ABSTRACT
This chapter considers space and the built environment in relation to mental health and therapeutic practice, with a particular focus on the environment of the home. Service users' experience of such spaces can have a highly emotional dimension, which is suggestive that design aspects of environments are a potential means to influence therapeutic efficacy. Self-harm is an act that removes the 'numbness' described by the service users and allows them to be present again in the environment, to reconnect with their body and wider spaces. Therapeutic implications are analysed, and future research avenues suggested, including the development of self-help materials related to the home, for use in therapy. Dissociation may be relieved through sensorial engagement with meaningful environments, such as the home. The home may also be used as a communicative tool by the service user via engagement and personalisation, which may have therapeutic relevance.
