Press Reviews

• Inside Out

  Urging professionals to act as recovery allies to their patients - listening out for the things they do not say, helping them to select the narratives that most resonate with the way they are feeling, and suggesting and helping assemble a selection of helpful tools - widening the focus from simply prescribing anti-depressants, to considering and encompassing the many other options and resources available, Recovery from Depression shows how offering patients a choice and the feeling of an active role can initiate and encourage continued recovery.

• Nursing Standard

  Informative and easily understandable, Damien Ridge's books shows how recovery from depression is an ongoing process. Ridge, a reader in integrated health at the University of Westminster, explores the tools of recovery including medications such as selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors an antidepressants, before moving on to discuss non-medical recovery methods. I recommend this book for people experiencing depression and professionals working in the mental health field who wish to learn more about the role of recovery using the narrative approach.

• Healthcare Counselling and Psychotherapy Journal 2009

  This is a hopeful book that offers a view that there is no one right way for people to deal depression, and that as professionals we can assist people to find their own ways, becoming their allies in recovery rather than experts who know best.

• Writing in Education

  This book will be useful for anyone on either side of the divide between the depressed person and his/her family, friends and professional helpers.

• Dr George Lewith, MA DM FRCP MRCGP, Reader in Complementary Medicine, University of Southampton

  A very timely book. Challenging the idea that depression can simply be treated with pharmaceuticals, this book explores avenues for self-management and enablement that allows individuals to cope with - and overcome - their depression from within their own resources... This book reminds us that, as with other chronic illnesses, there is much we can do to help ourselves.

• Christopher Dowrick, Professor of Primary Medical Care, University of Liverpool and author of Beyond Depression

  At last, an authoritative book about people who have been through depression and come out the other side. Ridge takes up the story where Karp (in Speaking of Sadness) left off. Starting within the debilitating experiences of depression, he bears witness to his respondents' journeys of discovery and reappraisal. He provides us - whether patients or professionals - with crucial new insights into the processes of recovery.

• Dr Chris Manning MB BS (Hons) BSc. MRCGP DRCOG, Chief Executive, Primary Care Mental Health and Education (PRIMHE), UK

  Recovery is about progress, not perfection. Whilst "recovery" is used or felt to be "owned" by many in the mental health sector, it is a vital word that needs to be widely reclaimed by society. In this refreshing book, the author does this, showing how recovery is not "something" that happens to people, but is ongoing, being enabled and co-produced by people working together to nurture their innate abilities to rebuild and regain hope. In this book, recovery is shown to be practical, real, ongoing and achievable. We are all in recovery in one way or another, and we need to listen more to those with depression: stories from people with depression show how positive health care and social changes can be made.