ABSTRACT
This chapter describes the therapists' practice as a survivor led person-centred service. It articulates the place of love as a necessary therapeutic intervention in supporting people in crisis. Leeds Survivor Led Crisis Service was founded in 1999 by a group of mental health service users, who had cam paigned for an alternative to the medical model of psychiatric care for people in crisis. The organisation was set up to be a place of sanctuary and an alternative to hospital admission or statutory services for people in acute mental health crisis. C. R. Rogers' work is supported by Sue Gerhardt's important book, Why Love Matters: How Affection Shapes a Baby's Brain. She describes a catalogue of problems that can result from lack of love in early infancy, including depression, addiction, a compromised immune system, and an inability to regulate emotion, due to not having "been taught to manage feelings in any consistent way".
