Ghost Mother Part 2...

(Or "How the Mental Health System Makes People Insane")

Originally published by Selena@Becausemotherhoodsucks.com

Tuesday, August 16, 2011

Depression has me in a death grip right now. It's serious. The anxiety is back with it and I feel like I am literally going insane. I can't stop the terrible thoughts that something is going to happen to me. Or that something awful IS happening to me. I feel like I am going to die.

Yesterday I went to the emergency room demanding to see someone right away. The psych ward has an emergency unit and I went there to wait. And wait. I waited for 9 hours. Granted during that time I was seen by a nurse for a psysical evaluation and I talked to a counselor to determine my mental condition but I did all that in the first two hours. It was seven more hours before I could see the doctor.

Understand that this is desperation talking. I would NEVER take just a simple sadness to the hospital because I live with sadness every day. This was different. This was extreme hopelessness mixed with agitated anxiety and I was willing to do anything to make it stop, even sit in a psych ward for 9 hours. If they wanted to check me in and put me with all the crazies I would do that. ANYTHING to make this stop. This is the kind of feeling that makes someone desperate for a way out. It just so happened that I am too much of a wuss to think about suicide. I am too afraid to die.

So I waited 9 hours and when I was finally called in to see the doctor I was met with a little white woman in a white shirt with white hair and glasses. She sat down and started asking me simple questions in such a way that I wanted to ask her if she was mad at me. I was afraid of her in a way. Or maybe intimidated is a better word. She had the power to find something to fix me or else send me away or perhaps even lock me up, although I felt it was unlikely because I was not a suicide threat.

I tried to answer her questions simply, as she kept saying "give me the short version" and so I couldn't tell her how I woke up with a jolt in the morning and felt like I was insane for most of the day. She didn't give me the chance to talk about how for the last few days I couldn't even bring myself to turn on my computer because it seems like too much work and I would rather just take one of my uncle's Xanax and sleep (I have done that 3 nights in a row, avoiding doing bathtime and bedtime with Lila because it feels like too much). I didn't get to tell her about how the news makes me cry and how my daughter keeps asking me when I am going to get better.

She criticized the place where I finally found a therapist without a 6 month waiting list. She criticized me for asking my family practitioner for psychoactive medications and said that it's probably her fault that I am like this. And although I tried to explain that I called 4 different places to see if I could see a Psychiatrist and was told all four times "we're not taking new patients". She literally rolled her eyes at this. LITERALLY. I fucking hated this woman.

She told me she was "recommending" that I increase my dosage of Cymbalta and we'll see if that helps. I put that in quotes because she then told me that she won't "tell me" that's what I should do, she will only "make a recommendation". I JUST WANT SOMEONE TO TELL ME WHAT THE FUCK TO DO TO FIX THIS SHIT LADY!!!!. But of course I didn't quite say that.

When I asked about the anxiety she just smiled this terrible sort of smile and said, "you can't tell me this is your first go round with anxiety," and she left it at that. I was shocked and couldn't say anything at all. What would you have said? Was she implying that I was one of those people just fishing for good drugs even though we talked about the fact that I don't even fucking drink? I started crying at that point out of sheer frustration, and told her that I was quite honestly scared. This did nothing to soften her. She told me that I had nothing to be scared of, and that I wasn't crazy, pointing to the woman in the hallway who was swearing at everyone who walked by her. She didn't even bother to add anything reassuring, like "I think you'll be fine".

I cried and cried and cried. It was by far the worst day of my life. I woke up today ready to go check myself into another hospital and instead went back to my regular family doctor, who sat me down and told me she would give me something for the anxiety. She told me that the recommendation to increase the dosage of my current medication would likely give me at least SOME relief and that I am not broken and that she would do anything she could to help, just to let her know what she could do.

I am trying SO FUCKING HARD not to give up completely. I am tempted to check in somewhere but this city is really lacking in decent mental health facilities. What I know is that I cannot go on like this. Something has to give. I am doing all the things that they tell you to do. I am seeking help. I am basically BEGGING someone to help me. And I am lucky that I was recently approved for Medicaid because two months ago, I didn't have insurance at all. Imagine what I would be up against then!

As a side note, I called for my "emergency follow up" and the lady gave me the earliest appointment available...OCTOBER 19!!! What the hell do they expect people to do? Seriously. What the fuck am I supposed to do? How am I going to get myself through this?