AIBU to think MN should really review the way it treats vulnerable posters on here

[imsotiredofitall]

I have had enough. mumsnet has many good qualities but i have grown tired of seeing how people on here hwo have legitimate issues and real struggles are being written off as trolls and not given a chance to prove themselves

twice tonight have my posts regarding struggling with my fears i may have been sexually assaulted as a child and the effect it is having on my health- (i already am in treatment for complex ptsd, social anxiety and personality disorders caused by years of DV, and childhood verbal emotional and pyhsical abuse) been deleted and i have been accused of being a troll. no reason given.

and then a post in mental health subforum on here has been deleted.

i understand why MN has to take action against people who post racist things or who make up sob stories for money but if someone is just reaching out to MN as a sounding board and needing advice, they are harming nobody.

we are all adults on here, we are all capable of walking away and setting boundaries or choosing what posts we read and repsond to on here. we are not delicate fragile flowers who are incapable of deciding for ourselves who is a genuine poster or not.

if people are upset by a thread they can move on. no real harm done, maybe a few seconds of wasted time reading.

quite often the people who are posting and reaching out are vulnerable and hurting. we are more likely to sufffer from the effects of being disbelieved, as this can risk us being retraumatised. i do agree we al responsible fo roursleves and if posters are at risk of harming themsleves they cannot hold MN responsible.

i just ask for a little compassion, that's all. for these trollhunters to consider that maybe some of us who seem a little "off" are coming across this way because we are not neurotypical- we have mental health issues and that can sometimes cause our posting style to come across as weird.

the mental health sub in particular should be one place where people can post about "difficult" subjects. not all of us have life figured out and some of us have questions

when i asked that i thought i had been sexually assaulted by another child when at school, i was asking honestly for opinions, because i am someone who has a tendancy to doubt myself and be unsure of whether my experiences and feelings are valid or not? i was reading a thread in AIBU about someone having experiences of this and my brain was full of memories and questions, my therapist is away at the moment.

i simply needed a listening ear. i really am glad for the good times i have had in mumsnet of being a lurker of several months and the posts which i have enjoyed reading. i am not trying to slate the site. but i do find all this erasing posts and "whitewshing" everything very irritating.

I mean this respectfully and gently, but MM isn’t here to take the place of your holidaying therapist.

Posters here can’t deal with the issues you’ve raised on the boards tonight, and shouldn’t have to. The topics will either be outside posters’ experience (in which case they can’t offer much, if any, support) or highly triggering.

You’ll only be deleted if your posts have been reported multiple times by distressed posters.

Treat MN as what it is - an anonymous forum of random people who will help where they can but oftertimes can’t - and find professional, properly informed help elsewhere until your therapist returns from vacation.

I wish you well.

If you have had enough, then there’s your answer.

However, if you draw support from the boards you will understand that they do need to be moderated, especially on sensitive subjects and trigger issues.

MN can’t act as a replacement because your therapist is away. It isn’t a substitute.

Hello. I'm sorry you're feeling so bad tonight. I think the reason that your thread about abuse got removed was because it was an AMA.
'Ask me anything' is not a suitable area for discussing such a difficult issue, and having your post there would have made you very vulnerable and open to all sorts.
Hope this makes sense, and hope that you feel better soon.

OP you only joined MN tonight apparently (you posted in Newbies)

Please get real life help

Like pp said, MN is a general purpose, open forum for all sorts of discussions, you're expecting too much of the people who use MN to have specialist diagnostic and counselling experience to sort out what appear to be significant challenges.

If you want a hand hold because you're feeling low, then you don't need to go into every detail of your past circumstances in order to get support on here while your therapist is away. You just need to be a bit more selective as you're on the internet and recognise that people reading your details may find it difficult to know how to help and may find it upsetting if it brings bad negative past memories for them.

I think the reason that your thread about abuse got removed was because it was an AMA

Using AMA trivialises your situation - it's voyeuristic and is all about 'spilling the beans', which isn't appropriate if you're feeling vulnerable. Do you really want random internet users asking you all sorts of nosey and inappropriate questions about your past. That's no substitute from professional help, believe me. It's car crash stuff.

Perhaps until your therapist is back you could try to write down what happened and how it makes you feel, repercussions it's had on your life, and phone some specialist advice lines (you can google).

A poster gave me the advice once not to post if you feel particularly vulnerable/emotional. Sounds like you are doubting your own mind and can't detangle what happened in the past which is damaging so it's best to speak to s specialist.

Well said, Daisy. That's exactly what I was trying to say about AMA, you expressed it much better than me.

Thanks to all of you who replied. I think i understand a bit better now. i had not realised AMA was like that- i had seen others post on mental health related subjects like bulimia and self harm etc so i assumed those reading those threads were people who wanted to offer support and advice. i am someone who if i saw a post like that would understnad someone is vulnerable and not accuse them of being a troll.

i understand some posters are distressed, and that is fair enough. if people want my posts removed due to being genuinley trigered then that is fine but it is the accusations of trolling which are unneccessary- the mods can just delete the threads or explain that it is not safe topic for posting. the poster who called me a troll was not distressed, believe me.

people who are triggered or distressed, i have no issue if they tell me they don't feel able to respond to my posts and would rather move on or if they just walk away, it is the calling people "trolls" and saying "don't feed it". i think calling another human being an "it" is appalling.

i think what hurts is the assumption that people lie about being abuse or having mental health issues, i am pretty sure only a tiny minority of people lie about this, and most likely they want revenge on someone they accusing, or money, like Cliff Richard's accusers and that Westminster accuser. not people like me who have nothing to gain from it.

but thanks for your posts. i do understand maybe i need to be a bit more selective of who i share with.

really do wish i could have someone who i could receive a handhold from on here though. just to remind me that am not completely hopeless. just a would do fine.

thanks for listening though. it helps keep my mind away from darker activities (and no, this isn't emotional blackmail, just telling it how it is at times)

thanks for talking me down and talking some sense into me. much appreciated

Have some

LanguidLobster that is brilliant advice about the writing it down and the phone lines.

thanks Languid have some

The mods are very cautious about removing threads about sensitive subjects, I reported one the other day, not yours, where it's clearly nonsense, and they said they prefered to keep it up and give the poster the benefit of the doubt due to sensitivity.

I didn't see your posts, but I'd have to agree with the others, if you posted ask me anything about sexual abuse, then they would have needed to take that down, for reasons i think have been well explained.

Op, cross posted, the problem is people do lie on here, it's quite shocking some of the things people make up. You know who you are and why you're posting, others don't. They only see what's posted, not who posted it. So it's not a personal attack. You're anonymous, no one knows who you are.

I think some of these comments are harsh. I don't buy the triggering argument, people post on here for help about all kinds of upsetting stuff, both MH related and on other subjects such as miscarriage, termination, domestic violence... and agree with OP that it's the poster's responsibility to exercise self-care and not open, or exit, threads that distress them.
To be fair, I haven't seen the original threads, imsotired may have been inappropriate somehow. I've seen threads describing sexual abuse/ offences before. I also thought troll hunting isn't allowed.
I do think mental health issues are stigmatised and moderators are very quick to delete threads on that topic.
It can be very difficult to post in a way that is coherent, easy for others to digest, see the kind of response needed and respond when very distressed.
So imsotired please don't feel you did anything wrong. There are other forums where you might get support, there's the Samaritans etc etc but you know that, it's not that you're wrong or not good enough to post here. You're not wrong to need to talk and for the things you need to get out to not come out nicely packaged.
Your therapist should really have made arrangements for while they're away tbh. I'm sure you know you can see your GP, or call 111, if you're not coping,even go to A&E

I don't think replies have been 'harsh' at all, I think they've been sensitive and helpful.
Imsotired is in the US, I think.

Hi op I hope you are ok - I didn't read your posts but I get where you are coming from as someone who has reached out on MN when vulnerable and also suffers with MH issues.

Sometimes all we need is someone to understand where we are coming from not to get a bashing from those who have never walked in our shoes and at stupid o clock professionals are not available. All we need is that one kind comment to get us over a moment that is pretty black and could turn even blacker with the wrong commentsy - Ive even here too.

Like you I fight back - your strength comes across in this post. All your feelings and experiences will be valid but I expect you have had years of being told the complete opposite and this is why you doubt yourself - it is a huge self battle to undo all this destructive experience so that we can start again - it taints us for life if we are not careful.

You are doing all the right things with getting help etc and I've actually found the people wh have disbelieved me on here have made me stronger - every time I've had to defend myself - my truth becomes clearer - does this make sense?

The world needs people like you - people who have been through horrendous times that most people are so lucky enough to have never experienced that they think it cannot be true - that do all they can to help themselves and "get better". I put this in quotes because really there is nothing wrong with us - we have endured experiences that we know deep down are not right but we have been told so often that there is something wrong with Us because we have imagined it - that we believe it. We have to compartmentalise these experiences because to have them on the " surface" would destroy us and make us unable to participate in life - but every now and then they come to the surface for us to deal with to probe a bit more find the answers that are deep down within us - this is the only way we can heal.
Maybe you posted in the wrong section -maybe you got the "nothing better to do in my life than put others down to make myself feel better" gang - I don't know as didn't see your threads - but if when you are vulnerable and you reach out here as so many do as nowhere else to turn and this too ends up being just another stick to be beaten with then the world is a very very fucked up place and MN really needs to try better.

I hear you op - I don't doubt your feelings or experience - be kind to yourself

Try The Mental Health Forum:

www.mentalhealthforum.net/forum/

I think you may find it can offer more of the type of support that you are seeking.

Op you only joined MN tonight apparently What's that got to do with anything? Please get real life help She already is doing, duh!!! OP needed a hand hold and bit of support and instead got called a troll. Lovely!!

It's a talk forum. Not a helpline or an advice service, I think people forget that.

And some people DO lie about abuse all the time on MN. Just the last few days I've reported (and the threads were deleted as trolls) threads about domestic violence and child abuse.

Same as some people on MN lie about their current financial situation and posters send them money. We've had people using fictional dying children to troll MN.

People lie all the time on the internet. That doesn't mean most people do so in real life but it's true of the internet.

Agree with PP
I am afraid that a dose of realism is needed around MN . It’s greaf but at source it’s a money making website

I think that when it starts to upset you from a mental health aid perspective it’s take to take a step back

I am so sorry for your childhood and the scars it’s Left , wishing you strength and healing

Know exactly how you feel OP, on both counts having had severe mental illness myself and being called a troll when discussing my incontinence problem!! Go figure!! You will get better with the help of your therapist but it does take time. I can remember feeling absolutely lost and panicky when my therapist was away even though I had family around me. It's an awful feeling isn't it? You will get through this though Are you on meds if you don't mind me asking?

rosylea yeah sometimes I think a little too much is made of poo/wee trolls.

OP wasn't banned anyway so it's not that MN thought she was trolling. One of her threads was apparently deleted from MH forum. Didn't read it nor AMA thread so don't know about those.

Oh and I recently got called a disinformation agent because I was questioning some videos I'd seen that was a good one!!

OP, YANBU to think MN should review the way it treats vulnerable posters. Completely agree with you. x