I spent time in a psychiatric hospital on a few occasions. AMA

[whatyadoing]

If you're not too scared!

Where you in the same place each time? If not was there a different feeling to each place?

I've been in three different psychiatric hospitals (always for reasons unrelated to actual psychiatric - I wasn't a patient, nor was I seeing any patients). One didnt feel a nice place, one was frightening and the other felt calming. They were all meant for different psychiatric needs though so I'm wondering if it's that, or down to the management or maybe even the building.

A typical day is centred around mealtimes. You're not allowed your phone or a laptop. There are books and TV.

So you get up, shower if you're up to it and get breakfast. Then it's medication time (highlight of the day if you're on the good stuff)

You hang around.

Lunch is at 12.30. Meds again if you're on them a few times a day.

You hang around. Read books. Watch TV. Talk to other inmates.
I think there is visiting 2 - 4pm.

Dinner is 5pm. Again meds.

Visiting time then from 6pm to 8pm if you are lucky enough to have anyone to visit.

Then you get tea at 9pm or so followed by the night meds and then it's into bed and lights out. You're not allowed to wander around at night or go out for a cigarette. Usually they prescribe strong sleeping pills though so you're out like a light. I usually refused anything sedative so was staring at the ceiling half the night until a normal sleep pattern returned.

I always got the exact same feeling from them. The only variation would be staff changes if particularly nice staff or particularly mean staff came on.

“There is plenty of inpatient therapy etc“

But whatyadoing is telling us about her lived experience. No one can just flatly contradict that.

It’s ansolutely not ok to devalue someone’s truthful account of their own life and experience because they have mental health problems.

I’m sorry to pick up on one poster who probably didn’t mean it like that.

However it’s important.

Its such a harmful and insidious attitude, to devalue and discredit anything a person with mh illness says, just because of the mental illness. Sadly it’s rife throughout the mh sector, and I’ve seen it in mh ‘professionals’ who absolutely should know better. Not everyone of course, but it’s something that needs fighting back against. It’s not just unpleasant and unfair. It’s dangerous. It enables abuse and unacceptable standards to continue unchallenged.

Because it creates an environment where there is no accountability. If the only people who can give evidence or be witnesses are discredited before they open their mouths.

Sorry, I’ll get off me soap box now :)

And I see the poster who’s words I was reacting to didn’t mean them from the perspective I was thinking she did. So I just wanted to say that I realise that from further posts now.

But my point still stands in a wider way, it’s terrible that mh patients words can be devalued in that way, and it’s something that needs fighting against.

I spent a very short space of time in hospital and three days a week there were therapeutic activities but no therapy as such. I found it to be awful there! Fortunately I now have a psychiatrist, medication and therapy is coming up! If I felt I needed hospital I would lie and say I was ok in order to avoid going!

I found that they liked you to try and get to sleep yourself before giving any medication to help you sleep. But I used to attend a group and most had been in hospital and everyone’s experience was quite different!

WellThisIsShit you're right. You have no voice as a mh patient because anything you do say is going to be taken with a pinch of salt! It's very difficult to complain and be heard. There are means to complain but you never hear back and you're usually too bloody stressed to care and too thankful to just be out of there. In summary, a psychiatric unit bears more resemblance to a prison than even a hospital, let alone a therapeutic environment.

I was allowed my phone and I know someone who is in hospital now who had her phone and laptop!

I'm really glad you're in a much better place now, OP.

Sorry OP and Wellthisisshit for my first response. It was blunt and rude. I totally agree that hospitals are not the place that they should be, I remember watching a documentary about a woman's prison a few years ago and thinking that, aside from being locked in my room at night, it was almost exactly the same. They are shit places to be, especially when you are already feeling shit. I've had 4 different admissions and been inpatient in 6 hospitals. Some are better than others in terms of therapy available. But short term stays are definitely more about getting you back out than about actually treating the issues

My sister had a 10 day (I think) stay and she found it very boring and some of the inmates quite concerning. I visited and I felt very hollow to be honest.

I'd be terrified to go to be honest so hope I never do have to (I think I juSt have depression and anxiety but who knows).

How long were you in there?

And how did they declare you fit to leave?

whatyadoing I have a friend with bipolar- it is very tough going. She has been sectioned a few times. How are you coping now? Has your bipolar improved at all?

I've been in a psychiatric hospital. Longest stay four months.

Therapy was stopped during inpatient stays due to funding - it was more of a place of containment (to stop people killing themselves) and medication, than therapy and recovery.

Weekly ward round was when we saw the psychiatrist, adjusted meds etc.

I have also been on an Eating Disorders unit. There was a lot of inpatient therapy there. Mainly groups but weekly individual therapy.

I was allowed my phone too. In three different units.

People in there are patients not inmates! I know it can feel like it if you are in for a long time!

Sorry for very delayed response.
How do they declare you fit to leave?
You see a psychiatrist and they ask you whether you have any suicidal thoughts. I presume they monitor your mood. They also take bloods maybe once every few days, depending on what is the cause - sometimes it can be malnutrition I think myself (not! a professional opinion). Nurses will report on your mood, whether you have been eating, whether you have been sleeping, any erratic episodes etc. When you're sectioned it's much more formal and you have nursing staff, maybe 2 psychiatrists and a secretary taking minutes I presume. If you're voluntarily there, you might think you can just walk out, but sometimes that's not the case - sometimes they will admit you as a voluntary patient and when you try to leave, they'll section you at that stage - it just prolongs the process in my experience.

The longest I was in was 8 days. I would have been discharged after 6 days except due to a suicide attempt in my shared accommodation I was booted out of there, so had nowhere to go - and they couldn't discharge me onto the streets.

I don't have bipolar. I have recurrent depressive disorder and Borderline Personality Disorder (the latter only diagnosed 2 years ago). I just seemed to get on well with the 'bippos' as they called themselves! Quite a funny bunch and always up to harm, always knew the ways around things.

Thank you HollowTalk - it has taken oodles of self discipline to get myself back on track. I'm very much someone who goes for instant gratification rather than playing the long game. I've learned the hard way that I simply can't afford to do that anymore.

MummySparkle - depending on your state of mind while you're in there, it may well be a welcome haven for some. For me it felt like how I imagine prison feels. No offense taken whatsoever!

Yes, it is incredibly boring. The mornings can be ok until lunch-time, as you may have to see a psychiatrist or get bloods taken or something to break the monotony. Also, just showering and putting on makeup can be nice as in my case it was something I hadn't done in a very long time. Some of the patients organised things like painting each others nails (supervised by a nurse of course). Some patients never left their rooms and were on constant suicide watch, so staff were not available very often. There was always one present in the TV room. The days are interminably long.

Everything is taken off you when you first go in. Your bags are searched. Your phone, laptop, lighters, tobacco, tweezers, scissors, razor blades, anything sharp is taken. Anything that might contain alcohol is also taken.
You are allowed to request your mobile to make a call every now and then. You quickly learn to ask for the phone just before a shift change, as the new staff coming on won't know you have it to ask for it back.

Shednik - that sums up exactly my experience.