I love the film Taxi Ride to Station in which Huseyin Djemil, Founder of Towards Recovery, provides an analogy of treatment and recovery, first told to him by Mark Gilman. This film was edited from my interview with Huseyin in March 2023.
Taxi Ride to Station
‘If recovery is a journey from London to Manchester, then treatment is the taxi ride to the station.’ Huseyin argues that the taxi-ride to the station has become a proxy for the journey. Taxi drivers convince you to get into their taxi so you can get to the station (treatment), but when you get there you don’t know which train to take to continue your onward journey. You live on the station for a while, but then decide to return home. However, the taxi driver finds you again and convinces you to let him take you to the station.
The cycle continues—the so-called revolving door of treatment—until the driver tells you that you may just as well stay in his taxi. While we want everyone to get help in the form of treatment, if they so wish, Huseyin points out that if one stays in treatment long enough it can erode your ability to find recovery. What we need are people on the station platform helping you with the onward journey of recovery.’