»Too much information for my young head«: Living after a first psychotic episode

Abstract

This article analyses some aspects of an individual’s everyday life after a first psy­chotic episode. It is based on ethnographic fieldwork at the Psychiatric Hospital in Coimbra, Portugal. First , the article analyses a variety of different explanatory models of psychosis, where one can see how the participant’s subjective experience was not a part of the narrative of psychiatric care he received. Secondly, the article approaches recovery narratives as enacted relational phenomena. It analyses subjective experiences in intersubjective contexts where they emerge. Thirdly, the research relation is consid­ered. The withdrawal of the participent from the study is interpreted as that individual’s meaningful coping strategy that was a part of his wider withdrawal from society in his life after his first psychotic episode.