Feminism, psychiatry and Mumsnet

[OnceThereWasThisGirlWho]

This started as a reply to a post on another thread (not a thread started by me). I don't want to upset anyone by theorising in a support forum so am posting my ponderings here.

My brain is not at optimal functioning to rephrase everything, so here is part of my reply:

"OP is understandably and justifiably frustrated and distressed and some posters are seeking to justify shoddy treatment and the smoke-and-mirrors operation of MH services. Which obviously makes the OP more frustrated and distressed.

It baffles me that an online community which appears to encompass thoughtful discussion, criticism of existing power structures/services/wider system, and has many strong feminist viewpoints/posters, should be so lacking in any kind of understanding support about how crappy the mental health system can be. Or, dare I say it, any kind of vaguely antipsychiatry/survivor movement type experiences/thinking/feeling."

At this point I realised this was a discussion to be had elsewhere. Personally, I have found it immensely helpful to look at alternative ways of viewing things to the narrow medical model of psychiatry. To realise that others have similar experiences of the system, similar criticisms or frustrations or alternative viewpoints encompassing the wider context. Even if I am very distressed, talking to someone who understands generally ends up in a lot of dark humour and discussion of the sociopolitical context. Especially helpful when things like gender role expectations, male on female violence and control, and issues around poverty and homelessness form part of the issues.

To be honest, if someone had started talking to me about the things I now agree with (including feminism!) in the past, I would have been polite but inwardly patting them on the head, trying not to dislodge their tinfoil hat. So I do understand others not understanding in general... but so surprised to see it on Mumsnet, where issues are normally pulled apart with alternative viewpoints argued.

I hope I'm making sense, and hope this is the right place to ask...

i have no idea how to cope any longer with the memories. I hate men. They have taken everything and used me. And I cant even ask for help because im just a shit worthless "hysterical" woman in their eyes. Theres no way out.

The mental health system is so shallow. It is so rare ro find someone who understands. I can't bear it. Where do you turn when there really is nowhere? I try to keep going with all this inside but it's just an act to tyr to stop anyone being cross. I'm so alone - where are the feminists and nice thoughtful people in real life? Why do I end up with only dysfunctional men interested in "friendship" ... well not any more, I cut them out. But I'm so alone. It's better in many ways thatn having to please them but I miss laughing occasionally. Im so sorry. I literally do not know where else I could say this that someone may possibly understand.

Thank you buffy
If that is true, why am I brushed aside as irrelevent by people irl? It's so strange, people around me seem to have got themselves together a bit (for some thats the basics like not living like The Young Ones, for others its stuff like having children/late start in a career etc). I spent my early to mid 20s feeling much older than my peers so in theory I'm pleased certain people have finally got the hang of being adults, but for some reason this means I get sidelined, as if I'm part of the old crap. Some people I know who I feel more "similar" to somehow (more middle class? Something? IDK) clearly just see me an an unemployed mental and as they are busy having children and so on I'm a million miles away socially. Not on my part - I'm not trying to drag them clubbing or something. Just when we all used to hang out I thought we'd be doing the same a few yrs later, just with babies on the scene. But the social groups seem to have split off into smaller groups and I dont fit anywhere.

Sorry that was long. Mainly right now all the tings men have done are speeding through my head and I feel so trapped, and so angry at them being so fucking entitled as to be so so cruel and selfish for their own egos.

oops x-post

i'm 31 btw

once and a Big hug
I also don't want to be trite....but have you tried Mind? Or any other support groups. It sounds like you could really do with some female friends. Open the door a crack to someone warm, I bet you will be surprised at the support...
Or keep posting and we can do virtual support

There's a complete death of support groups or anything here. I live in an ok but deprived area (the sort of place where students and artists live before the become middle class and have babies ) so I guess charities are having to do more hardcore work that would be covered by council in other neighbourhoods. Or something. I don't know... I just dont seem to fit in anywhere. When I was in my early 20s there were other women like me but they somehow magically got better/were fine/met a wonderful man (seriously - that shouldnt work but did for one friend ). It seems that whenever I've met someone "like me" ie. interested in the same things etc, they are much more "successful" and popular so friendship doesn't happen. There's also no groups/clubs I'm interested in - a few in a different, middle class area though. Sorry to keep mentioning class but it might be relevent. I seem to be too middle class to fit in here (background), but too poor and politically radical to fit in anywhere middle class either or afford it.

A man lied to me about everything and used me and I cant talk to anyone about it. I told the mental health team at the time and it was two idiot men who dismissed my mental health concerns and told me the realtionship was repairable. He was living a lie, pretending to go to work somewhere, he wasn't the person he said he was.

He was bonkers, or maybe not, or maybe not in the way he said. When it all came out he was a different man. Boy really (not under 18! Just childlike). I felt sorry for him. He stole money from me. He got in with my friends and made fun of me in public. He treated me worse and worse as a "friend" where at first he had been grateful I'd stayed friends and tried to help. It was really fucked up. Im so humilated I was ever with him. I feel dirty and makes me sick to think, well I cant wriite it. I dont know if i can ever have a relationship again because I feel sick of sex. Im scared of all men. I want children so much but cant go near men. Im sorry if this odesnt make sense

but he was the only person i knew who understood about the way the mental health services are.

One other I trusted and could talk to but then he got in a relatiomship and she stopped him seeing me/squeezed me out of group. He sent me waky text saying he was "developing his life" so didnt have time for me anymore. I dont trust men

You sound like you are having a hard time. Could you try counsellor? Just to talk things through. That guy sounds like a nightmare, It Might be good to talk through what happened between you and put it behind you. Very hard to do I know. But you are a worthwhile person in your own right.

Mmm except I've been trying to get counselling/therapy from the NHS for 6 yrs. I can post link to previous thread of how thats gone. I cant afford private therapy atm (on benefits with big HB shortfall). I did have some private therapy which helped with the self confidence/not putting up with dickheads stuff but was still friends with this guy and with another ultimately abusive man for some of it (we went our separate ways as his behaviour escalated as I learnt to stand up for myself) so didn't go into this stuff. It also seemed like the deeper we got the more she sort of... blanked out. Didn't "get it". She came across as quite dim towards the end - I don't think she was, it just felt that way because she did not seem to understand and I was having to explain stuff so slowly.

From an NHS POV (round here at least - area with v limited resources and v high need) the stuff that I need to talk about it just navel-gazing. They are busy trying to stop people dying/killing people etc.

This is especially hard both with ordinary people and private counsellors... people dont realise how crap MH services are, especially for certain difficulties (interpersonal trauma is all but ignored), so they think I'm not bothering to seek help, or that I'm making a fuss about nothing. That's another thing pissing me off about men - one in particular was going on about how I should "get help" and that apprently he got sectioned when he was fine really (they thought suicide risk). I'm sure he wasn't fine but it doesn seem much easier for men to get help and treated with respect. One GP couldn't do enough for my most recent ex - who was drinking heavily (always had tbh) and refused counselling (or any kind of actually sorting out his isses), yet dismissed me as a malingerer. This ex, btw lectured me on how I wasn;t trying to "help myself" because after trying 4 types of antidepressants I didnt want to take them again. I was paying £40/week for private therapy at the time.

Sorry this is a bit rambly, I seem to be hitting some kind of peak feminism moment but in a really personal and devastating way.

Once I feel as if anything I suggest will either sound trite or out me or both.

That said, I believe you. Safety first: are you safe? If you do not feel safe, do you know what you need to do? Your safety is important as a first step.

I find the Samaritans helpful when it is all running through my head and I need to talk it out, but not everybody finds them helpful and it may be that you do not. If a man picks up, my understanding is that it is considered reasonable to either request to speak to a woman or to hang up and call back until you get through to a woman, but I have never tried either of these.

I take exception to the notion that meeting a man shouldn't work, not because it should or should not work, whatever that means, but for the implication that meeting a man is the thing that "worked" for your friend. Maybe this is guilt on my side for betraying the cause, turning down my invitation to the separatist commune, and choosing to get married instead. Who knows? It is not reasonable for you to write about other people "magically getting better". In the eyes of psychiatry I am a lot better than I have been in the past and believe me, it was not magic that made the difference, really, it was not.

. Keep going Once and keep posting on here. You have found a safe space on this board.

Oops, x-posted.

I love the notion of peak feminism. I think I will use this description.

It takes a very, very skilled practitioner to work with interpersonal trauma, and a professional who is not sufficiently trained, experienced and supervised - and even one who is - can easily re-traumatise the person whom they are supposed to be helping. I am sorry that you are going through a difficult time Once, which sounds trite to me even though I wish that it didn't.

If I've understood the thread correctly, I agree that there is a tendency to over-medicalise social and emotional problems nowadays. (I will likely struggle to articulate this, same as theop) I am pleased to see sucha topic discussed. Mental health has become a huge topic nowadays, and a huge industry, even a political topic,yet it always seems to be phrased as an individual's problems, not as healthy reactions to bad social environments.

Phrases such as " as thinking the world is against her is undoubtedly part of her emotionally unstable worldview." (from penne) really help to nailthat down. Sometimes,the world is against us. If you've been brought up in an unsupportive environment, experienced little beyond bullying and humiliation from every side, been chucked out to survive in the world with no social support, or even suddenly find yourself on your own at any point, then the world is not exactly your friend is it? Being then told that the resulting depression and anxiety is a 'mental illness' and what you need to do is pop a few pills and get back to being a worker drone - whether that is a paid drone or the unpaid and unwanted home drone - doesn't strike me as very helpful either.

Possibly it's just a question of vocabulary, since the aim of therapy in mental health seems to be to take the place of all that social support you didn't have.

the aim of therapy in mental health seems to be to take the place of all that social support you didn't have.

This is not the aim of therapy, or at least, not of good therapy, which is not to deny that it might seem like it. An inexperienced or poor-quality therapist may work with the goal - conscious or unconscious on the part of the therapist - of becoming the social support that the client does not have.

Such a therapist will easily re-traumatise a vulnerable clients when the therapist is not able to be that social support, which, by definition, they are not able to be - they are not a social support, they are a therapist, and this is a different thing.

Therapy, eh?

Once I hope that you managed to get some sleep. I would send hugs, if I knew whether or not you find that type of thing supportive. and keep posting here. I have the impression that you will find a way, in part because you are articulate in the face of all that you have experienced. If you feel able to, you could name change and post a thread with your approximate location, and ask for suggestions for IRL connections you could make. I know people who have found succour in, variously, the WI, borrowmydoggy.com, meetup.com, volunteering, gardening, knitting, writing...you will be able to find your own connections too, and there is always MN as well for the rough bits. Perhaps come and join us in the pub? It is Friday after all.

bungo amazing post that really resonates with me.
girl what do you want to achieve? Do you want to feel differently yourself,do you want the world to accept you as you are, do you want not to have relationships where people take advantage?

Firstly - there's an MN pub forum?

I think I hit peak something else last night too - peak hormone arghhh stage. Not madness exactly but all the bad stuff comes into focus the day before my period! Now in physical agony which makes a change. That's a whole other thread really... hormonal stereotype vs not denying reality... argh.

Felas I'd like to somehow come to terms with what has happened, as well as trying to be as emotionally healthy as possible and protect myself from further wankers in future. Not just in intimate relationships. I think I need a feminist and MN trained therapist. I'm struggling to make sense of a lot of things because I've been encouraged to think crap by the MH system/wider society, so it's working out what's true, or helpful, from the bits that don't add up.

Bungo Yes, agree with your post. Except perhaps the therapist part - did you mean a therapist is making up for the social support you didn't have at a specific time in life? Eg. if previously isolated in abusive relationship, they would go over that time period with you and help you through it, as you lacked that support at the time? (Though I don't know if that's how it's supposed to work either!)

As well as medicalising MH problems, within the UK there is a tendency to just sort of ignore them. If antidepressants don't work and/or it's very clear the person needs to talk through their experiences, then services start to see it as not really within their remit (very underfunded, focussing resources on psychosis and extreme suicde risk, firefighting rather than prevention or even maintenance nowadays).

In more recent years there has been a big push to provide talking therapies in primary care - IAPT (Improving haha Access to Psychological Therapies). In reality this tends to be short term, mainly behavioural interventions, sometimes counselling. So those requiring more indepth, longer term therapy are deemed not suitable for the service and referred on to secondary services. Where therapy budget has been cut, and many are deemed "not severe enough" for secondary care, and left in limbo between services (this has happened to me but is a recognised issue in general).

The brief interventions, mainly CBT (always think Cognitive Behavioural Therapy sounds a bit Orwellian), focus on changing your "faulty" thought processess. The world is fine, it's your thinking that is wrong. There's also this movement towards what they call a "recovery" model in MH sevices. Sounds great (if a little concerning "recovery" hadn't occurred to them before) but also has this sort of watered down focus on "wellbeing" and learning to live with your issues (live = find paid employment). It's not all complete wank, but this explains the issues well.

Furthermore, difficulties arising from complex interpersonal trauma, especially that experienced in childhood, is highly likely to be diagnosed as a personality disorder, for which there is little help/funding set aside. Until 2007 this diagnosis excluded one from services altogether.

When I was ill in hospital, the two male consultants at the bottom of my bed discussed between themselves, as if I wasn't present, that they had to visit me earlier as I had clearly put on makeup - a bit of lipstick, nude, and a blusher, all very muted.

When I saw a psychologist post this operation, long story, she also remarked that I looked well because I was dressed well and had put on make up and done my hair.

Mental health in women is clearly under catered for. However, mental health problems within the community at large is a huge issue that is at best underfunded.

I blame the return of patients from institutions to the community for this. It was a disaster in that it led to vulnerable people totally unprepared for the wider world and left in the care of some parents/guardians/partners who clearly didn't want to know.

Obviously it's much more complicated than that. This is a very interesting discussion nonetheless and needs to be aired.

Oh pmt sucks. Mine is awful
Can I recommend this book? www.amazon.co.uk/Reinventing-Your-Life-Breakthrough-Behaviour/dp/0452272041
A clinical psychologist I know lent it to me, its very interesting and might help you a bit in lieu of counselling.

erin Your posts are, as ever, helpful - thank you.

It is not reasonable for you to write about other people "magically getting better". In the eyes of psychiatry I am a lot better than I have been in the past and believe me, it was not magic that made the difference, really, it was not.

I'm sorry, I didn't mean to be offensive. I wouldn't have put you in the "magically getting better" category - just from the way you write about this stuff it's obvious you've put a lot into thinking about and working through this stuff. What baffles me is the people who appear to have massive issues/have gone off the rails, and deal with it in not the most helpful way, but nonetheless seem to be "fine"/coping with life at the very least in a relatively short time period. Wheras I'm constantly trying to understand, figure stuff out, obtain outside help/therapy, try to make sensible decisions, don't turn to drink etc. yet I'm still fucked.

I wrote "magically gets better" in a tongue in cheek way tbh, because it appears that way from where I'm standing. It's worse if others laud them as an example with a vague explanation of "they sorted themselves out" and imply you must not be trying hard enough or too thick to work it out. I think I'm a lot better than I was, in a way, because I understand so much more, but then I can't cope with what I understand...

I take exception to the notion that meeting a man shouldn't work, not because it should or should not work, whatever that means, but for the implication that meeting a man is the thing that "worked" for your friend. Maybe this is guilt on my side for betraying the cause, turning down my invitation to the separatist commune, and choosing to get married instead.

Sorry - I didn't mean there's anything wrong with finding a man, marriage etc. Would like it myself. What I mean is, it's not a good idea to pin your hopes on it (I think?) If some wonderful man appeared in my life right now, I'm sure it would be helpful, for a variety of reasons. But chances are, if an apparently wonderful man appeared, I'd need to tread very carefully as I'm very vulnerable. Also, the conventional wisdom is that finding a man is not a magic bullet, but for the friend I have in mind it really did seem that way. I'm sure she wasn't suddenly fine overnight, but the positive impact was immense, sudden, and sustained.

What really struck me though, at the time, was that it appeared to spell disaster. We'd known each other socially for a while, but had spent more time togther after both going through horrible break ups and being bonkers in similar, longstanding ways (and both refused help by MH services for same reasons). However, she seemed more "unwell" than me, with severe self harm. The circumstances of meeting and impromptu wild shag that led to relationship meant there was a lot of potential for huge knock-on effects if it didn't work out, and it was all very sudden and they moved in together very fast. Honestly, I braced myself to be there for the (IMO) inevitable fallout. But no - a decade later and they're still going strong. It's just the way that her course of action seemed ill-advised, with warning signs all over, but... wasn't.

This is making me think of a random comment I read on a blog or something ages ago.

It's relevent to thread in general, anyway. The gist of the article/blog was about how to treat Borderline Personality Disorder. This particular comment said something like "We could try being nice to them". The poster went on to explain he had been married for several years to a woman diagnosed with BPD, who had been through abuse IIRC. They seemed to have parted on amicable terms, and he wrote that she had been the most stable and happy during their relationship. He felt the reason for this was that she had someone there being kind, listening to her/being supportive and understanding her history. IIRC he felt MH services did the opposite.

Not very scientific but I instinctively agree with him. Not sure how we could translate that into treatment/society though... Actually if the care/support is available in some form at the right time it can mitigate the effect of the trauma, or - here's a thoight - stop it happening in the first place.

Feminist Pub XX

It's not an MN thing. It's a FWR thing. Come on in.

Related: I just started this thread in MH.

I ricochet between the MH and Feminism boards, and I hope that Once you can find some support on the Emotional (dis)regulation thread. Otherwise, tumbleweed for erinaceus .

I have more to say about feminism, psychiatry and mumsnet, but not today...boundaries and stuff like that.