Mental Health Blog

What do you find important to share about your professional and personal experiences with and within the field of mental health care?
 

Although I had been working at the San Diego County Psychiatric Hospital for six plus years as a Mental Health Aide, it probably wasn't until Fall 2023 in September, inspired by the Philippine Cultural Arts Festival at Balboa Park that I "begun" my re-membering journey or intentionally incorporating and integrating my experience as a Filipino American with mental health care.

I would intentionally go out of my way, both in and outside of the graduate program, to actively incorporate my experience. It was in Winter 2023 in December when I begun to do my own personal research reading articles on Filipino American experiences and Sikolohiyang Pilipino.

 

I have my own personal lived experiences navigating the mental health care system with regards to my own personal psychotherapy, psychiatry, medication and utilization of the 12 Step Program. I find navigating your own mental health is an integral role in the “self of therapist” and for life in general. Given my experience with depression, anxiety, and addiction, I know I have the skill to hold some pretty heavy, gnarly stories but I do know it’s a skill you can develop over time. I've also considered how examining my countertransference and “triggers” allows me to address my own stuff. Similar to looking in the mirror before looking out the window. 

I find my “liabilities” are now “privileges” in that I have personal lived experiences with theory and lecture. In some ways, I’ve walked the life clients have walked and my clients can pick up on that. With coming out on the other side or end, I feel perfectly comfortable touching topics such as abuse, pain, hurt, traumatized and traumatizing, addiction, and then relating to religion and spirituality from my own healing.

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​With your study of Sikolohiyang Pilipino and Narrative Therapy, can you share your experience learning about both and provide brief definitions?

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I was first introduced to Sikolohiyang Pilipino by Dr. Patricia Perez's workshop recording through Kasamahan and reading the supplemental article "Sikolohiyang Pilipino: A Legacy of Virgilio Enriquez" by Rogelia Pe-Pua and Elizabeth Protacio-Marcelino. The best way I can describe my experience when I learned about Sikoholiyang Pilipino was a sense of wonder like my ancestors speaking to me and as though it opened or unlocked something that was just waiting to be tapped into. At the same time, it felt like languaging for something I've already experienced. There was a moment of "this is it. This is right where you’re supposed to be”.

As far as a brief definition, to quote Enriquez work, Sikolohiyang Pilipino is, "a process of 'indigenization from within' as it sought to develop a theoretical framework and methodology based on the Indigenous culture and language of the Pilipinx, and by examining sociohistorical and cultural contexts, to conceptualize Pilipinx characteristics".

I was exposed to Narrative Therapy in my program and didn't realize its strong presence in the SDSU's Marriage and Family Therapy program. Michael White is the founder and to provide a definition, I would quote Victoria Dickerson's article on "The Advance of Poststructuralism and Its Influence on Family Therapy",  "A narrative approach understands problems as produced by cultural meaning systems and as having real effects on how persons make meaning of their lives". From my understanding, values and preferred identity states are also produced by cultural meaning systems, and in turn, community, resilience, and protective factors. 

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So far with your studies, how do you see Sikolohiyang Pilipino and Narrative Therapy coming together?

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The way I see it, Narrative Therapy is a therapeutic lens and Sikolohiyang Pilipino is a cultural lens. The intentional use of Narrative Therapy brings curiosity of culture such as the Filipinx experience to the surface, and whether the person or client, in this case Filipino, wants to think about their life in such a way is a choice of agency, but is one I can consciously listen for. Although I listen and support agency with clients which happens to sound and look like therapy, it's more like storytelling. 

 

One work I always find myself drawing from and may connect with Sikolohiyang Pilipino and Narrative Therapy is Edwin Decenteceo's work on the Pagdadala Model or "burden bearing". "The Pagdadala model provides a framework, i.e., a language, for discussing the lives of Filipinos." I recommend reading the article to learn more about this model which can be used for Filipinos.

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Moving onto your graduate research, what inspired you to narrow in on the "Lived Experiences of Filipino Mental Health Professionals Working with Filipino Clients"?

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Even before I began my research, I came into the program in conversation with Filipino mental health professionals with two initial questions, one, "What is culture or how do they themselves define it?" and two, "What has been their experience as a Filipino mental health professional and how do they navigate the mental health system?" My initial research question was, "What are Filipino mental health professionals' experiences with Sikolohiyang Pilipino"? However given the context that this is a research paper for a research class, I chose to broaden the topic to capture Filipino mental health professionals experiences working with Filipino clients. It almost comes full circle in that it gives nod to one of my initial questions of curiosity.This is a long winded answer to be in some thought of curiosity and wonder in how I picture my own future practice and my own therapeutic style to look like. The intentional integration of privileging more Eastern Asian indigenous ancestral knowledges in the Filipino context with the what can be already privileged westernized, Americanized, medical model that is peer reviewed, evidence based.

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What did you expect in interviewing Filipino/a/x MHPs and with this research ongoing in mind, how do your experiences compare so far?

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I expected conversations about culture, spirituality or religion, colonialism/colonial mentality, migration, mental health seeking behavior, Filipino traditional and indigenous healing practices, resilience, language with Tagalog and different dialects, intergenerational issues and Sikolohiyang Pilipino. 

 

I have found and discovered some Filipino mental health professionals have already been in some thought or theory in what this conversation may look like, how this might be implemented, and a sort of "wish" in what this may look like and modeled for them(selves). I have found that the languaging of our own personal lived experiences has already begun.

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May Filipino/a/x therapists still contact you to be interviewed as part of your research?

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Of course! They are more than welcome to, so feel free to reach out. It wouldn't necessarily be in the context of research for a research paper for a class, but I am more than happy to be in conversations of curiosity and wonder while continuing to expand upon my research work beyond my college education. I am also by no means an expert nor do I want to be a "silo" of information. If it were up to me, there would be the dissemination of what I know to be used for future research similar to an intellectual "land acknowledgement". I return to my community what I benefitted off of it. To encapsulate the essence of "kapwa" or oneness, May this conversation spark something in you that sparked something in me and may you use the knowledge of yourself, your body, your ancestors, the land you stand on and your community and cocreate with us. 

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Last, but not least, do you have any thoughts or suggestions for other Filipino/a/x MHP students to support them in their journeys in the mental health field?

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Take initiative, put yourself out there, be in wonder, amazement, and curiosity, and join organizations. I'm thinking about my own experience of being the graduate student advisor for SDSU's Andres Bonifacio Samahan, and my participation in Kasamahan, Division of Filipinx Americans, and Therapinxy (San Diego chapter). I recommend reading, attending workshops, being in conversation or learning from Filipino mental health professionals that have come before you and helped pave the way such as E. J. R David, Kevin Nadal, and Leny Strobel.

One article that speaks to my experience and perhaps the experience of other students is Kevin Nadal's article, "Overcoming the Model Minority Myth: Experiences of Filipino American Graduate Students". Much is still being written, cocreated and collaborated in academia with the representation of Filipinos.

 

There is also intentionally learning about your ancestry and lineage maybe through creating a genogram and having a conversation with your parents and grandparents. Maybe to preface these thoughts and suggestions, go at your own pace, do what feels right for you, listen to your body, be one with your people, and the land and nature that you stand on. This is a lifelong journey of becoming, and it's important to engage or not engage with it how you see fit. Remember to take care of yourself throughout the whole entire process.

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"Be the ancestor that your ancestor couldn't be."
"Mabuhay ang kulturang Pilipino."