What would happen if you never felt better? TW: discussion of suicidal feelings

[MentalHealthQuestion]

NC'ed for this. I have in the past, on multiple occasions, suffered from feeling suicidal but have been lucky enough to recover each time through treatment and time.

What would happen, in terms of how our health services work, if someone just DIDN'T feel better with treatment? Not that they necessarily would try to go through with it, if they knew they didn't have a reliable plan, but if they just kept feeling bad and remained in crisis, to the extent that they couldn't live a normal life at all.

Would they be sectioned? What would happen after that, if they just never stopped feeling as though they couldn't go on?

I honestly don’t know. Sorry to hear that you’ve felt so low and glad that you have recovered each time and kept going. It’s very hard.
From what I know, people are generally only sectioned in this situation when they are ‘actively suicidal’, which seems heartbreaking to me. The lack of funding for mental health services is shameful.
I am sure someone more knowledgable than me will come along.

From my experience I’d say absolutely nothing would happen. I’ve been actively suicidal at points in my live and the most help I’ve ever been given is anti-depressants. I went cold turkey on my anti-depressants and never got so much as a call from my doctor to see if all was well. These days I just swing from not really caring if I wake up in the morning to praying that I don’t.

I did a post not long ago about this about the lack of help for mental health within the NHS.
Basically even if you were suicidal you wouldn’t get much help the crisis team are beyond useless ppl working there who really shouldn’t be just to fill a vacancy it’s shameful.

These replies are worrying. I have felt my mental health getting worse recently, and am deeply worried about what will happen if I spiral out of control. I don't intend to actually try anything because, aside from anything else, it's so unlikely to work, but I've suffered from prolonged panic before - for other reasons - and am concerned I will again from feeling trapped and wanting to end it. The idea that there is nothing they would do beyond an initial prescription is terrifying.

Basically if you were suicidal due to eg depression then yes you'd be sectioned, and treatment options tried until the depression improved. (On average a depressive episode lasts around 2 years I think without any treatment). If you were still suicidal once well then you would be discharged. People have suicidal thoughts/plans for all kinds of reasons, often unrelated to their mental health, and many of these can't be cured!

Do you know how common this is? Does the person just live in misery from then on? Or maybe it would become a revolving door situation where every few years you'd need treatment again, then end up going back to that feeling. Maybe that's what happens to me - it's not coming back again, instead it's just going back to the baseline.

There are multiple different treatments for those in crisis, depression can also often resolve spontaneously although it can take some time. When you’re out of crisis there’s a lot of measures you can take such as talking therapy, exercise, lifestyle etc to keep well. But unfortunately some people do have recurrent major depression/ bipolar and have to be sectioned multiple times

Could there be a situation where the crisis didn't resolve, but persisted? If the medication only alleviated the situation temporarily, e.g. if the patient was intermittently highly agitated and emotional and medication was able to calm them down, but the patient then always returned to feeling suicidal once in their calm state. And what would happen to them then? That's what I'm worried about.

All that would happen is you'd be offered other drugs/therapy and maybe ECT.
If nothing ever works then you'd just have to live with it really and manage the worst of your symptoms by contacting crisis team or GP when actively suicidal.

There is no magic wand if treatment doesn't work, unfortunately.

All I’ve wanted to do is sleep the simplest of tasks are really hard at the mo worse is no one has time for it your right there is no real help it’s awful

Sorry to hear you're also feeling bad. The exhaustion is awful. I think people may not realise, or forget, how tiring and distressing it is to feel that way. Have you been able to access any kind of help at all?

Is there any real help tbh I’m put off as the MH system seems quite frightening

Antidepressants (just from the GP) have really helped me in the past, although I don't want to go on them again at the moment - not because of anything bad about them, I'm just fed up of the on/off revolving door I seem to have fallen into with them. But if you're feeling terrible, they can make that bit of difference that's needed to pull you out - just watch out for feeling worse at first (although that hasn't happened to me).

I've been referred to a couple of different types of therapy (like CBT and I can't remember the other) but didn't find them as helpful as the medication - just my personal experience though.

GPs have always been quick to offer antidepressants - I never felt like they didn't believe me or anything like that.

This feeling is not abating. Might speak to the GP on Monday.

IME episodes of depression can ebb and flow and there are times of being depression free but chronic depression is another beast altogether and unfortunately I know of no effective treatment