To ask why psychiatrists are viewed in this way

[busyweeks78]

I’ve only ever had positive experiences with them but as a general rule the stereotype seems to be a negative one. Aibu to ask why?

I used to work in it mainly child psychiatry and the ones who were good were good. It attracted women as a job since it wasn't a hard speciality like surgery in terms of career development and one could be a consultant by early 30s. Always vacancies so opportunity to move. They worked in diagnosing the spectrum of psychiatry from autism/add to bed wetting, anorexia/bulimia etc.. Very caring as opposed to surgeons but academic psychiatrists were a nightmare. They taught/researched the subject and as they were bright they believed they were superior (or thought they were). Psychiatry deals with the mind, psychology deals with behaviours. Frasier was v.true to life in his attitude.

I think they can be dangerous - at least they were when they had involvement with a family member.

I believe medication is needed o get a lot of people to a place where they can do therapy. Obviously that’s not the case for everyone but I believe it to be in a lot of cases.

They know so much about medicine but yet so little about people. They can be intimidating and cold and a million miles away culturally from their patients.

Maybe justdeckingthehalls and I are lucky as I have never come across hostility from people I have looked after. I absolutely agree about how important talking therapies are and maybe I am lucky to work in a service where we have rapid ( within a month) access to this. I would also say that I would prefer to be told if a patient or their family feel I am completely on the wrong track with the care proposed as collaborative care is what gets people better. And the diabetes anaology isn’t a bad one - I use it in a slightly different way for patients with bipolar disorder - you have to think about your diabetes every day to stay well by monitoring how you are. I would encourage people to use PALS if they do have complaints about services as it is the way services improve and if a particular psychiatrist is indeed causing problems it is how organisations find out

Agree with @Vaselinehero
All through experience. Been seeing psychiatrists since I was 17. Found them dismissive and unhelpful. One I remember demanded to know why I wore tops that showed of my operation scar (from heart surgery) the scar showed a little bit.

I was prescribed medication that helped, he decided I was attention-seeking and took me off the tablets and I badly deteriorated. I was 17.

Then a few years ago I had a psychiatrist dismiss my experiences repeatedly.

A clinical psychiatrist then diagnosed me with a dissociative disorder. I went into a hospital for a brief period and was told the DD and BPD were the same things by the lead DR. I was then told my symptoms were due to trauma and was taken off all medication.

Experience has taught that most want you to fit into carefully defined categories and if you don't throw medication at you.

My medication and the support of my psychiatrist has 100% saved my life. I have schizoaffective bipolar disorder, and pre diagnosis I wasn't coping at all. It's a miracle I'm not dead.

I've had three psychiatrists in total - all excellent. No bad experiences at all.

I've seen a few, one I saw under the nhs asked (on the first meeting, without much background info) if I had been sexually abused by my dad or another family member (I haven't) but he seemed to decide that this was obviously the root of my MH problems and just ploughed on with that idea, kept asking me about it, which was v upsetting and not at all helpful. However I have seen another one (private but funded by the nhs) and she was amazing

Tbh every thought is a chemical process and therefore every distressing thought is an adverse chemical process but I'm not convinced that this means a person is ill in the sense that they are if they have asthma.

Psychiatry is a culturally bound set of practices that varies between countries and across time not due to advances in medical science but due to cultural preoccupations yet despite this lack of pathological rigour psychiatrists hold a lot of power.

Honestly wonder how much of obesity is the result of so many of these drugs truly having weight gain as a side effect.

I agree, and also the explosion in type 2 diabetes since a lot of psychiatric drugs change the way your body metabolises sugar.

One mood stabiliser I took made me gain weight so rapidly I had stretch marks where the skin was splitting. I was told the medication was not to blame but it was what I eat. Of course food and exercise play a role in weight management but a lot of these drugs cause weight gain.

Some do amazing work and save lives and giveback quality of life. Some take people with physical health problems and decide it’s mental health, one had a friend admitted to an eating disorder unit for 18 months despite the fact her physical eating problems would of shown up on tests. Someone I know had a daugther with physical health problems and a psych decided other wise, sectioned her and the chain of events led to her death, the autopsy proved he was wrong. I could go on and on and on

@Gingerkittykat was that mood stabiliser quitiapine by any chance? I was on it for six months and my God, the cravings I got after taking it were terrible. I put on a load of weight and i couldn’t handle how sedating it was, I felt like a zombie, so came off it luckily.

Nope, it was sodium valporate. I have heard similar stories about quitapine though. I have a friend who swears by it in terms of his mental health but he has put on very significant amounts of weight.

I'm currently taking a different mood stabiliser (lamotrigine) which is weight neutral.

Seen two in my life, both arseholes, both just wanted to push drugs on me. One of those (a sleep 'med') I believe contributed to my bruxism which has totally fucked my teeth over the last five years. Never again.

I suspect that psychiatry is an area in which people are more likely to approach with a preconceived idea of what the service is, what their problem is and how it should be managed.
Also worth noting that only a certain demographic will be able to respond to this. There is a large community of people with serious mental health problems who do not have the ability to advocate for themselves.

I've never come across this stereotype / opinion. I have had depression and anxiety for a while so I've had various contact with mental health services. I've had friends who have also had mental health issues. I have also worked in mental health support. So plenty of opportunities to come across this attitude. GPs on the other hand, no very positive.

There are some really odd opinions on this thread. 🙁. I'm sure there are some 'bad' psychiatrists but I bet they are very much in the minority.

Psychiatrist's don't get to be psychiatrists without years and years of experience in a really wide range of mental health situations. I've a lot of respect for them. I think it must be a difficult and frustrating job.

It's hilarious how so many people without any training at all think they know better than someone with masses of trading. It's a bit like those Mumsnet threads where posters can confidently diagnose autism from a paragraph or two....

I believe medication is needed to get a lot of people to a place where they can do therapy.

This was absolutely the case with me. The years of therapy (with psychiatrists/occupational therapists/counsellors) were what "cured" me, but I would not have been in a place to access them without the medication.

It's the UKCP which is the regulatory body for psychotherapists, BACP more for counsellors. The difference is v hard to define with significant overlap but to get onto the UKCP register your training has to be a minimum duration and you have to have had more personal therapy. Research shows clients just seem to pick the photo they like best though!

I'm an NHS psychotherapist, am trained in integrative psychotherapy, CBT, ACT, CFT and EMDR. So actually more extensive than some of the clin psychs who's training courses only taught CBT. It's so hard to define the terms because individuals vary so much.

My clin pysch colleague calls psychiatrists 'failed doctors who couldn't hack it in mainstream medicine'. Maybe that's a little harsh but she's met a lot! I guess like any profession there are good and bad. Everyone in NHS MH services is trying to shovel snow while it's still snowing anyway.

My brother hated his psychiatrist (NHS) because he refused to keep churning over his past to find reasons why he was like he was. My brother has borderline personality disorder. The psychiatrist wanted him to focus on the present but he didn't like that. Now he pays privately for some Freudian psychiatrist who lets him talk about his past non stop without trying to move forward and he's worse now than he has been in years. Some people don't want to get better, they don't want to listen to advise and resent this.

That's a shame jen

I'm bpd and I've just started DBT therapy which is the recommended pathway of treatment for the disorder and its really helpful for me and lots of others. Recognises that your trauma has left a significant mark on you but gives you the tools to deal with it in a healthy way and learn to regulate your emotions, the way you should have learnt growing up etc.

My clin pysch colleague calls psychiatrists 'failed doctors who couldn't hack it in mainstream medicine'

I don't think that is true. Maybe it was in the past for some people but it's not now. The training is long and hard. Successfully completing 12 years odd (I think?) of training is hardly my idea
of someone who has failed. I don't think psychiatry is an easy option either. I think it must be incredibly frustrating and I wouldn't like to make some of the decisions they have to make. It's a hell of a lot of responsibility.

It's a sad that your clinical Psychologist friend thinks like that.

Most of our team of psychologists/psychotherapists would probably agree with her, there is a real split between the psychiatric/medical model and the psychological/environmental in a lot of MH services.

Whereas psychotherapist training is part time and requires 450 hours practical. Not in the same league imv and some practices are still a bit woo , EMDR for example.
www.psychotherapy.org.uk/join/how-to-train/

Nothing woo about it, it's pretty much just cognitive exposure like most trauma therapies