At risk of harm to yourself - at what point does this lead to action?

[fluffydressinggown]

I am currently engaging in risky behaviours, I am self harming in a fairly serious way (needing internal stitches to close the wound) and I have taken to visiting somewhere that I could jump off to kill myself.

I am involved with the crisis team and having regular visits / phone contact and I have been honest with them.

I am having increasingly intrusive thoughts around my self harm and I am struggling not to do it, I have something planned that is pretty dodgy (although would not kill me but would require plastic surgery intervention). I have told the crisis team about this. She asked me not to do it and will ring/visit on Sunday and see how I feel about things.

I am just wondering at one point do they take action to prevent you from harming yourself? I am not psychotic or using drugs or alcohol and I have a stable life style (no children). I just feel unable to keep myself safe, it is like the self harm is not me it is another part of me that I have no control over.

Thanks.

Hi I've no idea but didn't want to read without replying :( You sound like you wish you would get more support?

Do you mean at what point will they section you? Do you want to be sectioned?

In my experience unless you're psychotic they won't intervene. If you're sane then you're perfectly free to harm yourself if that's what you want to do.

What do you want them to do?

I don't think that anyone here can really say that they will take action at point X or Y, because all professionals are different and so are all patients and you can't really tell online.

That said, I've been sectioned and it wasn't pleasant, although of course ultimately it was helpful.

upwardandonward - can I ask, when you were sectioned was it because you were suicidal or for other reasons, ie. psychosis?

Will understand if you'd prefer not to answer but I'm having a few problems myself at the moment and an enforced hospital stay is something that I desperately want to avoid.

fedupandtired, sorry, I'm not sure what the deciding factors were (I was told safety), but I was suicidal and had psychotic symptoms at the time. Safety was also the given reason the 2nd time I ended up (informally) in hospital.

Thank you.

I'm not suicidal (or at least not for any prolonged period, was very last night but not today) but I'm bipolar and my mood is currently unstable. Well, when I say currently, not currently because currently I'm okay but it changes very quickly and it's been one hell of a week. I don't know whether or not I've been psychotic but in hindsight I've definitely not been on planet earth.

Sorry - didn't mean to hijack the thread!

Sorry - 2nd time I wasn't suicidal/depressed, just not very well.

Thank you upwardandonward.

Thank you for the replies. I don't want to say what I want to do because it is a bit sick tbh. It would require surgery and long term medical care to resolve though.

I don't want to be sectioned, and I agree - if you are not psychotic they are largely uninterested. I just wanted to check they won't section me if I do go ahead or continue to engage in risky behaviour.

Do you want to do the thing to yourself so you have to have the surgery and medical care? When I was at my lowest, I wanted to be admitted to hospital just to have the responsibility taken off me. It worked on one occasion, but I wouldn't recommend it.

At low times after I was discharged, I seriously considered harming in that way again so I could have somebody else take responsibility for my clearly incapable self.

When I was engaging in risky behaviour, self-harm, experimenting with nooses etc, I was told that unless I came in voluntarily to the hospital, they'd section me.

I wasn't psychotic but I was ill. This was 10 years ago now.

Whilst you do have the choice to extreme self-harm etc, it's not really a viable solution or course of action and will compound your problems. I appreciate I sound somewhat harsh but fundamentally you have a choice as to what you want to do. A major turning point for me was being told by a psych nurse in the ward that 'you can choose to be a patient for the rest of your life or you can choose to go and have a life'. I chose the latter, as you too can do.

What are your plans for the day? Can you go, get a newspaper or magazine, go out for coffee? Meet a friend?

FDG - you say you are not psychotic or on drugs or alcohol. Are you depressed, because suicidal thoughts are a major symptom of depression.

It is not the case that you can only be sectioned if you are psychotic. You can be sectioned under the Mental Health Act if you are deemed to be a danger to yourself or others. I have been an inpatient twice on a psych ward and certainly people came in with severe depression (had stopped eating and drinking) on a Section.

I think you are in great danger because you have actually made a plan. That is far more worrying than ideas of suicide and possibly a vague plan, (which is suicide ideation)

I think it is absolutely imperative that you tell a MH professional about this plan you have to self harm yourself.

Sorry you are feeling so dreadful.

They are not sure if I have depression, I have suffered from long term mental health problems. I don't have a diagnosis though, possible something on the personality disorder type spectrum but not borderline pd.

They know about my suicide plan and my plan for self harm.