Ten Years of Creative Group Therapy

TEN YEARS OF CREATIVE GROUP THERAPY GEORGE DAY, M.A., M.D.* "Creative group therapy" is a fine grandiloquent title for a medical paper—which is why I have chosen it. Actually, it is something which is happening all the time in the best-regulated families, like accidents. And, indeed, the birth and growth ofcreative group therapy in the Mundesley Sanatorium was due to a succession ofaccidents, albeit very happy ones. History It is understandable that the shopkeepers in the vicinity ofa reputedly wealthy private sanatorium should make quite a living out ofthe patients and that some shopkeepers should display excessive zeal in the process. Such was the unruffled state ofaffairs in Mundesley village for more than forty years. About ten years ago, however, a body of patients suddenly rebelled against these local tradesmen's prices, which were so often a little higher than expected, and decided to open a Patients' Shop on the sanatorium premises, so that the goose should lay its golden eggs in its own backyard. With no rent to pay, no wages—in fact, no overhead whatever —the Patients' Shop naturally prospered and was soon earning a substantial income. So its inaugurators had to meet in committee to decide what to do with the money. How best could the sanatorium community benefit from the profits it was furnishing? Meanwhile, another epoch-making institution had developed. To encourage full use ofthe Patients' Shop, each corridor supplied an ambulant patient as voluntary shopper, who visited and executed the orders ofhis bedridden neighbors. At first, the motivation may have been concern for the welfare ofthe shop rather than compassion for the fellow patients, but * The author was formerly medical superintendent of the Mundesley Sanatorium, Norfolk, England. 119 it was not long before a frankly declared "Help Your Neighbor" spirit prevailed. The idea spread, and other ambulantpatients undertook to actas newspaper deliverers, magazine slingers, and library-book changers for thebedridden. One ofthese voluntary workers, thus in daily contact with all his constituents, became Corridor Representative, with a seat in the Patients' Parliament which met every Wednesday morning. At first, the Patients' Parliament's happy task was solely to incur expenditure and mop up some, at least, ofthe shop's profits. Five pounds a month was voted to the Book Library, and thirty shillings a week was applied to keeping all corridors supplied with a rich variety ofperiodicals. The fund was used for buying and maintaining equipment for the miniature golfcourse, playing cards and chessmen, and other small games. The enactments ofParliament had to be broadcast to all patients' headphones; and this entailed a modest expenditure on microphones and amplifiers, the possession of which, in turn, opened the door to patient-devised radio entertainments, debates, brain trusts, quizzes, and competitions. By the time the sanatorium movie projector had become a bit too tired and capricious, the Amenities Fund was in a position to replace it with a firstclass up-to-date machine. One of the earliest and, to my mind, wisest moves made by Parliament was to levy a monthly subscription ofhalfa crown from all patients. It was a voluntary subscription. There was no compulsion: no curtailment of amenities for those who could not or would not subscribe. In fact, in obvious cases ofhardship, the Corridor Representative would conveniently forget to collect the rent. This half-a-crown subscription, although small and redundant in comparison with the shop's profits, gave every subscriber a stake in the game. He belonged. It gave him a right to complain or make suggestions which he might not have felt he was entitled to when, bedridden and incapable ofactive participation and being waited upon by fellow patients, he could give nothing in return. It was, ofcourse, asking for trouble, and it met with a gratifying response. Troubles you ask for are much less disconcerting than the ones which pop up unexpectedly. Our Wednesday Parliaments soon became a clearing house for suggestions and complaints. Suggestions were sometimes so obvious that one marveled at their never having been thought ofbefore, and one had no hesitation about acting upon them immediately. More often they were quite impossible or fantastically difficult, in which case a 120 George Day · Creative...