My cool blog :)

haita - 26 - he/him antipsychiatry leftist ACAB includes MH workers minors DNI please. DNI if MAP/"pro-ship"/whatever term you use to defend gross behaviors or radfem/terf/exc.

[innerchildabortionclinic]

there is something very sad and humiliating about having to desperately beg doctors and family members to understand that involuntary institutionalization does not in fact help your mental health, knowing your perspective will always be dismissed at the end of the day

it's such an awful existence to be a psychiatric patient as a teenager, there has to be another way to help aggressively suicidal teenagers, such as addressing the circumstances that make them want to die so much in the first place! you can stop suicide by locking someone up, sure, but they will not want to live

[doe-eyed-disaster]

it's awful that researchers are only now starting to take this perspective seriously, but there is a small but growing body of study supporting exactly what patients have been saying about psychiatric incarceration. one study in particular, from Allegheny county in Pennsylvania, offers a damning analysis of involuntary psychiatric commitments:

For individuals whose cases are judgment calls, where some physicians would hospitalize but others would not, we find that hospitalization nearly doubles both the probability of dying by suicide or overdose and also nearly doubles the probability of being charged with a violent crime in the three months after evaluation. We provide evidence of earnings and housing disruptions as potential mechanisms. Our results suggest that, on the margin, the system we study is not achieving the intended effects of the policy.

[enbaluka-tokyo-drift]

[4shtronomy]

This is so true and it's very common to be misdiagnosed in general for actual physical disabilities to be mental illnesses/disabilities.

I have fatigue, headaches (now looking if they're migraines), and dizziness. Before even being considered to be POTS and migraines I was diagnosed with Disruptive mood dysregulation disorder. As I was not believed by my head doctor to actually be in any pain. I then 2 years later after multiple failed doctors went to urgentcare for the all of it again (for the second time), and got sent to a Psychiatrist who made me take antidepressants. They obviously did nothing as that wasn't my issue.

My friend has a stomach issue that got dismissed for a long time as just anxiety. Another friend was misdiagnosed for years before getting to her Reumatoid Arthtritis. I have at least 7 more examples of people I know.

When something is wrong with the body, doctors can and do tend to dismiss it as mental. And I do think it has to do with gender in this case as most of the people that I know that have had this happen to them are women/were socially imposed as women/fem presenting.

Also the typical "but if you are seeing a therapist they won't do so because you would be diagnosed/in the process" is shit. I've had these issues for the last 5 years. I've been going to therapy for 8.

[i-suggest-psych-abolition]

I have a suggestion

[battle-for-dyke-island]

this is what healthcare is like as a disabled person

[fenrichaita]

There isn't a significant difference between how a person who is wrong or delusional is treated by psychiatry, and a person who is correct or who is accurately describing their situation is treated.

There isn't a significant difference between the way a person who is catastrophizing is treated by psychiatry, and the way a person with reasonable concerns about their situation is treated.

There isn't a significant difference between the way a liar is treated by psychiatry, and the way someone who is telling the truth is treated by psychiatry.

There isn't a significant difference between the way someone who is having a disproportionately intense reaction to something is treated by psychiatry, and the way someone who is having a reasonable, common, and/or expected reaction to a difficult situation is treated.

The fact that psychiatry assumes that the patient is always wrong or mistaken means that it is overall disinterested in the truth and actual facts of practically any situation. It does not matter to them and once the psychiatric professional decides what your situation is, you cannot reason them out of it.

[is-this-fascism]

nobody ever talks about how 'compliance' is directly at odds with boundary setting. compliance in mental healthcare is for insurance companies only. it's for their metrics and to ensure the poor insurance companies that their money is being used 'properly', i.e. the way they demand.

when a mental health service demands compliance, they're threatening to cut you off from services for enforcing your boundaries. 'i will not take that medication that gives me awful side effects and doesn't work' is non-compliance and grounds for termination from the program. 'i will not attend group therapy on the weekends' is non-compliance and grounds for termination from the program. 'i will not answer a call from staff past 8pm' is non-compliance and grounds for termination. 'i will keep my door locked while i'm sleeping' is non-compliance and grounds for termination. 'i will attempt to make friends and seek peer support from other members' is non-compliance and grounds for termination.

compliance, and that is the actual word they use, is an archaic and backwards way to force people to not set boundaries in terms of their care. it shuffles them along through a system that may or may not, and likely will not work for them because they know what they need and insurance companies do not. insurance companies do not have their best interests in mind, their interests are profit and spending as little money on the crazies as possible, and they will literally hire a person whose job it is to find any reason to kick people out of whatever care program it is, and they'll frame it as 'if you don't comply, you must not want help! we can't help you if you don't comply!!'

[talestobetold]

an offshoot of this is actions taken "against medical advice." from what i've seen, psych wards i've been in are always allowed to hold you for 72 hours at their discretion, barring a court order. after 72 hours, you are technically free to go, but if the doctor does not give you their say-so to leave, it is "against medical advice" and therefore will not be covered by insurance. which means the 72 hours of hold you did not agree to can now be leveraged by the hospital as debt insurance will not pay unless you do whatever the staff wants.

i also witnessed a patient begin the process to leave against medical advice and still be delayed over 24 hours before discharge. so he stayed for four full days against his will, the last day in violation of his rights by the law, and likely had to pay $3-5k out of pocket for the pleasure.

requiring patients to follow medical advice or comply with doctor orders is not neutral, and mandates the destruction of the patient's autonomy and boundaries. refusal to comply with a treatment plan without consequence ought to be a protected right. it is only through sanism and ableism, and the unshakable faith that doctors are both experts in all health matters and authorities in moral matters, that we strip the rights of psych patients and force "care" on them against their will

[fenrichaita]

There's just something so invalidating about how the response nowadays to anyone opening up about mental health struggles or really, any type to struggle, is some referral to mental health services. Tossing a "seek therapy" or "get help" takes no effort or thought and does absolutely nothing for the person receiving it. They most likely already know mental health resources are an option, but there are barriers to receiving them that can be the reason why they're opening up to their loved ones or the internet. Actual, practical advice is so much more meaningful than generic suggestions to see a professional that could have come from basically anyone.

What is worse is that I see so many of these suggestions prefaced with softening words like, "gently," or "I mean this kindly, but" that kind of clue you in that what they're saying is not so gentle and not so kind. When you really look at what people are saying when they use phrases like, "go to therapy", or "seek help" as thinly veiled insults or character judgements, or when they advocate for "mental health services" directly after horrific acts of violence such as school shootings, there is an implication there. If it wasn't there, they wouldn't have to soften the supposedly neutral act of suggesting therapy. So, are these generic suggestions (that I could "gently" label as genuinely worthless for the majority of people who receive them) even well meaning in the first place?

[fenrichaita]

The problem with psychiatry and the broader mental health institution is that if the treatments make you worse, it is only ever considered a reason to double down on those treatments. No reasonable person or institution would ever believe that detaining people, resulting in them possibly losing their pets or jobs or homes while in detention, subjecting them to abuse, sexual violence, or forced drugging, then making them pay for it, would make someone less suicidal instead of more. And yet we still have psychiatric incarceration.

[fenrichaita]

things have been really bad this week and it's making my ocd flare up really badly when it hasn't done that in forever. i am ruminating really badly and it's basically all i can do.

[starblaster]

The very concept of 'voluntary' psychiatric hospitalization is so absurd and laughable to me. No one who has ever been subjected to psychiatric confinement has ever been fully informed of the kind of treatment they will receive in the psych ward. Informed consent does not exist in psychiatry.

You may naïvely go in as a 'voluntary' psych patient believing that psychiatric hospital staff are acting in your self-interest only to emerge finally realizing that their only job is to prevent you from having any human dignity or bodily autonomy whatsoever.

[sailatina3]

If a suicide could've been avoided by just having more money, it was a murder.

[pixie-stick-it-to-the-man]

so apparently the dsm 6 is being structured around bio-pathologizing mental illness specifically in the direction of biomarkers…if u aren’t concerned about this maybe you should be…

DSM-6 Will Be Structured Around Biomarkers—Despite Acknowledgment There Aren’t Any

Psychiatry is hard at work crafting the newest edition of its diagnostic bible, DSM-6.

[sin0fempathy]

…so they’re now trying to search for “biomarkers”- which are essentially genes, or circumstances of conception/birth/what have you, that can “increase the risk” of mental illnesses. how is this any different from people wondering if there’s a “gay gene?” or autism speaks trying to find a genetic or reproductive “cure for autism?”

it’s not. this is barely disguised eugenics that they have ACKNOWLEDGED may (will) do more to harm than good for people with abnormal mental states. what else could the end result of finding a “mental illness gene” be than a reason to further marginalize those who are already marginalized, already branded as more likely to be (or even inherently) “mentally ill” and eventually discourage them to reproduce, either by coercion or force?

it’s more obvious than ever now. everyone should be anti psych

[fvckw4d]

I'm sorry, ERP or exposure therapy, THE ocd treatment, has a less than 50% success rate and has a 25% drop out rate.

[fvckw4d]

People are going to see this and go "oh do you think real treatment that helps people is bad and no one should do it." I think people should be allowed to do whstever the fuck they want. I just think people aren't very honest about the psychological toll these treatments can have, which is the number one reason people either don't complete ERP, never start it, or it doesn't work for them. People act like purposefully triggering yourself is nbd bc it "isn't real" and if you cant handle it, you just werent committed to "processing your discomfort enough," and that's the attitude most psychiatrists have as well.

[i-suggest-psych-abolition]

I have a suggestion

[kulluto-remade-deactivated20201]

[wheelie-sick]

it really pisses me off when I tell someone about my experience with lupus psychosis (caused by cerebritis, a form of brain inflammation) and they're like "wow someone should have brought you to the psych ward."

that actually would probably have killed me.

lupus psychosis is caused by an autoimmune disease (literally brain inflammation), it's not psychiatric. antipsychotics do absolutely nothing to help lupus psychosis. the only thing that can improve lupus psychosis is treatment for the lupus itself.

when people with lupus psychosis are admitted to a psych ward with a misdiagnosed psychotic disorder they often die. when people with lupus psychosis are in the psych ward they are often put on increasingly high doses of antipsychotics and other psychiatric drugs and aren't discharged. they are often denied other medical care because it's "unnecessary" and often because "it's just their psychosis"

I hope I don't need to explain why ignoring brain inflammation is dangerous.

[fenrichaita]

A lot of what is asked of patients to do in exposure therapy is pretty ridiculous. Like, especially when you look at what people who have contamination related obsessions are asked to do in ERP. They will be asked to do things that anyone would recognize as harmful or unsanitary, and the patient's unwillingness or hesitance to do it would be seen as a facet of their disorder.

It is not healthy to ask a patient to become "desensitized" in this way or to ask them to ignore real risks or rational disgust as "treatment". This treatment is more about accepting needless pain and discomfort than healing.

[fenrichaita]

I think some mental health aphorisms like "don't give people with OCD assurance" started out somewhat well meaning advice based on what worked for some people with the diagnosis and have eventually devolved into rationalizations to accidentally or purposefully justify abuse.

Like, "it gets worse before it gets better" started out as a saying that means sometimes entering recovery or taking the steps towards improving your life means that things will be more difficult before they become easier. And then it just became a justification to continue enduring abusive "treatments" because of the promise of a carrot at the end of the tunnel, even though you're not given any proof that you will eventually receive that carrot or even that the carrot exists.

[hexpatient]

i think thr phemonemon of recovered (even if partially) mentally ill people doing microaggressions to other mentally ill people in the trenches is maybe because they truly forget what its like. these days i actually notice that within myself sometimes and i have to gently grip myself on the shoulders and say "Do Not Forget What It Was Like and say Some fucking Bullshit to people who are Still There."

that and i think when you're not in the pits of hell, the tired mental illness cliches like eat healthy do yoga go outside make a lot more sense.

but the thing is in my experience is that that change is a EFFECT of things being better, not the CAUSE. please remember to not slug your peers with bullshit because youve forgotten what its like to live in the pit. i am begging you.

[onedayillbedeadddd-deactivated2]

psychiatry as an industry directly benefits from putting those who participate in an "us vs them" mentality in regards to interactions with other mentally ill people.

if you have an unpleasant interaction with someone else who is mentally ill, you can tout the fact that youre in therapy and on medication, something they're clearly in dire need of. you can talk about how theyre obviously unhealed and must hate themselves and they need to fix themselves like you have. you're better than them.

people who are in therapy are the group that have actively been the most hostile towards me in my life. and I truly do believe this is by design. they want to isolate you to the point you feel you have no choice but to succumb to their wishes and start attending therapy and taking psych meds.