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#1601 - 08/21/02 06:22 AM Exuse me, but i am a human being
Broken Offline

Registered: 03/25/01
Posts: 273
Loc: Huntingtun Beach, CA, US
I had a dismal encounter with a psychiatrist today. I needed to reevaluate my medication, and instead i was thrown into some sort of group so i could get presribed the same thing i got last time. When i told the woman who they had transfered me to that i wanted to change, she was extremely hurried and belligerant. I was extremely tired, i had not slept last night, and staying up to make the drive over was an effort in and of itself. She kept talking to me as if she assumed i was severely disturbed, and she spoke to the office people like i wasnt in the room. She said that she didnt have my case history and she would give me enough pills to "keep me together". Then when i expressed what i felt was legitamite confusion, she rushed me out of her office to reschedule an appointment, and right in front of me, said "he is out of it." I may have been tired, but that pissed me off. Who the hell does she think she is? Did i go into her office and mention she seems to be insensitive and condescending? I sopke up, and she said, "no, its true..." I just took the key to the bathroom and left so i didnt explode right there. Fucking shrinks man, they think they can throw pills at people and fix them. Nobody explained to me how my appointments work, i just assumed that you go there when you are about to run out of medication. They didnt ask me if i wanted to make an appointment with my docter, even though i called two weeks in advance, they just said, you being transferred to group. Maybe im exagerating, but maybe if you were there you would have understood what it felt like. If you dont stand up for yourself, you get pushed around by the health care system. I can be big about it now that i said something, but damn!

#1602 - 08/21/02 01:15 PM Re: Exuse me, but i am a human being
Roy Offline

Registered: 08/02/02
Posts: 184
Loc: Los Angeles
You are absolutely right about being pushed around in the healthcare system. You have to be your own advocate no matter what. Even though I am very happy with the care I get at Kaiser, I had to be very firm in the beginning about what I needed.
Even if you were a raving lunatic in this situation, she had no right to say anything in front of other people, even the office staff. And to tell you she will get you enough pills to "keep you together", well, how demeaning. Remember, everybody has a boss if you feel like fighting. I admit it is an uphill battle when you are the "patient". God, its hard enough just going to get help!

Take care, Roy.

#1603 - 08/21/02 03:34 PM Re: Exuse me, but i am a human being
SoCalJohn Offline

Registered: 05/18/01
Posts: 510
Loc: Los Angeles, California

you are a human being, the treatment you got sounds horrible, i am glad you were able to say something,, what a lousy system we have, its so damn complicated and they dont explain adequately to you how to work your way through the maze and then they treat you like its all your fault that things are not happening for you. pisses me off to.

i hope things settle in for you real soon and some good things start coming together, god knows your due.




#1604 - 08/21/02 04:43 PM Re: Exuse me, but i am a human being
angry Offline

Registered: 08/13/02
Posts: 23
I also have horror stories about psychiatric care. When I remembered my abuse 4 years ago I was so out of my head I was screaming, crying, throwing up and writhing around on my bathroom floor when my wife found me.

So she and my parents hauled me off to a mental hospital. I was remembering what my perpetrator did to me which I dont even want to mention for fear that someone will do it to someone else, but I was screaming that I was a faggot which is what he told me. And since some of the other patients and doctors heard what I was saying they treated me like crap for my entire stay.

Even some schitsophrenic woman who told me half the books ever written in the world were written about her ostracised me. Some Psychiatrist in a group session with about 20 people kept making veiled references to what I said when they dragged me in.

I almost went postal. They spent 2 weeks trying to force feed me medication against my will and got me hooked on something I'm afraid to go off and I'm furious about it. They talked about me in the third person tense like they did to Broken while I was standing there so many times, I just started yelling at them to have some respect for the patients.

Then I was frantically making phone calls to the police and various child care agencies to try to report the guy who did stuff to me and they would come over and try to hang up the phone on me. The only reason they couldn't is because I'm 6'2 235. So they sent 3 male nurses over at a time to try to talk me into hanging up the phone and take my medication. Then they made a special rule that no one was allowed to use the telephone while group sessions were in, which was 50 minutes out of every hour of the day.

I was in a professional position before my breakdown and when I told people they acted like I was a schitzo or something and then they would tell me to take my medication. I worked for a famous and prestigious employer and my wife brought me a hat they gave me at work with the company logo on it. I was worried that somebody at my company would find out I was hauled off to the looney bin so I asked one of the male nurses to lock it up for me in storage so nobody could see it. The guy said "your afraid because you have a (he said the company name) hat!" Then he rolled his eyes and started telling the other male nurses, and they laughed as he talked about me in the third person right in front of me.

They yelled at the patients if they came near the front desk and were so condescending it made me feel bad about myself. I don't reccomend Psychiatric hospitals to anyone, even if you are in really bad shape.

#1605 - 08/21/02 06:57 PM Re: Exuse me, but i am a human being
MrDon Offline

Registered: 01/08/01
Posts: 957
Loc: Deltona, FL
Write a letter and file a formal complaint with your insurance company on this place.. But what you went through doesn't sound like they are doing anything good for you.



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#1606 - 08/21/02 07:09 PM Re: Exuse me, but i am a human being
Lloydy Offline
Administrator Emeritus
Registered: 04/17/02
Posts: 7071
Loc: England Shropshire
Nobody deserves to be treated like that, and I'm glad you had a go at them Broken, although the chances of it making a difference are slim if your medical care is in the same state as ours here in the UK.

They hold our systems up to be the best in the world, technically maybe, but care and compassion left a long time ago - about the same time as nurses and doctors became overworked and underpaid.
Nobody has the time to care anymore, the accountants make sure of that

Henry David Thoreau


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