The Hospital Monster

After many weeks of coughing to the point of vomit and feeling exhausted from head to toe, sleepless nights and worsening symptoms I cracked. I don’t cope well with my mental health issues at the best of times, but putting the burden of physical illness on top of that is just cruel. I haven’t self-harmed for three weeks and one day, but the urges were powerful and violent last night. I feel disappointed after a self harm incident that all I have to show for it is a bit of blood and not much pain, so lately I’ve been thinking it would be nice to have a souvenir e.g.: a nipple, a toe, the end of my nose, a chunk of flesh bitten off wolf style, a cut right through my cheek; obviously I am aware that all of these are very bad ideas but it’s frightening what can be done on impulse.

Having experienced thoroughly useless results with the CAT team on the phone in the past, and repulsed by my local hospital, I drove to the next closest public which offers psych services. I must add that prior to this I tried to get see my GP but she’s booked until next week and the entire clinic was booked last night. I was hoping that at the hospital they could offer me some relief for the vomiting-cough, shaking, hot and cold spells and my mental anguish, I was mistaken. The triage nurse was lovely and thought I’d made a good choice to go there rather than stay home, the DR couldn’t hear anything in my chest, but he didn’t do any further investigation and left me as I was, but he understood my anguish and went to fetch the CAT team; he came back to check on me, apologised for the delay and offered me sedatives etc. Four hours later I was greeted by the psych nurse – I think I actually hate her.

She asked what I was expecting from them; I was hoping for an overnight admission, a drug re-assessment - because I think the recent changes are involved in my physical state – and basically just containment until I was feeling safer. But in my half asleep state (it was 1am and I hadn’t slept the previous night) I just said “euthanasia or a padded cell”. She snorted and said to be realistic, I then attempted to explain the situation. She wouldn’t listen to me, she made huge assumptions and didn’t take note of my corrections, and then this beauty of a line emerged from her lips: “It’s not like you’re dealing with a psychotic illness, it’s just depression, anxiety and borderline, you need to try harder”.  I was livid but maintained composure, I explained that I’m seeing my psychiatrist fortnightly, psychologist weekly, GP fortnightly, currently being assessed for DBT, taking my meds as prescribed, and coming here tonight instead of acting on very strong self harm urges; that I had reached the point in the combination of conditions whereby I could no longer suppress the ever present urges and I needed help. Again she said I wasn’t trying hard enough; through tears I managed to utter that I’m doing all I can. I said I wasn’t going to listen to anymore of this, got up and left, she asked “if you storm out of here now, am I going to be seeing you again shortly for self-harm?” my reply “You won’t be seeing me again.” I left balling my eyes out – and just so you know I’m not a crier - that was the first time in many months (excluding a few drops over M recently), I was vomiting from crying and coughing, shaking head to toe and nearly crashed my car on the way home, partly because I wanted to kill myself and also because I didn’t have the will or strength to drive well.

I arrived home in the same state I left the hospital, but mercifully, exhausted; pills, teeth-brushing and bed followed. I surrendered my last razor blade at the hospital (it was being stored in my handbag) so there was nothing other than kitchen knives to hurt myself with, though temptation was strong I didn’t yield. I was blessed with seven hours sleep, the most for a week. I have an appointment at my usual clinic, though not with my DR tonight, I’ve started the process of making an official complaint about my treatment last night and so far today I’m not feeling too terrible, though far from good.

Usually a post takes quite a while to write, I’m obsessed with making sure it’s readable, somewhat eloquent and I endeavour not to reveal my stupidity. This wrote its self in about 15 minutes, I haven’t had to go back and edit, just a proof read. Lesson learnt: Trauma is good for writing.