Professor Marius Romme, MD, PhD is President of Intervoice
In 1987, I had no idea the impact that the discovery that accepting and making sense of voices was a helpful alternative was going to have. Yet, after twenty three years of work we have built a unique and formidable movement of voice hearers and allies that has brought about a big change in the way hearing voices are regarded and has found new ways of helping people overwhelmed by their voices.
There are many fears and misunderstandings in society and within psychiatry about hearing voices. They are generally regarded as a symptom of an illness, something that is negative, to be got rid of and consequently the content and meaning of the voice experience is rarely discussed.
The research of Dr. Sandra Escher and myself with over 300 voice hearers has shown that over 70% of people who hear voices can point to a traumatic life event that triggered their voices; that talking about voices and what they mean is a very effective way to reduce anxiety and isolation; and that even when the voices are overwhelming and seemingly destructive they often have an important message for the hearer.
Typically, in Western medical thinking hearing voices has always been associated with mental illness and frequently seen as a symptom of schizophrenia. Yet, we discovered many people who hear voices do not have a mental illness and never seek help. For this reason we are prepared to accept a range of explanations offered by people who hear voices, including spiritual ones, and believe it is essential to the process of recovery from overwhelming voices to understand the meaning of the voices to the voice hearer.
Whilst we are finding more holistic solutions to voices that cause mental distress then those offered by psychiatry. It is very important to stress that in our view voices are an aspect of human differentness, rather than a mental health problem. As with homosexuality, which was also regarded by psychiatry in recent times as an illness, the main issue we have to confront is the denial of the human rights to people who hear voices and our main task is to change the way society perceives the experience. Only if can we do this, do we believe psychiatry will change its mind about voices. That is why this website is so important.
With the support of the worldwide hearing voices network, voice hearers, some of whom have spent long periods of time in psychiatric care, have reclaimed their lives and are now able to say they hear voices and accept them as part of themselves. We believe this is a good time to make our work better known across the world.
Dear Dr. Romme,
I am writing now for the voice I hear, which is that of GOD. And I, GOD, have this to say Doctor. Do you know who this is that is taking down this dictation for ME? This is the same Jenny who took dictation of MY words when I was calling MYSELF Archangel Gabriel. I did that for a reason, and that reason is and was because I wanted to effect a cause. What does that mean? It means that MY cause is one which is pro-life and I am going to be using this voice hearing phenomenon to effect that cause now and for all time.
I want that you would all realize that the voices are only ever ME, GOD, and not ME as Archangel Gabriel, who is only MY own altar ego. Why did I use the presence of archangels and angels in the Holy Bible and Koran and the other Holy Books? In order that you wouldn’t feel I was tooting MY own horn. It is easier for a publicist to promote a public figure unless the public figure is in politics, and I am most certainly in that realm as well, though not in the case of MY work with Jenny. What you all have to do is to realize that I have a wish, and that wish is that euthanasia, abortion, murder, capital punishment and any form of murder would not ever be carried out again. What further I wish to say is that I have now asked Jenny to be a vegan and that is what I am wanting of all of you who can possibly man age to find enough of a variety of vegan foods to satisfy your appetite. If you can’t then I am wanting you to try to buy food online as there are many online vegan food stores and also stores where vegan shoes and bags and other clothing items are sold. All tolled this is what I want. And I am asking a voice hearer to be one to display this want as it is that her voice hearing is meant to be MY own call to the world to be better. Better in the ways just mentioned.
Now what I have to say about voice hearing is just what I said when I was calling MYSELF Archangel Gabriel: All voice hearing is only ever ME, GOD, doing the talking, and even when there are multiple or either awful voices upsetting you. Why I sometimes cause upsetment is the question. The answer once again is to effect a cause. The very best way you can all be assured of the answer is to ask yourself if the voice you hear has ever asked you to do something untoward as I in fact asked Jenny to do several times while she was a younger person, though only by a short span. I sometimes ask you to do awful things in the hope that you will not do those things. Why ask that you do them then? In order to test you. YOu see, just as in the Bible there are tests that people must go through. And the test I am referring to in the Bible is the writing of the Bible itself. You see, the Holy Bible was written by voice hearers. And when those voice hearers placed a very big portion of the Bible in a very safe place, the place was raided as it was said that the words in the case of this particular writings were both pro-gay rights and also pro-life. And this is to say that I never said that life began after forty days of conception but rather at conception itself. And this is to say too that I never said that a man couldn’t love another man or a woman another woman. I only said that a man who loved another man was as much in the right as one who loved a woman. And the like in regard to the women. I wonder where those writings went. And also who changed the Bible in certain parts to be adding the mention of Holy Wars and also any mention of an eye for an eye, as that is not in any way the way I want that punishments would be doled out. And where did it all go? It went the way those who took the writings that I dictated went. They went straight to the editing room and simply cut out what they didn’t like and placed in what they did. And it was that they placed their own writings in both scrolls and later in books. And what does this have to do with voice hearing? Well, the voice hearers are being called schizophrenic and in Jenny’s case schizoaffective, and the people calling you all those names are the ones being paid mightily in some cases to do so. In others not so mightily but still enough to be relying on their salaries to have the patients instead of sending them to the spiritual counselors that they really need. And the counselors who cost much less than the psychiatrists. So now, what’s a good LORD to do?
I want to say that this transmission may be cut down in order to only say what is beneficial for the voice hearers. The letter is meant for Dr. Romme. And Dr. Romme, you are wanted if you have time to see if you can strike up a conversation with Jenny only then taking dictation from ME as I want very much to address you. So now be a good Doctor and please respond….GOD in the hand of Jenny, a voice hearer
i suffer from a persistant voice that is not creative inventive or godlike it is repetitious and merely says’ go to bed’ continually i cannot de trigger it and have sat in many therapy sessions trying too do so . i cannot see any real positive with it and it rarely enters into any kind of dialogue it runs continually and gets louder as the day progresses i have tried all kinds of treatments and therapy. I do get intuitive voices they are beneficial to me however the predominant voice,this voice that says go to bed continually as a type of control and punishment is like a stuck record and i don’t feel it offers any deeper message for myself or humanity i do feel it comes from being punished abused and traumatised as a child.I cannot connect it to any childhood events in any real way and i have done extensive therapy on my childhood issues