Beyond psychiatric diagnoses, drugs, and drug withdrawal.
Do you no longer need or want to rely on the mental health industry for help, but feel unsure about where to turn instead?
Do you yearn to reconnect with who you are and move beyond a medicalized self-understanding?
Do you feel it's time to let go of the endless quest for professionals, diagnoses, tests, scans, products, or devices you've been hoping will explain or resolve the pain you feel?
Do you wish to disentangle yourself from the pursuit of “quick fixes” for mental, emotional, and spiritual pain, but need support to do so?
Do you want to hear how others have found ways to stay present with the darkest, scariest, most agonizing parts of being human?
Do you suspect that all the information and wisdom you need are actually within you, but you don’t want to walk the path ahead alone?
Welcome to
Inner Compass Exchange.
We are a community of people who once turned to the mental health industry for answers. Now, we are building vibrant, purposeful lives beyond psychiatric diagnoses, drugs, and drug withdrawal.
Who We Are and Why We Exist
Our community is wholly comprised of members who currently are or previously have been psychiatrically diagnosed and/or medicated, along with their supportive family members. Any medical or mental health practitioner among us is here because of personal experiences with taking or coming off psychiatric drugs.
By educating ourselves, deepening our capacity for thinking critically, supporting one another, and sharing our valuable, unique experiences, we are building new, non-medicalized frameworks of self-understanding. Together, we are shifting our focus away from the pursuit of quick fixes to mental, emotional, and physical pain, and strengthening our capacity to stay present with ourselves, no matter what comes up.
"I founded Inner Compass Initiative to help play a part in filling the massive void of reliable information, resources, and support available to those who wish to leave behind their relationship to the mental health industry. In many ways, Inner Compass Exchange is the ultimate expression of the commitment we have to this broader organizational mission, because it’s the first space we’ve built that brings people together every day for authentic, real-time conversation, connection, and community."
-Laura Delano
ICI Executive Director
Within Inner Compass Exchange, we can discard the many identity boxes we have been put in (or put ourselves in)—mentally ill or sick person, patient, consumer, client, ex-patient, survivor, victim—and move ahead together into the painful, confusing, scary, exciting, meaningful stuff of ordinary life.
Who We Are Not
We are not a community for people who are still holding onto some faith in, or otherwise find benefit from, the medicalized, professionalized ideology of the mental health industry. We built ICE specifically for people who have had unhelpful or harmful experiences with psychiatric drugs, diagnoses, and other treatments, deciding instead that they no longer want or need them.
We are not “anti-psychiatry” or “anti-psychiatric drug.” We have zero affiliation with any institution, organization, religion, or other authority.
Supporting Inner Compass Initiative (ICI)
Inner Compass Exchange is the latest initiative of ICI, a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization based in the U.S. and serving people worldwide. You can learn more about ICI here. Our mission is to help people make more informed choices about taking and more safely tapering off psychiatric drugs. ICI receives no grants or institutional support of any kind; all of our revenue comes from ICE membership fees or from donations made by individuals and families who believe in our mission. To make a tax-deductible donation to ICI, click here.
