“Rising like phoenix from the ashes”: an arts-based qualitative study of mental health resilience and recovery in Romania

Milasan, LH ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1351-6463 and Finta, O, 2025. “Rising like phoenix from the ashes”: an arts-based qualitative study of mental health resilience and recovery in Romania. Qualitative Health Research. ISSN 1049-7323

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Abstract

The philosophy underpinning mental health care has undergone a shift from a biomedical, deficit model to a recovery-oriented, strengths-based approach prioritizing individual abilities, experiences, and skills. Within this context, it is paramount to understand how resilience is experienced by people living with mental distress, and the role it plays in the recovery process. This arts-based qualitative study aims to explore the meanings and experiences of resilience as part of the recovery journey of nine mental health service users from a community day center in Romania. In Romania, the mental health system and research into mental distress and recovery have been traditionally guided by a biomedical approach. This is the first study conducted from the perspective of people living with mental distress in Romania, revealing the experiential and conceptual complexities of resilience in their recovery. Thematic analysis of data generated through ten creative workshops, a focus group, and art-elicited semi-structured interviews revealed four key themes of resilience intertwined with participants’ experiences of recovery: re(dis)covering the authentic self, symbiosis with the day center, navigating conflicts (with self, society, and the psychiatric system), and leaving the past behind. The insights from participants’ verbal contributions triangulated with their artwork provided a deeper understanding of resilience within the cultural context of Romania. The findings add to an increasing body of evidence that informs the reformation of mental health practices in line with the perspectives on resilience held by people experiencing mental distress.

Item Type:	Journal article
Publication Title:	Qualitative Health Research
Creators:	Milasan, L.H. and Finta, O.
Publisher:	SAGE Publications
Date:	19 July 2025
ISSN:	1049-7323
Identifiers:	Number Type 10.1177/10497323251355120 DOI 2474043 Other
Rights:	© The Author(s) 2025 This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/) which permits non-commercial use, reproduction and distribution of the work without further permission provided the original work is attributed as specified on the SAGE and Open Access page (https://us.sagepub.com/en-us/nam/open-access-at-sage).
Divisions:	Schools > School of Social Sciences
Record created by:	Jeremy Silvester
Date Added:	25 Jul 2025 15:43
Last Modified:	25 Jul 2025 15:43
URI:	https://irep.ntu.ac.uk/id/eprint/54031

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