The phrase "lived experience"

[ifitpleasesandsparkles]

Where has this come from? Why don't people just say "my experience". You have to be alive to have experiences. It's tautologous and sounds pretentious. Your life is your life and it's full of experiences. How can you have an unlived experience?

It isn’t necessary. It just sounds ridiculous.

Have you actually read any of the well thought out, enlightening and otherwise interesting reasons why the phrase is used?

Or are you just being goady for the fun of it?

@bitheby

At work we use experts by experience. As opposed to experts by training. I work in mental health.

My least favourite mental health phrase. You are an expert of your own experience, only. To pretend this offers any expertise beyond an individual sphere leads to one or two of these "experts" being consulted to fill a tick box, and no further efforts to gauge general service user perspective.

Sorry - bold fail

[quote Washimal]@CleanQueen123, exactly! It's all very well people on MN dismissing the phrase as "pretentious" and saying "can't you just use XYZ instead?" but these distinctions do matter, particularly in a context where the professional can become blurred with the personal.[/quote]
Your last line is incredibly important and has been stressed throughout the thread but you put it very succinctly. Hopefully @ifitpleasesandsparkles can understand why it’s vital to have this terminology in many sectors and how it shouldn’t be dismissed because some people use it incorrectly.

You are an expert of your own experience, only. To pretend this offers any expertise beyond an individual sphere leads to one or two of these "experts" being consulted to fill a tick box, and no further efforts to gauge general service user perspective.

Yep — and always the same few individuals, drawn from particular sub-groups of the mentally ill (and not always those sub-groups whose voices most need to be heard).

"Lived experience" is up there with "own voice author"

Ah, your agenda is showing.

@NotJosieGrosieAnymore

Ahahaa I thought this was just me!

YANBU this has been irritating me ever since I first heard it. Wanky, pretentious, nobby shite. It just smacks of affected moral superiority.

I mainly hear it in a mental health setting where it's useful for reminding professionals that the person in front of them is more than just a 'service user' - a passive receiver of the service provided - but is the person actively experiencing the condition and should be listened to and not just talked down to.

No moral superiority. Just a desire to be recognised as a human being and to be allowed to work together with the professionals to find the best treatment for them.

@CrayonInThreeBits

You are an expert of your own experience, only. To pretend this offers any expertise beyond an individual sphere leads to one or two of these "experts" being consulted to fill a tick box, and no further efforts to gauge general service user perspective.

Yep — and always the same few individuals, drawn from particular sub-groups of the mentally ill (and not always those sub-groups whose voices most need to be heard).

Well I think everyone accepts that is a problem, but you can't make people come forward. I've passed on experiences for people, anonymously, at their request, but it's the people who are willing to stand in a room full of professionals and speak who are heard most often and that is likely to be a particular type of person.

If anyone has a magic solution to that, there are many of us who would love to know it. All we can do is try and open doors and let people know of opportunities. Most people, I think, are either too unwell, well and hoping to stay that way or don't want to 'rock the boat' in case it has repercussions.

@Haenow

ifitpleasesandsparkles can understand why it’s vital to have this terminology in many sectors and how it shouldn’t be dismissed because some people use it incorrectly

Mm, yes. I only know of this use now, from starting this thread.

A PP cockily said my agenda is showing. I don't have an agenda. I have an opinion. I don't like identity politics and for those of you who have only heard this phrase in particular sectors, there are other PPs on this same thread telling you they hear the phrase co-opted by the identity politics brigade.

Watch out for it as it will likely dilute the phrase and, yes, it is used as a trump card and as a way to shut people out of discussions. I.e. only those with a "lived experience" of "pick your tick-box category" can have an opinion.

My work use this and it annoys me a lot. Just 'personal experience' is fine.

I'm not blaming the individuals involved, or the concept of asking for patient input, just agreeing with the PP and saying that these opinions should be treated for what they are — individuals' opinions — and that great caution should be taken around assuming they're representative, or in any way "expert" except inasmuch as they relate to the individual themselves.

I use the term in my profession. Others in my field understand my meaning. It works for us.

Personally, I find it irritating when other people judge the words someone else has used, and then are unable to acknowledge their error when the context is explained. That smacks of superiority.