Em que solos é possível que Dê(Lírios)? Relato de Experiência de uma Oficineira em uma Unidade de Internação em Saúde Mental

Abstract

This study explored the lived experience of a therapeutic workshop facilitator in an inpatient mental health unit, examining how therapeutic workshops shape care practices and institutional dynamics. Workshops were conducted through the Dê Lírios extension project at the Mental Health Inpatient Unit of the Clinical Hospital of the Federal University of Uberlândia (HC-UFU), Brazil. Grounded in Michel Foucault's theoretical perspective, the study assumes the asylum apparatus continues to operate through medicalizing, disciplinary, and exclusionary practices despite advances achieved by the Brazilian Psychiatric Reform. Within this context, therapeutic workshops emerge as collective practices that draw on artistic and creative resources to promote forms of care that move beyond institutional norms. This qualitative, exploratory study was developed as an experience report. Data were generated through participant observation and field diaries produced during fifteen workshops held between June and September 2025 and analyzed using Thematic Analysis. Findings showed therapeutic workshops fostered spaces for encounter, desire, and expression of subjectivity, enabling participants to engage in experiences of creativity, freedom, and recognition beyond the identity of psychiatric patients. At the same time, institutional practices remained permeated by power relations that constrained these experiences, requiring workshops to operate within existing institutional boundaries. Therapeutic workshops proved most meaningful when they remained open to unpredictability and were guided by participants interests and needs. Facilitators willingness to embrace encounters without predetermined outcomes supported singular experiences of care, opened spaces within everyday hospital routines, and, although modestly, challenged the persistence of asylum logic.