The process of psychiatric reform is a social movement that proposes a new relationship between society and insanity. It's a construction of a net of services, as the mental health residential service. This service attends people with chronic mental disease. Since the end of the 1990's, some experiences in mental health residential services are set up in many places of our country. However, the first residential service in the city of Barbacena, Minas Gerais, was developed only in 2000, with 06 patients. This article shows the individual process of identity reconstruction for each resident who lives in the first Barbacena´s residential service and identifies the subjective construction of the space of the residence and the building of a new social net. The methods used in this research were the participant observation and the collection of narratives and life histories of the first Barbacena´s residential service dwellers.
Psychiatric reform; Residential service; Identity reconstruction; Life stories