Treatment Makes Everything Worse - What Can I Do?

[Sunset]

I don't know what to do anymore. A significant part of the initial trauma for me involved the mental health system and abuses perpetuated within it. Since then trying medications has introduced new traumas and new bad symptoms to go with them.

I've need help but I'm terrified at this point. I basically shut down completely, to the point where I can't even talk, any time the idea of a mental hospital comes up. Going to therapy brings up flashbacks so strong that I'm knocked out of commission for 2 to 3 days. I'm terrified of new meds because I don't want to be screaming and hurting myself again because they make me crazy. I've had three different medications do that, just got off the last one.

And it's the idea of the mental health system itself that causes the trauma. I know I can't function without meds, but they come at a terrible terrible price. It was the worst trauma in my life. And even in treatment I get widespread disbelief, because he was a psychiatrist and I was just a crazy girl. So many times I've tried to go for help and been treated like I'm just a stupid crazy person. Because he didn't do anything physically wrong, everyone assumes I'm just misinterpreting. I know I'm not. Emotional abuse is a thing, and psychiatrists are in a perfect position to do it.

I don't know what to do. Most times I go into treatment I come out actively sicker than when I went in. I need help but I'm terrified the next one is going to kill me. I can't keep going like this but I can't keep adding new fears and flashbacks and nightmares from when treatment goes wrong.

I hear all about therapy too, how you have to trust and work with the therapist and be open with them. I can't. Literally can't, I panic and my throat closes and I can't say anything or write anything. I get so badly triggered trying I end up hurting myself. But I get told I'm wasting my time, I need to come back when I'm ready, but I just feel like if I was "ready" I wouldn't need treatment.

I cannot feel safe in the mental health system. The only way I could EVER trust a mental health person was if they absolutely 100% could not call the police or have me hospitalized or anything. Anything short of that just exposes me to bias and lies. I've had it happen, where irrelevant things like how I dressed or even outright lies were reasons to threaten to lock me up. Where it wasn't really about helping me at all, it was about him being in control. I don't care if most of them aren't like that, it only takes one to ruin your life.

It's like, imagine a rape victim. Imagine as a rape victim being told that the "treatment" is to keep dating and be really open and vulnerable with men you barely know. And when you're not you'll be told you're uncooperative and you can't be in treatment. That's what this is like for me.

What can I do? I can't work or go on like this but I really can't make myself keep walking in. I cry and vomit before the limited appointments I have to have to get drugs. And half the drugs I've taken have tried to kill me. I feel like I need treatment just to be healthy enough to get treatment.

 

[Mystery]

Oh Sunset, you are so so so not alone. I call it the Cystem, Are you a person with a good imagination? Dissociation is an evolutionary advantage, not just a mental illness. If you really want their meds and you know you need them, then my only suggestion is for you to play a game in your head like when we are children and pretend you are doing something else. They won't notice, they'll just think you are getting better probably. If they feel like the enemy and it sure seems that way, then you have to be a covert operator in the enemy camp. Are you up for something like that or do you feel too fragile? I understand if you aren't.

I used to be a consumer advocate for people admitted to psych units. I've been inside twice myself and couldn't get far away enough from the cystem and their pills, as soon as I was out. When someone with little or no family support had just been admitted they would call me, to come in and make a connection with them. People who were feeling vulnerable and looking to the time when they can go home again. I'm not going to write too much about that because I sense it will trigger you. I get it...I get it more than you will ever know.

Other than the mental health system, what other support is available to you where you live, if you don't want to talk I understand. :-)) Big Hug to you ((((()))))

 

[Sunset]

I know I'm not getting enough support here. I've got issues far beyond what the limited friends network I have can handle.

The trouble is that I feel like, by and large, I don't get support within the mental health community either. I'm just at the point where I'm about ready to give up, because it seems like no one knows what to do with me. Psychiatry doesn't know what to do because I react badly even to supposedly safe medications. Therapy just gets stonewalled and I feel like they just live in different worlds than I do.

I don't know what to do. I've been told so many times that most doctors aren't like that, but I was told the bad ones I saw weren't likely to be like that too. And having been threatened with being locked up before when it was clearly just being used for control, as well as seeing outright lies written in my medical record...I don't know if I trust enough to try again when it only takes one liar to lock you away.

I've heard so many times to just try again. But when the meds routinely leave you tearing your hair out, can you really just push past that and try again? When someone threatens to lock you up, and when you're repeatedly disbelieved because it was from a mental health professional, can you just push past that?

But I can't hold down a job like this, and I don't know what to do. All I can think is that I need to be better before I'll ever have a chance to get better - I have to finish the job before I can even start it.

 

[Mystery]

I totally understand and believe you. I read my file after my first admission and couldn't believe the crap they wrote in it, twisting what I had said in order to suit the agenda, what ever that really was. I made sure I was very clear so as not to be misinterpreted because I knew that this goes on. When I read the file, I realized they did it on purpose. I felt so betrayed by the people I thought were there to help. So I decided not to tell them anything and was quite up front about it...that made me paranoid apparently, so I was medicated for that for 28 days against my will, when all I was, was traumatized and breaking down.

Your above analogy really describes it well. I don't know how I did it I just made a deal with myself that I'm never going to give up and if I die trying well at least I tried, I'm still not on med's but I can't say that is best for you or others only myself.

The second admission I had was such a good shock. It was 9 years later in a different state and I thought I was probably in for more of the same but I knew I needed to go to hospital and I was prepared to cop what ever I had to in order to isolate myself. They were so good, I couldn't believe it. Different hospital, different nurses, different psychiatrist. It took courage beyond belief to go to that hospital and ask to be admitted. I was even prepared for the act of being turned away too. You just never know what can happen if you change doctor's. I really feel for you mate. Wish I could offer more support and I don't want to rattle on with negative stuff because that's not going to help you either.

If you need to vent, I'll always listen and know this.....I believe you, you're not alone.

 

[KwanYingirl]

@Sunset. As I read your first post it reminded me of the long time I spent in the emergency stage. Just a total overwhelm of my nervous system. All I could do is tremble uncontollably. I would dissociate a whole therapy session. There were overdosed and emergency rooms. This went on for years.

Meds did not help, I had crap shrinks but a good therapist. I had a load of repressed memories. You just can't take it all at once, it's way too much.

I know it's cliche, but Time helped. All I could do was keep my appointments which was dreadful. After awhile I started to settle down and learn some skills.

I wish you well.

 

[Mystery]

Such great advice KwanYingirl, it's so good to hear that from someone who came through the otherside, for all of us.

 

[Sunset]

I don't know. I honestly don't know if I can keep my appointments when it seems like things are actively getting worse - to the point where treatment seems to send me from "bad but stable" to "suicidal" quite frequently.

I just get fussed at by therapists. I always get told I'm not cooperating or don't really care or whatever. The truth is, I can't trust them. I just can't. I cannot get the level of interaction I would need to trust a therapist within the therapeutic context.

I just don't trust the mental health system. Maybe most of them were good. But it only takes a single person putting lies in your file to ruin your trust forever. And of course medical records mean those lies stay with you over and over and over and you have to answer for them to skeptical professionals for ages.

Seriously, I'm starting to melt down just thinking about it. I need my meds, my gp won't keep prescribing them, but I just end up melting down and hurting myself even thinking about making the appointment. I know I go really bad off my meds but it's getting so bad just trying to deal with the mental health system again and I don't know what to do...I want to hurt myself and I need someone to intervene that isn't part of that system, some way to get help that means I never have to talk to any of those people again because the pain is too strong.

 

[Mystery]

I'm hearing you Sunset. Perhaps there is someone like that, like an advocate who can come with you. An advocate is someone who has been a consumer of the MH system and is relatively well, enough to handle being your 'interpreter'. Usually hospitals or outpatient services have people like that for you to use. In Australia, they have to. Advocates are independent of the hospital and they are there to help clients get what they need and overcome their communication issues.

I get like you are describing when I have to go for any gynaecological treatment. I just can't do it. I have to have someone I know and trust, holding my hand. I still shake, hyperventilate and cry all the same. You really need someone with you, I think, to speak for you when you feel you can't.

 

[xena21]

I just don't trust the mental health system. Maybe most of them were good. But it only takes a single person putting lies in your file to ruin your trust forever

I understand this very well. I didn't trust the mental health "system" at all after I was sent to the State Hospital from a private hospital because my insurance ran out. It was a 6 month ordeal of terror. The reason I tell you this is that despite the fear and rage I had toward this "system", I still was able to meet another therapist that has helped me.

I did go through a few that were horrible and I wouldn't trust them as far as I could throw them, but I finally found this one. I would say just don't give up the search despite your terror of the system. My terror was so tremendous I can't really give it justice in words. I just knew that I would die without getting therapy. I'm not saying I have complete trust in this person, nor does that mean you need to have complete trust. I do allow this person enough room in my life to hear my troubles and offer solutions that I wouldn't be able to come up with myself.

As far as the drugs, is there any way your primary care could get your medications for you? If you can't see a psychiatrist sometimes they will do that for you.

 

[Sunset]

For me it's not really my ability to speak up, as much as that I don't feel like I have the ability to say no and have it respected. I need to know that I can go in and make decisions about my medications, including ones that the doctors don't necessarily agree with, and not be labelled crazy for it. I want to be trusted that I'm not suicidal instead of having my behavior analyzed for any possible "signs" that I know nothing of.

That's what really bothers me. It's like you can just be arrested and locked up like a criminal. The way the determination of if someone is a danger or not is done, it has little basis in actuality and much more basis in the personal biases of the doctor. I feel like it's a system where simply being different is penalized, and you can easily be labelled crazy or even dangerous merely for being different.

My GP says they won't keep prescribing psych medications, I have to go to a psychiatrist to get them. They've got a time limit on how long I can keep getting medications from them.

 

[xena21]

It's like you can just be arrested and locked up like a criminal. The way the determination of if someone is a danger or not is done, it has little basis in actuality and much more basis in the personal biases of the doctor

I understand that. I get what you are saying and can sympathize. It sucks all the way around. The system doesn't work well in many ways. Obviously you and I have seen it in its very bad form. I have had doctors just make fun of me and my fears. One head doctor told me to not worry about the other people in the hospital, but to rely on my military and law enforcement training so as not to be afraid. I could defend myself against the other patients. Its a horrible system and the doctors are right up there with the worst of the worst.

The thing is there are some who are good, its just you have to find them. I never thought I would find anyone after the torture I saw. I tried killing myself 3 times after leaving the state hospital, and never thought anyone wold help me. This one doctor has been a great resource. I can't say I haven't been desperate since then, but I know she and others still are out there.

I hope you can find someone too.

 

[Sunset]

At this point...I don't care if there are good ones out there. It only takes one bad one to seriously mess you up. I'm still dealing with the consequences of a doctor who called my family behind my back, 5 years later. That's just way more risk than I want to take.

That's the crux of the matter, for me. I can hear all day that most of them are good. It just doesn't matter. What matters is that there are bad ones out there, and that the system gives them almost unlimited power. It's like being handed a bottle of pills and most of them will help but one of them is poison.