What Happens If You Go In For A Psych Evaluation And They Tell You You Need To Be Comitted?

[user27357]

Just wondering, what are the laws concerning the situation I am contemplating. I mean, if I let the seed of ideation grow it will become a larger and larger desire to stop this life, so I may decide that I need help stopping myself and go to an ER for what I have always heard called a psych evaluation. If it is determined I am a danger to myself, am i basically under arrest? Do i have any rights to get up and go home? What happens to my job responsibilities, my income, my health insurance, my financial responsibilities?

It is not a choice i take lightly, if I am about to do something permanent I want to go get help stopping myself, but not if it is just a source of more reasons that I should have just done it. Life sucks enough right now without the burden of having asked for help only to get a whole nother shit storm placed on me and my family. Dead is dead, unless I have added bankruptcy and loss of income and loss of health insurance and the stigma of being institutionalised to the mix and then just ended it after the additional shit storm hit. Thats worse than dead somehow.

I am so aware that I am not going to be happy, that my whole existence has been to make others comfortable and that they are never going to reciprocate. i trust no one, i don't even want to trust again now. Divorce just pays the lawyers, but suicide gives all of what's left goes to the undeserving people I have loved for no apparent reason. Somehow that's better. I don't really get it but it is.

Can anyone speak from experience? In the US is it a mistake to seek help at a hospital for a psych evaluation and possible time out at club White robe and slippers?

 

[EveHarrington]

Hi,

I strongly urge you to seek out therapy. IMHO therapy can help you bypass this whole ER process in many cases.

If you are deemed to be a harm to yourself or others, you can be held for 72 hours. Pretty much you belong to them for 72 hours. This means they have 72 hours to determine if you need to stay longer or if you can go home. And no, at this point you have no right to get up and walk out. You can/will be restrained if a doc says you must stay. They have a legal right to hold you.

As for your responsibilities, nobody here can say what happens. What would happen if you suddenly became ill and couldn't leave the house? It's sort of the same (or should be------barring discrimination).

 

[aut555]

Just wondering, what are the laws concerning the situation I am contemplating. I mean, if I let the seed...

Would you schedule a meeting with a therapist to be evaluated? Things seem gloomy, but things do improve. So to talk it out may help you avoid Club white robe. You could go to ER and ask for something to stable your nerves until your appointment. Good luck, try thinking positive thoughts.

 

[Bill Dickerson]

If it gets real bad yes go to the ER by all means but I think you see it as an all or nothing scenario. There are tons of places to go on your own. You may feel like life sucks right now but try to look both short term like finding a Therapist and long term things will get better eventually.

 

[Justmehere]

I have been put on a 72 hour hold in the past - also called a 5150.

It wasn't fun. It kept me alive. That's why they did it.

You do have rights and it's not the same as being under arrest. You will have to google to see what rights are offered for your state.

I'd suggest checking out Bazelon Center for mental Health Law's info on what's called and Advance Psychiatric directive: it basically gives the hospital a fairly weighty guide about how you would like to be treated if put on a hold. Link Removed It will help the hospital help you and it will give you a lot more say in your care.

In many areas in the US there is a shortage of inpatient beds so they generally don't put people on hold unless they are in danger of immenient harm.

Generally, if you go into the ER and meet with the doctor and mental health assessor (usually a therapist) and talk to them about your struggle honestly and engrave with them to come up with a plan for safety, then they generally won't put you on a hold. They may just keep you for a few hours and just give you some help getting outpatient care set up and a plan to make it until you can get into an outpatient therapist.

In the end, if the choice is die or go to the ER, go. I have had negative experiences (which is how I learned about the power of psych directives to help prevent them) but if I couldn't keep myself alive while outside of the ER, I would go back.

If you are having a lot of ideation and are not sure if you should go or not, you can also call a crisis line and see if they can help you make that decision.

Generally, the sooner you reach out for help, the less drastic the intervention will need to be. So reaching out sooner than later can likely lead to a more helpful and positive experience with less restrictions on your freedom.

 

[user27357]

I went to a therapist last night, i go every two weeks and asked for an extra session last night.

I am an ex EMT that has seen many suicide scenes. I know what works. That counts as ideation. I have been thinking about it for years, thats a count against me. The only thing that I would have going for me if I went to an ER and asked for a 48 hour safe harbor reprieve from stress and turmoil would be that I haven't attempted before and that I engage the interviewer. Other than that I risk being held until they don't want to hold me anymore and I can't do that.

If I wanted to kill myself I would be dead, by an efficient and 100% effective means, no bloody mess, no possibility that someone else gets blamed, no risk of being found by someone that shouldn't see the body. I know what works and the system cannot really be made unavailable to me nor can I remove it from my life entirely, everything I need is within about a minute from this keyboard. Phone call, address, short walk collecting necessary items, final conclusion to the life gone bad. Just another life thrown out like last weeks lettuce, gone bad, no return.

If I need a time away from the possibility of doing this thing that consumes my thoughts with all the possibility of doing it and the reasons I would want to held back for a short time, I risk being held beyond the length of time that I could get away with in my current situation. I can't risk it until I am sure I have no choice but to save my life by risking f*cking up my life. I can't do a psych eval without saving a life that will be more f*cked up than before. I can't do it unless it is a choice between death and hospitalization. But I have to make that choice, not some nurse practitioner and a board of psychs that look at her notes.

my counselor said: Look at all the things you have, some people would kill for what you have- I replied: I did kill for it, I killed me. Me is already dead. I am a walking shell of a man, in a well appointed home with a nice retirement coming and good vehicles and a boat and two dogs and a collection of guitars and a 30 year career. I just don't have anyone I trust or anyone I like anymore and I don't want to risk it ever again, I don't have a reason to shake off the PTSD nightmares and get up and go to work anymore. I don't have any joy at the end of the day to look forward to. I dread sleep. I resent my past and don't have any hope for the future. This is looking like the time I dreaded all along, when the suicide seed planted deep in my soul long ago finally blooms and I just have to step back and say finally, enough. lets do it and be done.

Scares the snot out of me.

 

[EveHarrington]

It sounds like you want help but you only want it on your terms.

Unfortunately it doesn't work that way so you have to decide if you want to continue on this current path or if you're willing to step outside of your comfort zone and try something different.

 

[Sideways]

Me is already dead

Simply not true.

The existence you have right now? I get that might not be much. You may well have nothing that is important to you in your life. Right now.

2 things I would say about that. First, in the middle of a major depressive episode, helplessness and hopelessness and the lost ability to feel pleasure (in anything) are all key symptoms. What you are describing, what you are feeling, is exactly that. You are having a MDE.

Depression, even in its worst form, is an illness. And one that you can recover from, if you can just keep yourself alive, and engage in treatment. And no, it's not rainbows and bunny rabbits overnight. But you're talking about a permanent and irreversible decision (suicide) as a means of ending a temporary and treatable illness. It can, and does, get better.

You've clearly spent a lot of time thinking as rationally as possible about this. But as rational as you think it is - it's all symptoms. You can't see things improving, and believe you've been struggling too long, because you have a treatable illness that is preventing you from seeing it any other way

Second, one of the few certainties in this life? It changes. You may feel like you've been in this situation for way too long. But it will change. Even if you do nothing, your life will change, because life changes around you whether you like it or not. And if you work towards recovery? It gets better. It really does.

I live with ongoing suicidal ideation. But after about a decade of chronic suicidal intent, I can tell you that it is genuinely possible to live with the idea of suicide in the back of your mind (because, by now, it's habit), and know that you're not going to because being alive is worth it.

What you are describing: symptoms of a treatable illness. So keep reaching out, communicating with your T, and go to the ER if you need to just keep yourself alive for a little while.

They don't hold you until they want to let you go. They hold you until the worst of it, the really dangerous part, has passed. And they do it that way because it always passes. If you can find a way to keep yourself alive, it will pass. Even if it comes back? Repeat, because it will pass.

My experience with involuntary admissions in Australia (for what it's worth), is even once inside, they will assist you to contact people to make arrangements so that your life stays as intact as possible for when you get out. Organising rent, notifying work that you're in hospital (they don't need to know your diagnosis, and IME don't tend to assume you're in the mental health ward - hospital could mean anything) - you are isolated to an extent, but they do want you to get out, and be able to go home, and still have your life.

 

[Deleted member 541]

Well, if you're like me, then you fight it tooth and nail. You give them every reason in the book why you don't need to go in. Work, commitments that you can't get out of. Blah, blah, blah... what I basically do even when I'm in the hospital trying to get out.

I guess it comes down to how far you will go to get better. What's important for your recovery, and if you think it will help you stabilize.

I've been in a good psych ward, and one not so good. But with both of them I learn new things. So it may be worth the trip.

 

[user27357]

another 24 hours, still alive. 25 if you count the clock reset we do here in the US. Feeling better, probably because I have been wearing myself out working away at projects. I raked a pile of leaves 6 foot deep, 50 yards from the tree they fell from on a day that we got a full inch of rain at the local airport. I tore apart a hot tub control center and decided it wasn't worth fixing so I upgraded the load center to accept a more modern version that arrives next week. I played my guitar for two solid hours, hard fast music that I know by heart and can improvise all over the top of. that last bit sounds more like fun than work but I drenched a t shirt and sweated through a ball cap doing it. I replaced all of the 9 volt batteries powering my smoke detectors, and I forgot to mention I cleaned the gutters when I was raking up leaves but I do it by climbing up on the roof and blowing them out with a leaf blower, quite the cheater am I. tomorrow I change the oil and filters in two trucks and go get my eyes examined, maybe start in building a birthday present I promised a son in law. If I stay busy, I don't have time to think about the things that depress me, so busy I am.

thanks everyone.

 

[Knak]

I was almost committed when a new Psychiatrist asked me if I knew how I would try to kill myself, and I told her how I would do it (I would never do it that way).

When she said I had to be hospitalized I said "no I'm not going in" (like "no thanks"). She got furious and said I had no choice. Finally she said if my husband said he would handle it, she would retract.

I later remembered it is a question with one answer to avoid commitment, i.e., saying no. She had one required response if I said something different.

You can always schedule a psych evaluation but they are in business for profit and can make you feel it is imperative. That happened to me and I felt like I was insane until a friend explained that.

I'm not sure if life is worth it often times, when I have to keep walking through the same muck without relief. Talking to the right person is the one thing that helps keep me from giving up - someone who cares, and understands because they've been there. Sometimes it's hard to find and takes energy you may not have at the moment.

As far as your job, insurance, etc., it's different for everyone. I got pulled in by "you will never know if this is the thing that will heal you unless you try" and lost thousands of dollars by their greed. Some ask "what is worth more?". However they don't know what you will deal with afterward and won't be there to help.

I have been sure there was nothing good in the future enough times to know it's only my thinking, and things do change eventually. You cannot see the light at the end of the tunnel when you are in the tunnel of chaos. It is good to endure the pain just so you know by experience the next time you feel hopeless, that things change. You become stronger and smarter. You understand things you didn't know before and what to avoid.