I worked in various mental health organizations from the mid-seventies onwards while also working with my own challenges in mental health, which I'd experienced since being in my final years in high school. Back in 1996, I was privileged to hear Patricia Deegan deliver a keynote address at the major mental health conference in Australia - The MHS Conference -held in Brisbane that year. Her keynote was pivotal in forming my own concepts of self, and consideration of alternative approaches to the systems that are often spirit-breaking. It was critical for me to hear her messages at that time, as I was emerging from a long period of unwellness and hospitalization.

So when I saw that Pat Deegan had developed this course, and it was offered online, I was keen to be involved, and I completed the course in 2021. Personal Medicine introduces an approach that is deeply centered with the person and within their own beliefs, actions, and agency, and it has been very exciting discovering and developing my own use of Personal Medicine, as well as learning the skills and coaching others, which I am looking forward to.