Part 2

This one is going unpublished, so I figured id throw YWN a bone. This is part 2 of my mental health series. Apparently it was too impersonal and too educational for Ami magazine. Whatever…

There are grammatical errors, I know, but I can’t be bothered to edit something which will not be published. Enjoy.

In my previous article I outlined all the reasons why a person should seek care when they are diagnosed with or suspect they have a mental illness. In this article I will try and explain how the mental health system works so that you, unlike my family, can be better prepared for the mess that is the American mental health system.

As I said previously, it has really been the past 3 years that have been the most trying. For one simple reason. During all those other hospitalizations, my mother, once committed, acquiesced to treatment. In other words, at the time of admittance, her commission to the psychiatric ward was involuntary. Once treatment began, however, she realized that there was, in fact, cause for her commission. On the other hand, as I have explained, she, for the most part, saw no valid reason for her commission.

Perhaps it would be wise to explain the laws behind involuntary commission. A person may be involuntarily committed to a psychiatric ward if they present a danger to themselves or others. What that basically means, is that if you seem someone muttering on the street to no one in particular, no matter how annoying, they are well within their rights to mutter and there is absolutely nothing you can do about it. If, however, you see a person either harming themselves or harming or intending to harm another person, you may call the police and have the person involuntarily committed.

By all accounts, both from personal experience and research I have done on this matter, voluntary commission is the ideal option. When a patient voluntarily commits herself the doctors are basically given a waiver to decide when the patient should be discharged. If a doctor feels that a patient needs more care, because the patient committed herself she effectively deferred completely to the opinion of the doctor. No hearings, no 72 hour sign outs. Moreover, a patient who commits herself is more receptive to treatment as they are not actively fighting the doctors’ every effort.

So al that was getting the patient to the hospital, but what happens once the patient is admitted? There are some very important things that the family of a psychiatric patient should know. The most important is to understand that your loved one has a disease. It may not manifest itself physically, but believe you me it is equally as real as a broken bone, heart attack, or cancer. you need to come to terms with the fact that your loved one has disease which must be treated, and much in the same way that you wouldn’t say to a cancer patient “they have no idea what they’re talking about, you’re fine,” do not ever say that to a psychiatric patient. Ever. Many psychiatric patients are already predisposed to paranoid as either a direct symptom of their specific illness or because of an affective disorder affiliated with their specific illness. All you accomplish by saying that is heightening their paranoia and denial.

The second thing you must understand is that your loved one will be hospitalized for a while. Anywhere from 2 weeks to two months. Expect it. Such is the nature of psychiatric treatment. The mind is a very delicate entity controlled by a very specific set of chemicals. The slightest imbalance in those chemicals can lead to catastrophe, so you will understand if the treatment is a little hit or miss. Certain medications will not work with others, others will induce side effects which require further medication to keep the side effects at bay, however while doing so, clash with the original medicines. Others, such as lithium, lose their effectiveness after q patient stops taking their medicine and never work again on that patient.

Taking all that into consideration you should now understand the prognoses you will be given. It takes between 6 and 8 weeks for a doctor to verify that a specific regiment is working. Letting a patient out after 2 weeks if the patient really required 8 seems, at first, like kindness, but infant tell you that it is utter cruelty. As a result of said “kindness” the patient will, in the long run, require up to 3 times the original prescribed hospitalization time if not more. Trust me; you don’t want the doctors getting the cocktail wrong. Let them do what they have to do. Ask all the questions you like, the more the better. But before questioning a doctor’s competence make sure you have a very good reason. You could be doing your loved one a great disservice. Which leads into my next essential nugget.

This next part has been a pet peeve of mine for quite a while, and I hope that those readers in the medical community can try and rectify this serious flaw in the mental health system. As I said above, no patient really wants to be in a psychiatric ward. Therefore, a patient will tell a doctor whatever he wants to hear, and it is up to the doctor to decide if the act was convincing enough. Sometimes it is, and a patient is released, prematurely, from the hospital.

We tried. We went down to his office at the hospital, we left messages on his answering machine, and we even spoke to the man once or twice. On every occasion we were rebuffed due, or so the doctor claimed, to doctor-patient confidentiality. To all the psychiatrists and psychologists out there, you are wrong. You are doing your patients and their families a great disservice by closing your ear to the feedback of those close to the patient. To those who are open to feedback, I commend you. Your progress is refreshing.