books are worth reading, also one called Hearing Voices by John Watkins. If Jerry does come back to answer more questions I would love to know if their is an equivalent organisation in the USA.
I mentioned that Jerry had said there was no evidence of a chemical imbalance in the brain to a friend but he said that there was in the dopamine system. Of course that doesn’t explain why the voices are for the most part so nasty and tormenting but I would like to hear Jerry’s comments.
Hello Maggie,
I asked Jerry about the book he was co-authoring with William Van Dusen, he's still working on it and releasing some of it soon.
I've just posted the interview on a hearing voices forum. Often talks like this get a mixed reception there. There's divergent views over whether the voices are ultimately malevolent or not, as people report that they change and become positive as they are more integrated. This would suggest a more psychological explanation – but I'm sure you're already familiar with this. I interviewed Dr. Joachim Schnackenberg a while back, he talked through how a malevolent voice can change to benevolent during dialogue.
https://www.podbean.com/site/EpisodeDownload/PB8D5BD28BPNJ
I'll think more about how to approach the chemical imbalance aspect. I didn't go deeply into it as the kind of people who listen to my podcast don't need much convincing on it. Jerry did tell me that drugs can help a person gain enough release from the voices to do some spiritual treatment work, but wouldn't cure a person. It does raise chicken and egg questions of, do people have hear voices because they have lowered dopamine, or do they have lowered dopamine because they hear voices...