Most of you know my story. I have regularly struggled with anxiety and depression throughout my life. Most people have struggled with it at different points. I always knew that there was a terrible stigma around mental health issues, but I never understood the magnitude of it until today.
I went in to see my OBGYN today for a follow up (I have an 8 week old baby). I had talked to my doctor a few weeks before my son was born and we identified that I was a high risk for Postpartum Depression (PPD). At the appointment today, I expressed that I believe I am experiencing PPD. My doctor asked if I had thoughts of harming myself and I said that I had in my past and had acted on those, but now, using logic, I know that those actions solve no issues.
Ignoring basically everything I said, the doctor sent me down to the ER to "get checked by a counselor" before going home. Knowing very little about how hospitals work, I assumed it was gonna be an easy evaluation and possible referral or prescription and then I would go home.
WRONG.
I did the paperwork, and waited for them to call me back. Again, I thought I was going to an office to talk to an on-staff counselor. A nurse called me back and took vitals. Then he led me to the nurse's station, handed me a 'Patient's Belongings' bag and some scrubs that seemed to be made of paper towels, and a cup for a urine sample. I was told that all clothing had to come off and they needed me to pee in the cup. I couldn't even keep my own socks.
When I came out of the bathroom, they took my bag of clothes and handed them to a police officer for him to search it. I was then taken to a bed in the hallway and the ER doctor came to speak with me. We had the same conversation as I had with my doctor just 3 floors above. He ordered some blood work and gave me some pills for anxiety because I was so upset I couldn't sit still and he left. I sat waiting until the nurse came to do the blood work. I ended up refusing them to do that blood work because of the phobia that I have. When my anxiety levels are already elevated, my reaction to drawing labs is much much worse.
I was stripped of my phone so I had to sit in a hallway while staff and other patients and guests passed my bed staring. Only the Psychiatric patients dressed out in scrubs. Everyone knew why I was sitting there. I was beyond humiliated. I sat there for 7.5 hours before they had the decency to move me to a room. When I was moved to a room, it was practically a closet. There was one bed and nothing else. Not even a pillow. The walls were white. The door had braces on it so they could lock me in there if need be, but unless I got violent, the door stayed open.
I wasn't allowed to leave. 8 hours of sitting.
The doctor's office had given me a pamphlet before they sent me downstairs. This pamphlet stated the statistics of PPD and the treatments for PPD (among other things as well). The treatments are antidepressants and therapy. The hospital gave me neither of those.
I waited 8 hours on a phone call from the Helen Ross McNabb Center for them to tell me that I can look at a list of what therapists I can go to on my insurance's website.
I was on suicide watch because I told my doctor I felt depressed and have had thoughts of harming myself in the PAST. This hospital treated me like I was either crazy or a criminal. I was told that if I tried to leave, security would "keep that from happening".
NO WONDER people choose suicide over getting help.
They are afraid of being treated like THIS^^^.
Being stripped of your clothing and dignity and being held captive is enough to make a person lose their sanity and never want to reach out for help again.
This stigma on mental health needs to go away. We can't treat people with anxiety and depression like they're off their rocker. If we were all completely honest with ourselves, we would say we have all experienced a mental health challenge at one point or another. When someone is depressed, you don't strip them of their identity and write them off as hopeless! You help that person redefine their perceptions and help them find a way to be whole again.
- I am extremely disappointed and honestly hurt at the way I was treated at Fort Sanders Regional Medical Center and their Women's Specialists office today. Feel free to share, share, share if this made you as mad as it made me and those that supported me today!
