On The Subject Of "Humanity"
Now, I've made no secret about the fact that I have a mental illness. It's something I deal with every day and I've talked about before. I've talked about how because the majority of people act a certain way then it is considered "normal" and becomes the "social norm." Anything different is deviant and not always accepted. Let's explore the concept of "humanity" with regards to psychology.
So, if you remember a post of mine from a good while back you'll remember me talking about how people who were gay were considered to have a mental illness listed as "Sexual Deviancy: Homosexuality" in the US DSM-II until it was removed in the DSM-III-R. The DSM is a big book of all mental illnesses and psychotic disorders. Imprisonment with insult therapy, electoconvulsive therapy, castration, and frontal lobotomy were all used.
I'm just going to state the following here for clarification sake: A male who performs sexual acts on a little boy is not homosexual. Likewise, a male who performs sexual acts on little girls is not heterosexual. In both cases that male's sexual orientation is either "pedophilia: male" or "pedophilia: female." They are not gay or straight.
Okay, here's where I question the "humanity" of how society, at large, treats anything that's not "normal." Because someone behaves differently from the majority of people then there's something wrong with them, they need to be studied, and they need to be helped to be like everyone else. The ethical question as been, "Where do we draw the line?" I mean homosexuality didn't hurt anyone and yet, throughout history, it has been a pariah.
My schizoaffective disorder is bad enough that, without medication, there is no way I could take care of myself much less live on my own. I'd have some days that were better than others just like anyone with schizophrenia, schizoaffective, bipolar, mania, depression, OCD, oppositional defiance, anxiety, etc. Just because someone has GAD (Generalized Anxiety Disorder) doesn't mean that they're not able to survive an event without medication. Things could get rough and they might have to go sit alone and shake and cry for a while, but it can be survived. It doesn't mean that they'll have to take a pill every day. I mean, I have to take an anti-psychotic that is for schizophrenia and schizoaffective disorders every day just to be able to take care of myself enough to not die. So, in order to actually live, I have to take medication. Which sucks... but it is what it is.
Let's get down to the meat of things. I want to talk about 2 events. One is my brother's stay in "residential treatment facility" for 6 months when I was about 11 or 12 and my stay, a few years ago, in a "mental hospital."
In the case of my brother having to "go away" for 6 months; at the time I didn't know why he had to go away, I didn't know why he had to stay where he was and couldn't leave, and I didn't understand the "family therapy" sessions that happened every Friday after I got out of school. I understand what my brother did now (but not why) and I understand why my parents opted for that course of action. I'll get to that.
In case you don't remember or you weren't reading this blog during that time, I was just tired of having to take medication all the time, feeling like a burden and freak of nature, and just wanted to curl up in bed and disappear. I think we all have those times. Something happens and we just wish that we didn't exist. It's not that we wish we were dead, that we would just die, or that we plan to or want to kill ourselves. We just wish the world would just stop for a while and we could get relief from the overwhelming emotional stress. It's not more than that. I have a social worker assigned to me through the MHMRA, the US governmental agency that helps those with mental illnesses that can't afford treatment because of income level, lack of psychologists/therapists in the area, and those on what we call Disability, which is what the government pays to Americans who can't work because of a physical or mental disability and is funded by taxpayer money that is taken from everyone's paycheck before they even see it. I also have a psychiatrist that I'm assigned to as well. I'm on my 5th psychiatrist since I started going there and my 2nd social worker. My social worker's 2 kids were both taught by my mother, as 2 year olds, at the childcare center she works at. This was long, long ago. The youngest is 19 or 20 years old, I think. So we're talking 18 or 19 years ago. Both my social worker and her 2 kids remember my mother. :) She's a good lady. Sorry, that was a sidebar. I went to this social worker and told her that I was tired of having to take medication every day and wished I could just "not be." I never once said the word "suicide." I even explained to her that it wasn't that I wanted to die but that I was just wished I didn't have to deal with the medication or the world anymore. She asked me if I had "suicidal ideation." That's fancy talk for "thinking about how I'd commit suicide or when I'd commit suicide or both." I told her that I wasn't thinking about it but that she knew my stance on suicide. She asked me if I had thought about how or when I would do it. I told her, "If I decided to do it, then with my knowledge of pharmaceuticals, I would choose to overdose on medication and do it after both my parents had left the house for the day and so that I wouldn't be interrupted, stopped, or saved." Which is all information I she knew about me. She knew my stance on suicide and how/when I'd do it. I'd told her before. None of that was new information. I never said to her that I was actually thinking about doing it now. I just, naturally, plan for possible future events. That's just my personality.
Sidebar about my stance on suicide and why that gets a bit angry: I think that if someone wants to commit suicide then they should be freely allowed to do so. I mean, if someone's quality of life is shitty then I don't see why they should be forced to sit around and suffer. Just because most of society doesn't actually understand what it's like to live with a chronic or terminal illness or disease. If they're terminal then why not let them die with a little dignity and grace, not wither away and die in great pain. Also, they're TERMINAL. They are going to die no matter what anyone does. Why does society force them to stay alive? I think that's exceptionally cruel to do to someone! I actually view it as a Crime Against Humanity. For those like me, they are selfish enough to think 'if that person kills themselves it would be emotionally hard on me, so I'm going to make it so that they can't do it so that I don't suffer.' Fuck you! I'm the one who has this shitty quality of life. Why the fuck are you to tell me that I shouldn't have the right to end something that belongs to me! Not you... me! Oh, so you'd be sad if I killed myself. Well, you know what, someone's death take a few years to get over. Maybe you might think about the person every day and feel a sad that they're not around anymore but what about the person who's actually suffering? Hmm? What about how they will feel every day for the rest of their lives!? Are your feelings and desires more important that mine!? If so, what basis do you have for that? Are you inherently worth more as a human being than I am? What right to do you have to tell me what I can and can not do about my own life? And for those of you out there that think, "Suicide is a permanent solution to a temporary problem," can kiss my ass! You know why? Because what I have to deal with is permanent! It will be with me until the day I die. It is not temporary. So you know what? If I want to end my own life because of a lifelong chronic mental illness then I should have the right to do so. If you think that someone should be in their "right mind" or "sane" in order to make that decision then fine. Get someone to the point where they can make the decision of whether or not life is worth living to them. But don't tell me that you or anyone else has the right to make decisions for another adult. For those of you who think that if someone thinks that suicide is an option is never "in their right mind" or "sane," then you have NO real idea about what that person's life is like. You will not have to carry the burden of living that life, with those problem, with those limitations, with everything that goes with it. You get to be "normal," so you feel that entitles you to your "ignorance." "Everyone has a right to an informed opinion. No one is entitled to ignorance." If you don't have the same problem or one very much like it, then you will never understand what a life like mine is really like. And I'm glad you don't. I wouldn't wish this on my worth enemy. So keep your ignorant opinion to yourself and don't you dare pass judgment on me for my beliefs or on someone who has chosen suicide. Is it more selfish of one person to want to end their suffering and cause temporary pain to many others or is it more selfish of many others to enforce their will on one person who and force them to suffer for their entire life? And for those of you who would use the quote made famous by StarTrek of "The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few or the one." I agree with that. If someone chooses to risk their life knowing that they might or will die because of it in order to save the lives of many others then that's fine. That's a personal choice someone can make. Are they "insane" or "out of their minds" because they know that they are going to die if they try to save others? Or do we call that "a noble sacrifice?" It's all about POV. I know what it's like for someone who's "normal." I lived for 17 years before my first symptoms started. I was normal for 17 years. I have been dealing with my mental illness for 17 years. So, I think, given an equal amount of time as "normal" and "abnormal" that I am a much better judge of how a low quality of life is sometimes just not worth living.
*clears throat* Okay, now that we have that settled...
At that point my social worker said that she'd go talk to the doctor (who was my psychiatrist) and see if there was anything that she could do me. Which I assumed was perhaps increasing my anti-depressant or being told to drop out of school and take a vacation. Because if it's doctor's orders, then my father couldn't be angry/pissy/self-righteous about me taking a vacation. What happens instead? My social worker comes back and tells me that the doctor has decided that "it would be best for [me] to go to a mental hospital." I told my social worker that I didn't want to do that. That was the point where the politically correct bullshit talk ended and my social worker told me that my psychiatrist had made the decision that I was a danger to myself (which I knew meant that I no longer had the right to make medical decisions for myself or really any rights as all) so I didn't have a choice. I said to my social worker, "So this is an involuntary committal?" She confirmed that and had the therapist there sit with me while she went and did paper work and tried to find me a bed in Houston, in a good mental hospital, call my parents to tell them so they could bring me clothes, and call the police to "escort" me there. Now, "escort" is the politically correct word for, "put you in the back of a police car, like a criminal, and drive you to the mental hospital." (Something I found both funny and very inappropriate about the ring tone of the police office who "escorted" me to the psych hospital is that it was the theme song from the old TV show M.A.S.H. Which you may or may not know that the theme song is non-vocal track of a song titled, "Suicide is Painless." I couldn't make that shit up if I tried! lmao)
So, when my social worker left me there with the therapist I turned to her (the therapist) and told her that I knew this was an involuntary committal, I knew that they could only force me to stay there for 3 days unless the psychiatrist who was assigned to me in the mental hospital went before a judge and could produce proof that I was still a danger to myself or others and that I would be allowed to speak on my own behalf to the judge, that I would be taking no part in any group or solo therapy while at the mental hospital, that I would be not resist or cause any trouble, that I be the model "inmate" because I know that a mental hospital is just a prison for those with mental illnesses, and that I would provide no staff at the mental hospital with any information that wasn't expressly asked which included me actively using the practice of the "sin of omission." She got what I can only call a "disgusted" look on her face and she asked me what my diagnosis was. I told her that it was schizoaffective and she said out loud to no one in particular, "Of course the diagnosis includes schizophrenia. They're always geniuses and the most intelligent patients we have." Which made me smile and laugh internally.
Ain't no therapist or psychiatrist that can use selectively worded questions that, if you chose between the two options they give you, will always end in you saying something that they'll latch on to as the word you picked out of the two. Then they'll use that to ask further questions that continuously narrow your ability to answer their questions without contradicting yourself. I'm not stupid. I'm actually quite intelligent. I know that you can't ever answer a question with a blanket "yes" or "no" without qualifiers to define the situations in which that would be true and in which they would be false.
My psychiatrist didn't even come and see me before I was "escorted" by the police to the mental hospital in Houston. I sat in my social worker's office for over an hour! She had plenty of opportunity to do so and she didn't. THAT... pisses me off. If you're going to take away all of my rights as a human being, then at least have the common decency to look me in the eye and tell me that you're doing it.
On to the experience with my brother's stay in a residential treatment facility. Which is really a long-term prison for those who have some sort of psychological problem. A mental hospital only keeps people, usually, for a short time. An RTF is a place where they'd send someone who might never actually come out. A mental hospital isn't meant to keep someone long term.
Now, when my brother went into the RTF, I didn't even know it had happened. Like, he was there one night when I went to bed and then the next day he didn't come home from school. My mother didn't say anything about it and waited until I asked where my brother was before saying that he was going to be gone for a while. I asked why and I didn't get an answer other than to not worry about it. My brother was gone for 6 months. I was never told why he was gone. My mother wouldn't tell me when he was going to be coming back. It wasn't until years later that I found out what event happen but never why it happened. The only person who knows why it happened is my brother and he refuses to talk about it. If I asked him today why he did what he did he would tell me that it was in the past, it wasn't important, and that he wasn't going to talk about it.
Now, I was about 11 or 12 years old at the time. I had never been exposed to the idea of someone having a mental illness or a nervous breakdown. Which, is what my brother had. He has bipolar disorder, but wasn't diagnosed until he was in his 30s. I believe that he was putting so much pressure on himself to be perfect (vis a vie our father's lack of praise or telling us that he was ever proud of us) that he had a nervous breakdown. When I was finally told what he did, I was lied to about it. I was probably 14 years old before I got my parents in the same room and asked what my brother had done all those years ago and get an answer. My father answered that my brother got a pizza and beer, climbed the fence into the neighbor's backyard who's house that was 2 doors down, ate the pizza, got drunk, and took off his clothes. That was the lie that they told me.
A few years later, I asked my brother why he did that and he said that he didn't have any pizza or beer but refused to say whether or not he got nude. I told Mom that I knew that she and Dad had lied to me about what my brother did, because I had asked him, and I wanted to know the truth. She told me that he did climb the fence, take off his clothes, and sit in the neighbor's backyard. She said that the neighbor had motion sensor lights and that's what he caught my brother. He had a daughter who was younger than I was by a few years (so 9 or 10 years old) and his daughter could have seen my brother, which I get why a parent would be upset by that. He was also an active duty police man. He's retired now. Well, it was a lucky thing that he was a police man, because he recognized that my brother was a kid that never got in trouble and that meant that he was obviously in mental/emotional distress. He told my parents that he would agree to drop the charges against my brother if my parents would send him away to get him professional help. So, in order to not ruin my brother's chance of getting into a good college and not having a police record that included "public indecency" and "potentially exposing himself to a minor." (Which would have made him a sex offender. Here in the US, sex offenders have to tell the police department who's jurisdiction they live in when they decide to move, where they are going to move to, tell the police department of the city where in that city they're moving, the police have the right to search a registered sex offender's home without needing a search warrant; and according to what is known as "Megan's Law" has to go around their neighborhood, knock on all their neighbor's doors, and tell them that they are a registered sex offender.)
Again, I think that this had to do with the years of anxiety building up to a nervous breakdown due to the pressure he was putting on himself to be the best and perfect. We're talking about a guy who didn't get a grade of B on his report card until his Junior year of high school. Even then, it was an 89.6 that the teacher refused to round up to a 90, which would have made it an A. Otherwise, he never made a grade that was less than an A. The day he came home with that B+ on his report card... he was so upset and angry that he cried.
So, now to my part of the whole RTF experience with my family. After my brother had been gone for about a month, my parents came on a Friday and picked me up after school (I was in Junior High), and drove us to the RTF that was about 45 minutes away. The whole way, they wouldn't tell me where we were going. It wasn't until we got there that my mother finally told me that this was where my brother was. Now, I read the sign for the place and it said, "Orchard Creek Sanitarium." Now, I might not have had any experience with people who had mental illnesses or psychological issues (that I knew of), but I knew what a "Sanitarium" was. I knew it was a place that crazy people got sent to when they caused a problem. Well, for the next 5-ish months, every Friday, my parents would pick me up and take me to this place.
We had "family therapy." Now, I had never spoken to a therapist or psychiatrist in my life. I had never been to therapy or know what happened during therapy. During these sessions the therapist mostly spoke to my parents about my brother's progress. However, at the time, I wasn't being talked to and the therapist was using fancy words that I didn't know or understand so I just tuned it out and tried to entertain myself until it was over. On several occasions the therapist asked me questions. He never introduced himself. He never said what his name was (when I was paying attention or thought to pay attention), he never said that he was a therapist, and he never used the words "family therapy." It wasn't until years later that I understood that was what that actually was.
Therapist: "How do you feel about your brother?"
Me: "Uh... he's my brother."
Therapist: "Yes, but how to you feel about your brother?"
Me: "Okay, I guess."
Therapist: "How do you feel about your brother being here?"
Me: "I don't even know where 'here' is. All I know is that he can't leave."
Therapist: "And how does that make you feel?"
Me: "Confused and why are you asking me these questions about my brother?"
Therapist: "It's important. How do you feel about what your brother did that got him sent here?"
Me: "I told you, I don't even know where 'here' is and I have no idea what he did get sent here. Mom and Dad won't tell me."
Therapist: "Do you know what this place is?"
Me: "Yeah... a place crazy people get sent."
Therapist: "'Crazy' isn't a word we use here. The people that are here are all minors and have some sort of psychological problems."
Me: "Okay, call it what you want, but I don't know what this is about. I don't know why he's here. I don't know why I'm here. No one will tell me anything about what is going on. So why would I feel anything one way or the other? Well, other than confused. I'm completely in the dark and no one seems to think it's important enough for me to know anything about what's going on, so you're asking the wrong person about this. I don't know anything. I'm not important enough to know anything. This is a waste of my time. I could be at home watching TV or doing homework. At least doing that makes sense to me. Asking me questions that I have no way to answer is pointless. This is all just confusing and frustrating. *turn to parents* Can I just be left home from now on?"
Therapist (to my parents): "Would you mind if Justin stepped outside for a moment?"
My Father: "No, that's fine. *turns to me* Justin, go wait in the hallway for a moment."
Me: "Fine."
*10 minutes pass and the therapist opens the door*
Therapist: "You can come back in now, Justin."
*I come in and sit back down*
Therapist: "Justin, your parents have decided not to tell you what's going on and your brother isn't ready for you to know, yet. Are you okay with that?"
Me: "What does it matter if I'm okay with it or not? The decision has been made already."
Therapist: "I want to know how it makes you feel to be left out of the loop?"
Me: *sigh and slumped shoulders* " It doesn't matter. It never matters. This is about [my brother's name]. It's always about him. Before that it was always about my sister.
Therapist: "So you sister was more important that you or your brother and now your brother is more important than you?"
Me: "Yep."
Therapist: "What do you think about that? What does that make you feel?"
Me: "Huh? I guess I've gotten to the point that I just don't care anymore. This is how things are and have always been. But if my brother is here and no one will tell me what happened or why then it must be something big. So he gets all the attention. Just like always. He makes better grades than I do. I can't make those grades, so why even try?"
Therapist: "So the only thing that's important is grades?"
Me: "To Dad, yeah. Dad works and Mom works. I get home from school and no one's there, my sister has moved out with her boyfriend, my brother doesn't come out of his room unless it's dinner time... I only see all of them when it's dinner time. Otherwise, I'm just doing my own thing."
Therapist: "And what's that? What do you do?"
Me: "Homework... video games... *shrug* I guess that's about it."
Therapist: "Do you do anything as a family other than dinner?"
Me: "Why would we do that?"
Therapist: "Do you have any friends?"
Me: "Yeah... at school."
Therapist: "So at home... you don't interact with your family other than dinner?"
Me: "Well, sometimes my brother and I watch each other play video games."
Therapist: "Do you two talk?"
Me: "Yeah. When we're playing video games he might see something I don't or I might see something he doesn't."
Therapist: "Do you talk about anything else?"
Me: "Not really."
So that's pretty much it. I still had to go to "family therapy" after school every Friday, but other than the odd question or two... I might as well have not been there at all. All this lack of attention just made me into a person who didn't ask for help or to even be noticed and the secrecy just made me feel like I wasn't important to my mom. I didn't expect to ever get Dad's attention except when report cards came in the mail. At which point, he'd pick apart my grades, tell me how many points I went down in a class, and ask me what I was going to do to bring that grade back up, for each class I made a worse grade in. There was never any acknowledgment from him about the classes I did better in. When I would bring that up, he would tell me that he expected me to keep it up. Nothing was ever good enough. I was never praised. I only mattered to my father when grades came out every 6 weeks. Even then it was only for 15 minutes while he made me feel like a failure and feel uncomfortable. But the fact that Mom wouldn't tell me what was going on made me feel like the one person I could count on to be there for me was shutting me out. Thus solidified my thoughts and behaviors about only relying on myself and not expecting anyone to care about me or my life. Still working on that. I write this kind of thing out in text for you guys to read but I don't know how many of you actually read this stuff. Especially when it's all of epic length. So, really, in my mind it's just me typing out my experiences and feelings without thinking that anyone will actually read it. I suppose some part of me hopes that you guys read it but... I don't actually dare to allow myself to believe that anyone actually does. That's not a cry for help/attention, by the way. That just me letting you know how my mind thinks.
Finally, my experiences in a mental hospital for 6 days! Since I was on suicide watch, because my psychiatrist sent me there because I "was having suicide ideation," I was woken up at 2 or 3 AM every night so that one of the night time Psych Techs could take my blood pressure and my temperature. I also couldn't leave the unit to go down to the cafeteria to get food so it was brought to me. When lunch was brought the first day it was mostly meat and I didn't eat meat. So I told the Psych Tech that brought it that I didn't eat meat and he said that he would unlock the patient fridge so I could get cereal and orange juice. There were 3 different sets of Psych Techs every day. Daytime Psych Techs, Evening time Psych Techs, and Overnight Psych Techs. So for the 2 days I was on suicide watch I had a lot of cereal and orange juice. I arrived at 11 PM at night, so I don't count that day, but the next morning, after another set of vitals checking, I was taken to an MD that had a small office/exam room on the floor to be checked out. He was thoroughly unpleasant and questioned everything I told him. Always asking me things more than once, but would word it differently to see if I changed my answer. Questioning the things I told him about my past medical history. He all but accused me of lying about what happened when I was 14... he asked me how I knew it was real and not something my mind had made up. Which, if someone tells you that they've been raped... you don't question the validity of that. That is beyond inappropriate to do. Especially for a doctor to do. He had a reason he did it though. I'll get to that.
Then on the afternoon of the second day, I met the psychiatrist that was assigned to me. He asked me how I was feeling. I told him that I felt fine, other than the fact that I didn't eat meat and that's what they kept brining me to eat for every meal so I was kinda tired of having to eat cereal and orange juice for every meal. He then asked me if I was thinking suicidal thoughts or about committing suicide anymore. Now, being who I am, you guys know I'm not going to answer that question with a "yes" or a "no." I didn't know him. I certainly didn't trust him. So, with a series of qualifications and explanations, I said, "I'm not thinking about suicide... but even if I were, do you really expect me to tell you that I am? That just gives you ammo to use to keep me here longer than the maximum amount of days that you can keep me here. Let me ask you something: If I really wanted to commit suicide, would I have told my social worker? No. I would have just done it. You and I both know that telling someone that you want to or plan on committing suicide is a cry for help or attention and telling someone that you them to give you a reason to live. Do you really think I'm stupid enough to say that I'm suicidal to any professional healthcare worker, police, or firefighter? I'm a Registered Pharmacy Technician that's licensed to work in the state of Texas. It's not like I don't know that anyone who seriously talks about being a danger to themselves or others, to a professional healthcare worker, that we are required by law to call the authorities to report it and do what we can to keep them from doing anything until the authorities arrive so long as we don't feel personally threatened with injury or death. The same goes for firefighters and the police can go pick that person up, take them into custody, put them in jail, and call the MHMRA to do an emergency psych evaluation at the jail. Also that we are required by law to report any observed or suspected child abuse to the authorities. Never once did I tell me social worker or psychiatrist that I was actively thinking about suicide or committing suicide. I my social worker that I was tired and just wanted to put everything and forget it. As in, 'I'm stressed and I'm depressed and just need to tell that to someone so that I'm not just holding it inside and pretending it's not there.' My social worker was the one who brought up the topic of suicide..." At that point I gave him an abbreviated version of how I feel about suicide, that it's a personal choice that everyone should be allowed to make, that this was not new information to my social worker or my psychiatrist; and that my social worker knew that I had long ago decided that if I ever going to do it then I knew how, when, and where it would all happen. Then I told him, "No one actually asked me if I were thinking about committing suicide before you asked. Just because I thought about it years ago and decided how I'd do it didn't mean that I was actually thinking about doing it right then. Of course, I have no idea what my social worker actually said to my psychiatrist that made her decide that I should be involuntarily committed to this psych hospital. Nor did my psychiatrist actually ask me any questions herself or explain why she was doing this. She just left it to my social worker and went home. So you'll forgive me if I'm less than trusting of doctors and nurses and social workers and your psych techs right now. You have my diagnosis right there. You know perfectly well that I won't be a person who easily trusts someone. You also know that neither you nor your staff have a snowballs chance in hell of me actually saying anything other than what will get me out of here fastest. At no point did I actually say that I was suicidal. At no point will I ever say that I am suicidal. If things get bad enough and I need help, then I'll go to my mother, just like I always have. If I decide that I am done with life... then I'm just going to do it. There won't be any preamble or notice. So write down whatever it is that you want to write down. You can write down that you think I'm lying to you and that I am suicidal. You can write down that you think I have an unhealthy attitude and opinion on suicide. Nothing you write down actually matters. I know what the truth is. You can't change that. No one can change that. Every time your nurse has asked me how I feel, I have said I feel fine. Every time your nurse has asked me if I have had any recent thoughts of suicide, I have said that I have not. Those are the only answers that I will give. Those are the only answers I have to give. So the sooner we're done here the less amount of your time I'm wasting and the sooner I can get back to my little mini-vacation here away from stress."
Now, was that smart? Well, I never claimed that I'm perfect. I'm very smart and that can get me into a lot of trouble with certain people. I just thought that the psychiatrist would appreciate me not blowing smoke up his ass or lying to him. Now, as to if he actually believed me, I can say that he did not. He did say that starting the next day I could leave the floor and go to the cafeteria with the rest of the group to eat meals. So, at least he knew that I was smart enough not to try to commit suicide in the psych hospital and if I were really going to do it that I have the patience to wait until I get out and do it when no one would be around to do anything about it.
At least that last part is what the therapist who was assigned to talk to me every day said was in my file. That was after I told her that I didn't want any BS from her, in return I wouldn't give her any BS, and as long as she was willing to agree to that then I would be open and honest with her. But if I caught her using semantic word games or trying to use any other sneaky psychological tricks that they teach, that the deal was off and she would get nothing further from me. That she had no way of knowing what I did and didn't know about psychology and to think about whether it was worth risking trying one I already knew or figuring it out. That if she wanted to know something, then I wanted her to just come out and ask the question and not dance around the topic to try to get me more comfortable about the topic. That I know that trick. That I've used it on others. That I won't insult her intelligence as long as she wouldn't insult mine. That I understand that she has a job to do here and I would respect that. But if she wants me to think about a certain topic or an aspect of a certain topic then just give me the "food for thought" and let me chew on it for a while so I could give her an honest considered answer. That I was willing to have good faith in her agreeing to my terms until she gave me a reason to no longer have that faith, but not to confuse it with me trusting her. That there were certain questions that I wouldn't lie to her about but I wouldn't answer either. Then I asked her if she agreed to those terms. That if she did then we could continue or if not we were done there.
She looked at me for a little bit, probably trying to size up whether or not I was bluffing her. So I said, "Look, I get it. You're not sure I'm telling the truth because of my diagnosis. However, given what you know about people with that diagnosis, is it fair to say that we are usually of well above average intelligence and that given how articulate I am, that I'm either outright lying to you or that I'm outright putting all my cards on the table? You're not gonna get my trust and I don't expect to get your trust. I expect that you'll take everything I say with a grain of salt. That's certainly what your education and training tells you, right? So all you can do is have faith that I'm being truthful to you and will continue to be truthful to you, just as I'm willing to have faith that you will treat me like a human being and not someone who's insane." Then there was a short pause and I added, "I'm well aware of the conditions here. I know that I am essentially a prisoner here. You can call it whatever you want, but I'm sure you can see that, from my point of view, I see myself as a prisoner. There's a locked door, there are guards -which you call Psych Techs and a Nurse-, and I can't go anywhere other than were this psych hospital allows me to go with an guard escort. This can either be pleasant for you and I'll be willing to stay and talk about things or, this being day 3, I know that you can't legally hold me past tomorrow morning without proof that I'm of imminent danger to myself or others. Which, you don't have. Now I'm willing to stay here for a few more days and do therapy with you, because frankly this is the first thing resembling a vacation that I've had in 5 or 6 years and I'm learning quite a bit about drug addiction from one of the women here and the mix of alcoholism and drug abuse from one of the guys here. I'm enjoying learning from someone who is actually living it instead of reading about it, but if we can't agree to be honest and transparent with each other... then I'll cut my vacation here short and leave. I've told you what I'm willing to do. I will choose to stay here and work with you. The question is; will you choose to accept what I'm telling you as truth until I give you reason to believe otherwise?"
She smiled and told me that I would make an interesting and probably very successful negotiator and that she wouldn't play poker with me because she can't tell whether I'm bluffing or not. I smiled and said, "Good. Then I look forward to working together."
So, day 6 comes along and I'm ready to go home. I've learned what I could learn from the two people in the unit who didn't have a mental illness, just an addiction, which some would argue is a type of mental illness, but my opinion is that it's not. The nurse had asked me every day how I felt and if I was suicidal or thinking about suicide. I gave him my stock answers every day that never changed.
My therapist comes in to the main room and asks to speak with me. She taken me to a private conference type room and there is a woman who I've never seen, the psychiatrist who was assigned to me but only saw me once, and the therapist at a square table. I took the last available seat and the therapist introduced the woman I didn't know as my social worker (who I'd never met and who nothing about me, but I know that she was there to make sure that the psychiatrist and therapist didn't put undo pressure on me to agree to anything I wasn't comfortable with or didn't want to do, given that I had been legally able to leave for the past 3 days). Then the therapist talked about what she was concerned about -which was my home environment with my relationship with my father being so adversarial that I might end up suicidal again-, and then the psychiatrist said that I seemed outwardly stable and that he didn't think I needed a change in medication but was also worried about my home environment. They said that they thought I should stay another day. I said that I never said I was suicidal and that, in fact, every time I was asked while there I had always said that I wasn't, that there wasn't anything left for them to teach me there, that at that point I was just taking up a bed that someone who actually needed it should have, that I didn't have a choice but to live with my parents so the adversarial relationship I had with my father was just something I was going to have to deal with better, thanked them for their help and their concern, but that I was choosing to leave today. The therapist said that she would start getting the paperwork done for my discharge but that it would say that I was leaving against my doctor's wishes and my therapist's wishes. I told her that I was comfortable with that, thanked her, asked if there was more, she said no, and I got up and went back into the main room to tell them that I was leaving today. A little bit later, my therapist called me into the hall and said that since I lived 90 miles away that she would have to use her pin number to allow for a long-distance call so that I could call my parents to come get me. She did so and I talked to my mother. She had not heard from me since going into the place so she was surprised to know I was coming home. She even asked if that was wise. I told her that I was never suicidal and that this had just been a nice 6 day vacation but I was ready to come home. She told me that she would call Dad and they'd be on their way.
Paperwork, paperwork, paperwork, sitting in a chair in the hall outside the main room, my parents show up with my therapist, my therapist asks if my parents and I were willing to sit and talk with her before I left, we all agreed, and went into a small private room. She expressed her concern about my intelligence being something that is as much harmful as helpful, the difficult relationship I have with my father and how that she thought was a major source of stress for me, and my personal view on suicide being worrisome. My mother agreed with all of that. My father denied that he ever got upset at anything, that nothing ever bothered him, and that any problems I had with him were my issues and not his. The therapist nodded to my father while my mother shook her head back and forth, and then the therapist looked at me like 'You weren't kidding about his level of denial, his lack of self-accountability for his actions, and him being distant.' I smiled at her and nodded a 'Yep.' Then I went home.
Now, here's the problems I have with those two experiences:
My brother was saved from having a sex offender record by going to the RTF. I think that he needed to get away from life and have a vacation, he should have been put on anxiety medication; he needed to talk about his issues with perfection, a distant father, and a father who never praised only condemned; and learn coping techniques for dealing with stress. I think that he could only do that if he weren't around Dad. So time away, certainly understandable. The lack of communication to me about what was going on and why was the first time my mother ever shut me out. I had always counted on her to be there and to be honest with me. But her shutting me out left me with very little to no information, I had no one to talk to, I was confused and hurt... and for the first time in my life, I was completely alone. I didn't have anyone but myself. Now, everyone in my family had shut me out of their life at some point before this, except my mother. At this point in my life I didn't know my sister, my father was distant, and my brother was a teenager with his own room that didn't want me around and didn't talk to me. But Mom... she was always there. Until that first family therapy session in which the therapist told me that my parents had agreed that I didn't need to know why my brother was there. That was the exact moment that all those times of not being able to trust someone truly became everyone. So I learned that I could only really count and rely on myself. I withdrew from my bio-family and more into my own world.
My imprisonment, I learned was because a patient my social worker and psychiatrist treated had told both of them 2 weeks previous that he was "going home on Friday." Which, to any average person would be taken as "going to visit family." He meant home home... like Heaven-home, and had killed himself. So my psychiatrist was worried that she'd lose her license to practice psychiatry if another one of her patients killed themselves so close to each other. So where they misread what the other guy meant one direction, they misread what I meant in the opposite direction. I actually lodged a formal complaint with the APA (American Psychological Association) and the Texas State Board of Examiners of Psychologists. No idea what happened with that.
So I was wrongfully imprisoned because my social worker misunderstood me and/or my psychiatrist misunderstood me and committed me to a psych hospital against my will. I didn't get a chance to explain myself to my psychiatrist. I explained myself to the admissions psychiatrist at the psych hospital and he obviously didn't believe me. I told the psychiatrist that was assigned to me on the inside that I never said anything about being suicidal and that I wasn't suicidal and yet he didn't release me. So... at each step, I wasn't actually listened to or believed.
What would happen if you told your doctor that your foot hurt, he told you to go to the hospital he is associated with to check into a room, they explained that your doctor said that it was an infection (without having actually done any tests) that required you to be quarantined from the rest of the world, and held captive with no actual proof that there is any infection from your doctor and the tests run by the hospital showed no infection? How would you feel? Worse, you know something is wrong but every doctor you go to tells you that there is nothing wrong with you?
In both cases no one is listening to you and they have no proof of anything. Yet a psychiatrist can just say that you're not mentally fit to make your own decisions, you're stripped of your rights, and locked away from the 'good citizens of the world.' I did nothing wrong. I said nothing wrong. I expressed feeling emotional fatigue and an opinion about suicide that isn't "accepted" or considered "healthy." There's nothing wrong with expressing an opinion!
The way that I was treated was bad enough. You should have seen how some of the others were treated.
All the Psych Techs sat at a table at the back of the main room and would tell any patient who sat down at the same table that they weren't allowed to sit at the same table as them. I'm sorry are we so dangerous that we can't be sitting at the same table as the Psych Techs? They take us in 2 groups in a crammed elevator and sit at the same table as all of us while both they and we eat. In both of those cases, they are on their own with us. The main room, where we all sat all day and watch TV because there was nothing else to DO, was 10 feet from the nurse's station. If anything the Psych Techs were much safer with us sitting at the the same table in the back of the main room than in a crammed elevator or a large cafeteria!
I'm not saying that I didn't see some people in there who were obviously delusional. There was one guy who, I swear to you, thought the he was some sort of magical chosen person who was born to protect the Earth from invaders from another dimension. That's okay for a sci-fi or fantasy genre book but he actually believed this was the truth. Was he dangerous? No! He probably shouldn't go unsupervised but he wasn't dangerous.
There was another guy who got it into his head that his roommate was evil and needed to be killed. So he went out of a machete to find his roommate, but was able to figure out that his thinking wasn't right, his roommate was in danger from him, called the police to come get him, and waited patiently for 30 minutes on a bench outside a WalMart before the cops showed up! Dangerous? Very much so... to his roommate and only his roommate.
Then, of course, there was the guy who was having a whispering conversation with the voice(s) in his head, he would randomly laugh at whatever the voice(s) in his head, and was constantly reading the Bible. Really... need I say more about that guy? Oh, and no boundaries with this guy! The night shift Psych Techs had to keep going to a specific room, that wasn't his, and guide this guy back to his room and put him in his bed all night long! And, we pretty watched the CW all day long. Like, that was what station was on the TV. We could change it if we wanted to as long as everyone was okay with that. This guy would randomly get up and start changing the channel until he reached some Christian religious channel or someone physically went up to him and told him that he couldn't just change the channel without making sure it was okay with every one else. When we saw him get up and head towards the TV we would call out his name, trying to get his attention, and telling him that he can't change the channel. He did not hear or did not listen to us. Someone had to actually get in his face, tell him to go sit down, and tell him that he couldn't change the channel. He would say that he watched that channel at home and hadn't been able to watch it since he got there. One girl, like, would make a New Yorker proud with her getting in his face. She told him that he couldn't watch that channel while he was in there. He could watch it at home if he wanted to but not while he was there because there are many other people there and none of them wanted to watch that channel.
He was one of the 3 guys who were all heavy into the whole Christian thing and always reading the Bible. Two of them were always going around and asking if they could pray with you. Were they dangerous? Not really. Annoying... but not dangerous. Obviously the one guy who was talking to the voice(s) in his head should be carefully watched in case he became violent. The other two were just guys who thought they were special messengers from God. They were very nice about things when you told them that you didn't want to pray with them. Now, they'd be back later to ask again, but they always walked away without incident when you said no to praying with them. According to the Bible there was a guy who was going around saying that he was the Son of God and had 12 other men with him that were all messengers of God. Jesus was killed, most of the others went back to fishing, and one of them went insane when God's temple in Jerusalem was destroyed and was exiled to an island for many, many years. You might know the last one as St. John. Therein lies the danger of relying too much on religion. Balance in life is the best approach, I think.
Most of the rest were drug and/or alcohol addicts. So they really weren't dangerous while in the psych hospital. Now, in the outside world, they might be dangerous when they need money for their fix and get it by robbing someone at knife/gun point.
There was one guy who was just... angry. He had to be 18 years or older, because there was a separate wing for the minors, and his face always looked angry. He wouldn't look at anyone, he would speak to anyone... all he did all day was brood. During the group therapy session, he refused to even give his name. Apparently he had been there for at least 2 weeks by the time I got there. So by the time I left it was 3 weeks that he was there with no sign of ditching the anti-social behavior.
Now... all us in there were being treated as thought we were dangerous (and I'm not saying everyone was a fluffy kitten) and locked away from the outside world. It was dehumanizing. Like the fact that we had a mental illness and behaved differently from the general public meant that we were locked away. I could have my cell phone. I couldn't have shoes with laces. I couldn't have a belt. None of us could. We were given toothpaste, a disposable toothbrush, a tiny shampoo bottle that made hotel shampoo bottles look giant, and tiny little deodorant sticks.
Just because someone has a mental illness doesn't mean that they should be treated as less of a human being. I don't deserve to be told that I can't sit at the same table as someone else because I have a mental illness that isn't dangerous to them and they have no mental illness. Exchange the idea of mental illness with gender or sexual-orientation or the color of skin or country of origin! Are any of those actually acceptable? No! I have NEVER been violent. I have never slapped anyone. I have never punched anyone. I have never been in a fight. I've been bashed, but I didn't strike back. I have never been a danger to anyone in any way that someone who doesn't have a mental illness could be a danger to anyone else.
Now, if they're being overtly violent, then okay... I can see them needing to be separated from the general populace. Psychopaths and sociopaths... murders. Okay, sure. But they're in a prison, not a psych hospital.
Just to give you an idea of what it feels like; imagine that you're someone who is feared or unwanted by the general public, so they put you all in a special place with people kinda-sorta like you in that you're feared or unwanted. You want a prime example of unwanted people being crammed into one place with the other people that society doesn't want? Two words: Nursing Home.
I'm sorry, I just feel like it's cruel to leave people in a state in which they can't care for themselves and are just pushed into Residential Living Facilities. Now, I'm very lucky that the medication I take works so well. I really am! However, someone who can't live a real life shouldn't be forced to live it. The quality of life is just so low for so many people and we just lock them away where they can't get seen and we can forget them. If I were faced with knowing that the medication I'm taking doesn't work anymore and nothing else does either... kill me. Please, kill me. I do not want to live as, basically, a vegetable. I'm breathing and my heart is beating, but my brain doesn't function right. I am no over-exaggerating when I say that there would be many days where I would be completely unaware of myself and anything around me. I would not be able to eat or drink because I would be unaware of it and couldn't swallow. I would soil myself and wouldn't even be aware of it or that it is even possible. What kind of life does someone have if they're not aware of themselves? Does that qualify them as not being alive. Being self-aware is who we are. If we can't be self-aware then we're not really alive.
It may seem strange to you, but I think that it is more humane to painlessly kill those people who are trapped in psychosis and have little-to-no quality of life. I'm all for figuring out what ones are genetic and which genes or combination of genes causes it and changing the DNA of a fetus so that it isn't born with a crippling deformity or mental illness. Heck, use the gene therapy to change the DNA of a teenager/adult who has a mental illness. In the interim, they should not be forced to live.
Believe me, if you've always been "normal" and all the sudden you're faced with something like Alzheimer's then at some point you'll think about whether or not you'd rather die than degenerate into a being that looks human but doesn't think or act human. If you end up with terminal cancer and you're in constant pain... at some point, you'll seriously think that you want to be dead NOW! You'll rethink your position on assisted suicide if you're against it. Until you're there and you're faced with it... you can't make an informed decision. You have no way to know with 100% certainty that you'd never commit suicide.
So, if you remember a post of mine from a good while back you'll remember me talking about how people who were gay were considered to have a mental illness listed as "Sexual Deviancy: Homosexuality" in the US DSM-II until it was removed in the DSM-III-R. The DSM is a big book of all mental illnesses and psychotic disorders. Imprisonment with insult therapy, electoconvulsive therapy, castration, and frontal lobotomy were all used.
I'm just going to state the following here for clarification sake: A male who performs sexual acts on a little boy is not homosexual. Likewise, a male who performs sexual acts on little girls is not heterosexual. In both cases that male's sexual orientation is either "pedophilia: male" or "pedophilia: female." They are not gay or straight.
Okay, here's where I question the "humanity" of how society, at large, treats anything that's not "normal." Because someone behaves differently from the majority of people then there's something wrong with them, they need to be studied, and they need to be helped to be like everyone else. The ethical question as been, "Where do we draw the line?" I mean homosexuality didn't hurt anyone and yet, throughout history, it has been a pariah.
My schizoaffective disorder is bad enough that, without medication, there is no way I could take care of myself much less live on my own. I'd have some days that were better than others just like anyone with schizophrenia, schizoaffective, bipolar, mania, depression, OCD, oppositional defiance, anxiety, etc. Just because someone has GAD (Generalized Anxiety Disorder) doesn't mean that they're not able to survive an event without medication. Things could get rough and they might have to go sit alone and shake and cry for a while, but it can be survived. It doesn't mean that they'll have to take a pill every day. I mean, I have to take an anti-psychotic that is for schizophrenia and schizoaffective disorders every day just to be able to take care of myself enough to not die. So, in order to actually live, I have to take medication. Which sucks... but it is what it is.
Let's get down to the meat of things. I want to talk about 2 events. One is my brother's stay in "residential treatment facility" for 6 months when I was about 11 or 12 and my stay, a few years ago, in a "mental hospital."
In the case of my brother having to "go away" for 6 months; at the time I didn't know why he had to go away, I didn't know why he had to stay where he was and couldn't leave, and I didn't understand the "family therapy" sessions that happened every Friday after I got out of school. I understand what my brother did now (but not why) and I understand why my parents opted for that course of action. I'll get to that.
In case you don't remember or you weren't reading this blog during that time, I was just tired of having to take medication all the time, feeling like a burden and freak of nature, and just wanted to curl up in bed and disappear. I think we all have those times. Something happens and we just wish that we didn't exist. It's not that we wish we were dead, that we would just die, or that we plan to or want to kill ourselves. We just wish the world would just stop for a while and we could get relief from the overwhelming emotional stress. It's not more than that. I have a social worker assigned to me through the MHMRA, the US governmental agency that helps those with mental illnesses that can't afford treatment because of income level, lack of psychologists/therapists in the area, and those on what we call Disability, which is what the government pays to Americans who can't work because of a physical or mental disability and is funded by taxpayer money that is taken from everyone's paycheck before they even see it. I also have a psychiatrist that I'm assigned to as well. I'm on my 5th psychiatrist since I started going there and my 2nd social worker. My social worker's 2 kids were both taught by my mother, as 2 year olds, at the childcare center she works at. This was long, long ago. The youngest is 19 or 20 years old, I think. So we're talking 18 or 19 years ago. Both my social worker and her 2 kids remember my mother. :) She's a good lady. Sorry, that was a sidebar. I went to this social worker and told her that I was tired of having to take medication every day and wished I could just "not be." I never once said the word "suicide." I even explained to her that it wasn't that I wanted to die but that I was just wished I didn't have to deal with the medication or the world anymore. She asked me if I had "suicidal ideation." That's fancy talk for "thinking about how I'd commit suicide or when I'd commit suicide or both." I told her that I wasn't thinking about it but that she knew my stance on suicide. She asked me if I had thought about how or when I would do it. I told her, "If I decided to do it, then with my knowledge of pharmaceuticals, I would choose to overdose on medication and do it after both my parents had left the house for the day and so that I wouldn't be interrupted, stopped, or saved." Which is all information I she knew about me. She knew my stance on suicide and how/when I'd do it. I'd told her before. None of that was new information. I never said to her that I was actually thinking about doing it now. I just, naturally, plan for possible future events. That's just my personality.
Sidebar about my stance on suicide and why that gets a bit angry: I think that if someone wants to commit suicide then they should be freely allowed to do so. I mean, if someone's quality of life is shitty then I don't see why they should be forced to sit around and suffer. Just because most of society doesn't actually understand what it's like to live with a chronic or terminal illness or disease. If they're terminal then why not let them die with a little dignity and grace, not wither away and die in great pain. Also, they're TERMINAL. They are going to die no matter what anyone does. Why does society force them to stay alive? I think that's exceptionally cruel to do to someone! I actually view it as a Crime Against Humanity. For those like me, they are selfish enough to think 'if that person kills themselves it would be emotionally hard on me, so I'm going to make it so that they can't do it so that I don't suffer.' Fuck you! I'm the one who has this shitty quality of life. Why the fuck are you to tell me that I shouldn't have the right to end something that belongs to me! Not you... me! Oh, so you'd be sad if I killed myself. Well, you know what, someone's death take a few years to get over. Maybe you might think about the person every day and feel a sad that they're not around anymore but what about the person who's actually suffering? Hmm? What about how they will feel every day for the rest of their lives!? Are your feelings and desires more important that mine!? If so, what basis do you have for that? Are you inherently worth more as a human being than I am? What right to do you have to tell me what I can and can not do about my own life? And for those of you out there that think, "Suicide is a permanent solution to a temporary problem," can kiss my ass! You know why? Because what I have to deal with is permanent! It will be with me until the day I die. It is not temporary. So you know what? If I want to end my own life because of a lifelong chronic mental illness then I should have the right to do so. If you think that someone should be in their "right mind" or "sane" in order to make that decision then fine. Get someone to the point where they can make the decision of whether or not life is worth living to them. But don't tell me that you or anyone else has the right to make decisions for another adult. For those of you who think that if someone thinks that suicide is an option is never "in their right mind" or "sane," then you have NO real idea about what that person's life is like. You will not have to carry the burden of living that life, with those problem, with those limitations, with everything that goes with it. You get to be "normal," so you feel that entitles you to your "ignorance." "Everyone has a right to an informed opinion. No one is entitled to ignorance." If you don't have the same problem or one very much like it, then you will never understand what a life like mine is really like. And I'm glad you don't. I wouldn't wish this on my worth enemy. So keep your ignorant opinion to yourself and don't you dare pass judgment on me for my beliefs or on someone who has chosen suicide. Is it more selfish of one person to want to end their suffering and cause temporary pain to many others or is it more selfish of many others to enforce their will on one person who and force them to suffer for their entire life? And for those of you who would use the quote made famous by StarTrek of "The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few or the one." I agree with that. If someone chooses to risk their life knowing that they might or will die because of it in order to save the lives of many others then that's fine. That's a personal choice someone can make. Are they "insane" or "out of their minds" because they know that they are going to die if they try to save others? Or do we call that "a noble sacrifice?" It's all about POV. I know what it's like for someone who's "normal." I lived for 17 years before my first symptoms started. I was normal for 17 years. I have been dealing with my mental illness for 17 years. So, I think, given an equal amount of time as "normal" and "abnormal" that I am a much better judge of how a low quality of life is sometimes just not worth living.
*clears throat* Okay, now that we have that settled...
At that point my social worker said that she'd go talk to the doctor (who was my psychiatrist) and see if there was anything that she could do me. Which I assumed was perhaps increasing my anti-depressant or being told to drop out of school and take a vacation. Because if it's doctor's orders, then my father couldn't be angry/pissy/self-righteous about me taking a vacation. What happens instead? My social worker comes back and tells me that the doctor has decided that "it would be best for [me] to go to a mental hospital." I told my social worker that I didn't want to do that. That was the point where the politically correct bullshit talk ended and my social worker told me that my psychiatrist had made the decision that I was a danger to myself (which I knew meant that I no longer had the right to make medical decisions for myself or really any rights as all) so I didn't have a choice. I said to my social worker, "So this is an involuntary committal?" She confirmed that and had the therapist there sit with me while she went and did paper work and tried to find me a bed in Houston, in a good mental hospital, call my parents to tell them so they could bring me clothes, and call the police to "escort" me there. Now, "escort" is the politically correct word for, "put you in the back of a police car, like a criminal, and drive you to the mental hospital." (Something I found both funny and very inappropriate about the ring tone of the police office who "escorted" me to the psych hospital is that it was the theme song from the old TV show M.A.S.H. Which you may or may not know that the theme song is non-vocal track of a song titled, "Suicide is Painless." I couldn't make that shit up if I tried! lmao)
So, when my social worker left me there with the therapist I turned to her (the therapist) and told her that I knew this was an involuntary committal, I knew that they could only force me to stay there for 3 days unless the psychiatrist who was assigned to me in the mental hospital went before a judge and could produce proof that I was still a danger to myself or others and that I would be allowed to speak on my own behalf to the judge, that I would be taking no part in any group or solo therapy while at the mental hospital, that I would be not resist or cause any trouble, that I be the model "inmate" because I know that a mental hospital is just a prison for those with mental illnesses, and that I would provide no staff at the mental hospital with any information that wasn't expressly asked which included me actively using the practice of the "sin of omission." She got what I can only call a "disgusted" look on her face and she asked me what my diagnosis was. I told her that it was schizoaffective and she said out loud to no one in particular, "Of course the diagnosis includes schizophrenia. They're always geniuses and the most intelligent patients we have." Which made me smile and laugh internally.
Ain't no therapist or psychiatrist that can use selectively worded questions that, if you chose between the two options they give you, will always end in you saying something that they'll latch on to as the word you picked out of the two. Then they'll use that to ask further questions that continuously narrow your ability to answer their questions without contradicting yourself. I'm not stupid. I'm actually quite intelligent. I know that you can't ever answer a question with a blanket "yes" or "no" without qualifiers to define the situations in which that would be true and in which they would be false.
My psychiatrist didn't even come and see me before I was "escorted" by the police to the mental hospital in Houston. I sat in my social worker's office for over an hour! She had plenty of opportunity to do so and she didn't. THAT... pisses me off. If you're going to take away all of my rights as a human being, then at least have the common decency to look me in the eye and tell me that you're doing it.
On to the experience with my brother's stay in a residential treatment facility. Which is really a long-term prison for those who have some sort of psychological problem. A mental hospital only keeps people, usually, for a short time. An RTF is a place where they'd send someone who might never actually come out. A mental hospital isn't meant to keep someone long term.
Now, when my brother went into the RTF, I didn't even know it had happened. Like, he was there one night when I went to bed and then the next day he didn't come home from school. My mother didn't say anything about it and waited until I asked where my brother was before saying that he was going to be gone for a while. I asked why and I didn't get an answer other than to not worry about it. My brother was gone for 6 months. I was never told why he was gone. My mother wouldn't tell me when he was going to be coming back. It wasn't until years later that I found out what event happen but never why it happened. The only person who knows why it happened is my brother and he refuses to talk about it. If I asked him today why he did what he did he would tell me that it was in the past, it wasn't important, and that he wasn't going to talk about it.
Now, I was about 11 or 12 years old at the time. I had never been exposed to the idea of someone having a mental illness or a nervous breakdown. Which, is what my brother had. He has bipolar disorder, but wasn't diagnosed until he was in his 30s. I believe that he was putting so much pressure on himself to be perfect (vis a vie our father's lack of praise or telling us that he was ever proud of us) that he had a nervous breakdown. When I was finally told what he did, I was lied to about it. I was probably 14 years old before I got my parents in the same room and asked what my brother had done all those years ago and get an answer. My father answered that my brother got a pizza and beer, climbed the fence into the neighbor's backyard who's house that was 2 doors down, ate the pizza, got drunk, and took off his clothes. That was the lie that they told me.
A few years later, I asked my brother why he did that and he said that he didn't have any pizza or beer but refused to say whether or not he got nude. I told Mom that I knew that she and Dad had lied to me about what my brother did, because I had asked him, and I wanted to know the truth. She told me that he did climb the fence, take off his clothes, and sit in the neighbor's backyard. She said that the neighbor had motion sensor lights and that's what he caught my brother. He had a daughter who was younger than I was by a few years (so 9 or 10 years old) and his daughter could have seen my brother, which I get why a parent would be upset by that. He was also an active duty police man. He's retired now. Well, it was a lucky thing that he was a police man, because he recognized that my brother was a kid that never got in trouble and that meant that he was obviously in mental/emotional distress. He told my parents that he would agree to drop the charges against my brother if my parents would send him away to get him professional help. So, in order to not ruin my brother's chance of getting into a good college and not having a police record that included "public indecency" and "potentially exposing himself to a minor." (Which would have made him a sex offender. Here in the US, sex offenders have to tell the police department who's jurisdiction they live in when they decide to move, where they are going to move to, tell the police department of the city where in that city they're moving, the police have the right to search a registered sex offender's home without needing a search warrant; and according to what is known as "Megan's Law" has to go around their neighborhood, knock on all their neighbor's doors, and tell them that they are a registered sex offender.)
Again, I think that this had to do with the years of anxiety building up to a nervous breakdown due to the pressure he was putting on himself to be the best and perfect. We're talking about a guy who didn't get a grade of B on his report card until his Junior year of high school. Even then, it was an 89.6 that the teacher refused to round up to a 90, which would have made it an A. Otherwise, he never made a grade that was less than an A. The day he came home with that B+ on his report card... he was so upset and angry that he cried.
So, now to my part of the whole RTF experience with my family. After my brother had been gone for about a month, my parents came on a Friday and picked me up after school (I was in Junior High), and drove us to the RTF that was about 45 minutes away. The whole way, they wouldn't tell me where we were going. It wasn't until we got there that my mother finally told me that this was where my brother was. Now, I read the sign for the place and it said, "Orchard Creek Sanitarium." Now, I might not have had any experience with people who had mental illnesses or psychological issues (that I knew of), but I knew what a "Sanitarium" was. I knew it was a place that crazy people got sent to when they caused a problem. Well, for the next 5-ish months, every Friday, my parents would pick me up and take me to this place.
We had "family therapy." Now, I had never spoken to a therapist or psychiatrist in my life. I had never been to therapy or know what happened during therapy. During these sessions the therapist mostly spoke to my parents about my brother's progress. However, at the time, I wasn't being talked to and the therapist was using fancy words that I didn't know or understand so I just tuned it out and tried to entertain myself until it was over. On several occasions the therapist asked me questions. He never introduced himself. He never said what his name was (when I was paying attention or thought to pay attention), he never said that he was a therapist, and he never used the words "family therapy." It wasn't until years later that I understood that was what that actually was.
Therapist: "How do you feel about your brother?"
Me: "Uh... he's my brother."
Therapist: "Yes, but how to you feel about your brother?"
Me: "Okay, I guess."
Therapist: "How do you feel about your brother being here?"
Me: "I don't even know where 'here' is. All I know is that he can't leave."
Therapist: "And how does that make you feel?"
Me: "Confused and why are you asking me these questions about my brother?"
Therapist: "It's important. How do you feel about what your brother did that got him sent here?"
Me: "I told you, I don't even know where 'here' is and I have no idea what he did get sent here. Mom and Dad won't tell me."
Therapist: "Do you know what this place is?"
Me: "Yeah... a place crazy people get sent."
Therapist: "'Crazy' isn't a word we use here. The people that are here are all minors and have some sort of psychological problems."
Me: "Okay, call it what you want, but I don't know what this is about. I don't know why he's here. I don't know why I'm here. No one will tell me anything about what is going on. So why would I feel anything one way or the other? Well, other than confused. I'm completely in the dark and no one seems to think it's important enough for me to know anything about what's going on, so you're asking the wrong person about this. I don't know anything. I'm not important enough to know anything. This is a waste of my time. I could be at home watching TV or doing homework. At least doing that makes sense to me. Asking me questions that I have no way to answer is pointless. This is all just confusing and frustrating. *turn to parents* Can I just be left home from now on?"
Therapist (to my parents): "Would you mind if Justin stepped outside for a moment?"
My Father: "No, that's fine. *turns to me* Justin, go wait in the hallway for a moment."
Me: "Fine."
*10 minutes pass and the therapist opens the door*
Therapist: "You can come back in now, Justin."
*I come in and sit back down*
Therapist: "Justin, your parents have decided not to tell you what's going on and your brother isn't ready for you to know, yet. Are you okay with that?"
Me: "What does it matter if I'm okay with it or not? The decision has been made already."
Therapist: "I want to know how it makes you feel to be left out of the loop?"
Me: *sigh and slumped shoulders* " It doesn't matter. It never matters. This is about [my brother's name]. It's always about him. Before that it was always about my sister.
Therapist: "So you sister was more important that you or your brother and now your brother is more important than you?"
Me: "Yep."
Therapist: "What do you think about that? What does that make you feel?"
Me: "Huh? I guess I've gotten to the point that I just don't care anymore. This is how things are and have always been. But if my brother is here and no one will tell me what happened or why then it must be something big. So he gets all the attention. Just like always. He makes better grades than I do. I can't make those grades, so why even try?"
Therapist: "So the only thing that's important is grades?"
Me: "To Dad, yeah. Dad works and Mom works. I get home from school and no one's there, my sister has moved out with her boyfriend, my brother doesn't come out of his room unless it's dinner time... I only see all of them when it's dinner time. Otherwise, I'm just doing my own thing."
Therapist: "And what's that? What do you do?"
Me: "Homework... video games... *shrug* I guess that's about it."
Therapist: "Do you do anything as a family other than dinner?"
Me: "Why would we do that?"
Therapist: "Do you have any friends?"
Me: "Yeah... at school."
Therapist: "So at home... you don't interact with your family other than dinner?"
Me: "Well, sometimes my brother and I watch each other play video games."
Therapist: "Do you two talk?"
Me: "Yeah. When we're playing video games he might see something I don't or I might see something he doesn't."
Therapist: "Do you talk about anything else?"
Me: "Not really."
So that's pretty much it. I still had to go to "family therapy" after school every Friday, but other than the odd question or two... I might as well have not been there at all. All this lack of attention just made me into a person who didn't ask for help or to even be noticed and the secrecy just made me feel like I wasn't important to my mom. I didn't expect to ever get Dad's attention except when report cards came in the mail. At which point, he'd pick apart my grades, tell me how many points I went down in a class, and ask me what I was going to do to bring that grade back up, for each class I made a worse grade in. There was never any acknowledgment from him about the classes I did better in. When I would bring that up, he would tell me that he expected me to keep it up. Nothing was ever good enough. I was never praised. I only mattered to my father when grades came out every 6 weeks. Even then it was only for 15 minutes while he made me feel like a failure and feel uncomfortable. But the fact that Mom wouldn't tell me what was going on made me feel like the one person I could count on to be there for me was shutting me out. Thus solidified my thoughts and behaviors about only relying on myself and not expecting anyone to care about me or my life. Still working on that. I write this kind of thing out in text for you guys to read but I don't know how many of you actually read this stuff. Especially when it's all of epic length. So, really, in my mind it's just me typing out my experiences and feelings without thinking that anyone will actually read it. I suppose some part of me hopes that you guys read it but... I don't actually dare to allow myself to believe that anyone actually does. That's not a cry for help/attention, by the way. That just me letting you know how my mind thinks.
Finally, my experiences in a mental hospital for 6 days! Since I was on suicide watch, because my psychiatrist sent me there because I "was having suicide ideation," I was woken up at 2 or 3 AM every night so that one of the night time Psych Techs could take my blood pressure and my temperature. I also couldn't leave the unit to go down to the cafeteria to get food so it was brought to me. When lunch was brought the first day it was mostly meat and I didn't eat meat. So I told the Psych Tech that brought it that I didn't eat meat and he said that he would unlock the patient fridge so I could get cereal and orange juice. There were 3 different sets of Psych Techs every day. Daytime Psych Techs, Evening time Psych Techs, and Overnight Psych Techs. So for the 2 days I was on suicide watch I had a lot of cereal and orange juice. I arrived at 11 PM at night, so I don't count that day, but the next morning, after another set of vitals checking, I was taken to an MD that had a small office/exam room on the floor to be checked out. He was thoroughly unpleasant and questioned everything I told him. Always asking me things more than once, but would word it differently to see if I changed my answer. Questioning the things I told him about my past medical history. He all but accused me of lying about what happened when I was 14... he asked me how I knew it was real and not something my mind had made up. Which, if someone tells you that they've been raped... you don't question the validity of that. That is beyond inappropriate to do. Especially for a doctor to do. He had a reason he did it though. I'll get to that.
Then on the afternoon of the second day, I met the psychiatrist that was assigned to me. He asked me how I was feeling. I told him that I felt fine, other than the fact that I didn't eat meat and that's what they kept brining me to eat for every meal so I was kinda tired of having to eat cereal and orange juice for every meal. He then asked me if I was thinking suicidal thoughts or about committing suicide anymore. Now, being who I am, you guys know I'm not going to answer that question with a "yes" or a "no." I didn't know him. I certainly didn't trust him. So, with a series of qualifications and explanations, I said, "I'm not thinking about suicide... but even if I were, do you really expect me to tell you that I am? That just gives you ammo to use to keep me here longer than the maximum amount of days that you can keep me here. Let me ask you something: If I really wanted to commit suicide, would I have told my social worker? No. I would have just done it. You and I both know that telling someone that you want to or plan on committing suicide is a cry for help or attention and telling someone that you them to give you a reason to live. Do you really think I'm stupid enough to say that I'm suicidal to any professional healthcare worker, police, or firefighter? I'm a Registered Pharmacy Technician that's licensed to work in the state of Texas. It's not like I don't know that anyone who seriously talks about being a danger to themselves or others, to a professional healthcare worker, that we are required by law to call the authorities to report it and do what we can to keep them from doing anything until the authorities arrive so long as we don't feel personally threatened with injury or death. The same goes for firefighters and the police can go pick that person up, take them into custody, put them in jail, and call the MHMRA to do an emergency psych evaluation at the jail. Also that we are required by law to report any observed or suspected child abuse to the authorities. Never once did I tell me social worker or psychiatrist that I was actively thinking about suicide or committing suicide. I my social worker that I was tired and just wanted to put everything and forget it. As in, 'I'm stressed and I'm depressed and just need to tell that to someone so that I'm not just holding it inside and pretending it's not there.' My social worker was the one who brought up the topic of suicide..." At that point I gave him an abbreviated version of how I feel about suicide, that it's a personal choice that everyone should be allowed to make, that this was not new information to my social worker or my psychiatrist; and that my social worker knew that I had long ago decided that if I ever going to do it then I knew how, when, and where it would all happen. Then I told him, "No one actually asked me if I were thinking about committing suicide before you asked. Just because I thought about it years ago and decided how I'd do it didn't mean that I was actually thinking about doing it right then. Of course, I have no idea what my social worker actually said to my psychiatrist that made her decide that I should be involuntarily committed to this psych hospital. Nor did my psychiatrist actually ask me any questions herself or explain why she was doing this. She just left it to my social worker and went home. So you'll forgive me if I'm less than trusting of doctors and nurses and social workers and your psych techs right now. You have my diagnosis right there. You know perfectly well that I won't be a person who easily trusts someone. You also know that neither you nor your staff have a snowballs chance in hell of me actually saying anything other than what will get me out of here fastest. At no point did I actually say that I was suicidal. At no point will I ever say that I am suicidal. If things get bad enough and I need help, then I'll go to my mother, just like I always have. If I decide that I am done with life... then I'm just going to do it. There won't be any preamble or notice. So write down whatever it is that you want to write down. You can write down that you think I'm lying to you and that I am suicidal. You can write down that you think I have an unhealthy attitude and opinion on suicide. Nothing you write down actually matters. I know what the truth is. You can't change that. No one can change that. Every time your nurse has asked me how I feel, I have said I feel fine. Every time your nurse has asked me if I have had any recent thoughts of suicide, I have said that I have not. Those are the only answers that I will give. Those are the only answers I have to give. So the sooner we're done here the less amount of your time I'm wasting and the sooner I can get back to my little mini-vacation here away from stress."
Now, was that smart? Well, I never claimed that I'm perfect. I'm very smart and that can get me into a lot of trouble with certain people. I just thought that the psychiatrist would appreciate me not blowing smoke up his ass or lying to him. Now, as to if he actually believed me, I can say that he did not. He did say that starting the next day I could leave the floor and go to the cafeteria with the rest of the group to eat meals. So, at least he knew that I was smart enough not to try to commit suicide in the psych hospital and if I were really going to do it that I have the patience to wait until I get out and do it when no one would be around to do anything about it.
At least that last part is what the therapist who was assigned to talk to me every day said was in my file. That was after I told her that I didn't want any BS from her, in return I wouldn't give her any BS, and as long as she was willing to agree to that then I would be open and honest with her. But if I caught her using semantic word games or trying to use any other sneaky psychological tricks that they teach, that the deal was off and she would get nothing further from me. That she had no way of knowing what I did and didn't know about psychology and to think about whether it was worth risking trying one I already knew or figuring it out. That if she wanted to know something, then I wanted her to just come out and ask the question and not dance around the topic to try to get me more comfortable about the topic. That I know that trick. That I've used it on others. That I won't insult her intelligence as long as she wouldn't insult mine. That I understand that she has a job to do here and I would respect that. But if she wants me to think about a certain topic or an aspect of a certain topic then just give me the "food for thought" and let me chew on it for a while so I could give her an honest considered answer. That I was willing to have good faith in her agreeing to my terms until she gave me a reason to no longer have that faith, but not to confuse it with me trusting her. That there were certain questions that I wouldn't lie to her about but I wouldn't answer either. Then I asked her if she agreed to those terms. That if she did then we could continue or if not we were done there.
She looked at me for a little bit, probably trying to size up whether or not I was bluffing her. So I said, "Look, I get it. You're not sure I'm telling the truth because of my diagnosis. However, given what you know about people with that diagnosis, is it fair to say that we are usually of well above average intelligence and that given how articulate I am, that I'm either outright lying to you or that I'm outright putting all my cards on the table? You're not gonna get my trust and I don't expect to get your trust. I expect that you'll take everything I say with a grain of salt. That's certainly what your education and training tells you, right? So all you can do is have faith that I'm being truthful to you and will continue to be truthful to you, just as I'm willing to have faith that you will treat me like a human being and not someone who's insane." Then there was a short pause and I added, "I'm well aware of the conditions here. I know that I am essentially a prisoner here. You can call it whatever you want, but I'm sure you can see that, from my point of view, I see myself as a prisoner. There's a locked door, there are guards -which you call Psych Techs and a Nurse-, and I can't go anywhere other than were this psych hospital allows me to go with an guard escort. This can either be pleasant for you and I'll be willing to stay and talk about things or, this being day 3, I know that you can't legally hold me past tomorrow morning without proof that I'm of imminent danger to myself or others. Which, you don't have. Now I'm willing to stay here for a few more days and do therapy with you, because frankly this is the first thing resembling a vacation that I've had in 5 or 6 years and I'm learning quite a bit about drug addiction from one of the women here and the mix of alcoholism and drug abuse from one of the guys here. I'm enjoying learning from someone who is actually living it instead of reading about it, but if we can't agree to be honest and transparent with each other... then I'll cut my vacation here short and leave. I've told you what I'm willing to do. I will choose to stay here and work with you. The question is; will you choose to accept what I'm telling you as truth until I give you reason to believe otherwise?"
She smiled and told me that I would make an interesting and probably very successful negotiator and that she wouldn't play poker with me because she can't tell whether I'm bluffing or not. I smiled and said, "Good. Then I look forward to working together."
So, day 6 comes along and I'm ready to go home. I've learned what I could learn from the two people in the unit who didn't have a mental illness, just an addiction, which some would argue is a type of mental illness, but my opinion is that it's not. The nurse had asked me every day how I felt and if I was suicidal or thinking about suicide. I gave him my stock answers every day that never changed.
My therapist comes in to the main room and asks to speak with me. She taken me to a private conference type room and there is a woman who I've never seen, the psychiatrist who was assigned to me but only saw me once, and the therapist at a square table. I took the last available seat and the therapist introduced the woman I didn't know as my social worker (who I'd never met and who nothing about me, but I know that she was there to make sure that the psychiatrist and therapist didn't put undo pressure on me to agree to anything I wasn't comfortable with or didn't want to do, given that I had been legally able to leave for the past 3 days). Then the therapist talked about what she was concerned about -which was my home environment with my relationship with my father being so adversarial that I might end up suicidal again-, and then the psychiatrist said that I seemed outwardly stable and that he didn't think I needed a change in medication but was also worried about my home environment. They said that they thought I should stay another day. I said that I never said I was suicidal and that, in fact, every time I was asked while there I had always said that I wasn't, that there wasn't anything left for them to teach me there, that at that point I was just taking up a bed that someone who actually needed it should have, that I didn't have a choice but to live with my parents so the adversarial relationship I had with my father was just something I was going to have to deal with better, thanked them for their help and their concern, but that I was choosing to leave today. The therapist said that she would start getting the paperwork done for my discharge but that it would say that I was leaving against my doctor's wishes and my therapist's wishes. I told her that I was comfortable with that, thanked her, asked if there was more, she said no, and I got up and went back into the main room to tell them that I was leaving today. A little bit later, my therapist called me into the hall and said that since I lived 90 miles away that she would have to use her pin number to allow for a long-distance call so that I could call my parents to come get me. She did so and I talked to my mother. She had not heard from me since going into the place so she was surprised to know I was coming home. She even asked if that was wise. I told her that I was never suicidal and that this had just been a nice 6 day vacation but I was ready to come home. She told me that she would call Dad and they'd be on their way.
Paperwork, paperwork, paperwork, sitting in a chair in the hall outside the main room, my parents show up with my therapist, my therapist asks if my parents and I were willing to sit and talk with her before I left, we all agreed, and went into a small private room. She expressed her concern about my intelligence being something that is as much harmful as helpful, the difficult relationship I have with my father and how that she thought was a major source of stress for me, and my personal view on suicide being worrisome. My mother agreed with all of that. My father denied that he ever got upset at anything, that nothing ever bothered him, and that any problems I had with him were my issues and not his. The therapist nodded to my father while my mother shook her head back and forth, and then the therapist looked at me like 'You weren't kidding about his level of denial, his lack of self-accountability for his actions, and him being distant.' I smiled at her and nodded a 'Yep.' Then I went home.
Now, here's the problems I have with those two experiences:
My brother was saved from having a sex offender record by going to the RTF. I think that he needed to get away from life and have a vacation, he should have been put on anxiety medication; he needed to talk about his issues with perfection, a distant father, and a father who never praised only condemned; and learn coping techniques for dealing with stress. I think that he could only do that if he weren't around Dad. So time away, certainly understandable. The lack of communication to me about what was going on and why was the first time my mother ever shut me out. I had always counted on her to be there and to be honest with me. But her shutting me out left me with very little to no information, I had no one to talk to, I was confused and hurt... and for the first time in my life, I was completely alone. I didn't have anyone but myself. Now, everyone in my family had shut me out of their life at some point before this, except my mother. At this point in my life I didn't know my sister, my father was distant, and my brother was a teenager with his own room that didn't want me around and didn't talk to me. But Mom... she was always there. Until that first family therapy session in which the therapist told me that my parents had agreed that I didn't need to know why my brother was there. That was the exact moment that all those times of not being able to trust someone truly became everyone. So I learned that I could only really count and rely on myself. I withdrew from my bio-family and more into my own world.
My imprisonment, I learned was because a patient my social worker and psychiatrist treated had told both of them 2 weeks previous that he was "going home on Friday." Which, to any average person would be taken as "going to visit family." He meant home home... like Heaven-home, and had killed himself. So my psychiatrist was worried that she'd lose her license to practice psychiatry if another one of her patients killed themselves so close to each other. So where they misread what the other guy meant one direction, they misread what I meant in the opposite direction. I actually lodged a formal complaint with the APA (American Psychological Association) and the Texas State Board of Examiners of Psychologists. No idea what happened with that.
So I was wrongfully imprisoned because my social worker misunderstood me and/or my psychiatrist misunderstood me and committed me to a psych hospital against my will. I didn't get a chance to explain myself to my psychiatrist. I explained myself to the admissions psychiatrist at the psych hospital and he obviously didn't believe me. I told the psychiatrist that was assigned to me on the inside that I never said anything about being suicidal and that I wasn't suicidal and yet he didn't release me. So... at each step, I wasn't actually listened to or believed.
What would happen if you told your doctor that your foot hurt, he told you to go to the hospital he is associated with to check into a room, they explained that your doctor said that it was an infection (without having actually done any tests) that required you to be quarantined from the rest of the world, and held captive with no actual proof that there is any infection from your doctor and the tests run by the hospital showed no infection? How would you feel? Worse, you know something is wrong but every doctor you go to tells you that there is nothing wrong with you?
In both cases no one is listening to you and they have no proof of anything. Yet a psychiatrist can just say that you're not mentally fit to make your own decisions, you're stripped of your rights, and locked away from the 'good citizens of the world.' I did nothing wrong. I said nothing wrong. I expressed feeling emotional fatigue and an opinion about suicide that isn't "accepted" or considered "healthy." There's nothing wrong with expressing an opinion!
The way that I was treated was bad enough. You should have seen how some of the others were treated.
All the Psych Techs sat at a table at the back of the main room and would tell any patient who sat down at the same table that they weren't allowed to sit at the same table as them. I'm sorry are we so dangerous that we can't be sitting at the same table as the Psych Techs? They take us in 2 groups in a crammed elevator and sit at the same table as all of us while both they and we eat. In both of those cases, they are on their own with us. The main room, where we all sat all day and watch TV because there was nothing else to DO, was 10 feet from the nurse's station. If anything the Psych Techs were much safer with us sitting at the the same table in the back of the main room than in a crammed elevator or a large cafeteria!
I'm not saying that I didn't see some people in there who were obviously delusional. There was one guy who, I swear to you, thought the he was some sort of magical chosen person who was born to protect the Earth from invaders from another dimension. That's okay for a sci-fi or fantasy genre book but he actually believed this was the truth. Was he dangerous? No! He probably shouldn't go unsupervised but he wasn't dangerous.
There was another guy who got it into his head that his roommate was evil and needed to be killed. So he went out of a machete to find his roommate, but was able to figure out that his thinking wasn't right, his roommate was in danger from him, called the police to come get him, and waited patiently for 30 minutes on a bench outside a WalMart before the cops showed up! Dangerous? Very much so... to his roommate and only his roommate.
Then, of course, there was the guy who was having a whispering conversation with the voice(s) in his head, he would randomly laugh at whatever the voice(s) in his head, and was constantly reading the Bible. Really... need I say more about that guy? Oh, and no boundaries with this guy! The night shift Psych Techs had to keep going to a specific room, that wasn't his, and guide this guy back to his room and put him in his bed all night long! And, we pretty watched the CW all day long. Like, that was what station was on the TV. We could change it if we wanted to as long as everyone was okay with that. This guy would randomly get up and start changing the channel until he reached some Christian religious channel or someone physically went up to him and told him that he couldn't just change the channel without making sure it was okay with every one else. When we saw him get up and head towards the TV we would call out his name, trying to get his attention, and telling him that he can't change the channel. He did not hear or did not listen to us. Someone had to actually get in his face, tell him to go sit down, and tell him that he couldn't change the channel. He would say that he watched that channel at home and hadn't been able to watch it since he got there. One girl, like, would make a New Yorker proud with her getting in his face. She told him that he couldn't watch that channel while he was in there. He could watch it at home if he wanted to but not while he was there because there are many other people there and none of them wanted to watch that channel.
He was one of the 3 guys who were all heavy into the whole Christian thing and always reading the Bible. Two of them were always going around and asking if they could pray with you. Were they dangerous? Not really. Annoying... but not dangerous. Obviously the one guy who was talking to the voice(s) in his head should be carefully watched in case he became violent. The other two were just guys who thought they were special messengers from God. They were very nice about things when you told them that you didn't want to pray with them. Now, they'd be back later to ask again, but they always walked away without incident when you said no to praying with them. According to the Bible there was a guy who was going around saying that he was the Son of God and had 12 other men with him that were all messengers of God. Jesus was killed, most of the others went back to fishing, and one of them went insane when God's temple in Jerusalem was destroyed and was exiled to an island for many, many years. You might know the last one as St. John. Therein lies the danger of relying too much on religion. Balance in life is the best approach, I think.
Most of the rest were drug and/or alcohol addicts. So they really weren't dangerous while in the psych hospital. Now, in the outside world, they might be dangerous when they need money for their fix and get it by robbing someone at knife/gun point.
There was one guy who was just... angry. He had to be 18 years or older, because there was a separate wing for the minors, and his face always looked angry. He wouldn't look at anyone, he would speak to anyone... all he did all day was brood. During the group therapy session, he refused to even give his name. Apparently he had been there for at least 2 weeks by the time I got there. So by the time I left it was 3 weeks that he was there with no sign of ditching the anti-social behavior.
Now... all us in there were being treated as thought we were dangerous (and I'm not saying everyone was a fluffy kitten) and locked away from the outside world. It was dehumanizing. Like the fact that we had a mental illness and behaved differently from the general public meant that we were locked away. I could have my cell phone. I couldn't have shoes with laces. I couldn't have a belt. None of us could. We were given toothpaste, a disposable toothbrush, a tiny shampoo bottle that made hotel shampoo bottles look giant, and tiny little deodorant sticks.
Just because someone has a mental illness doesn't mean that they should be treated as less of a human being. I don't deserve to be told that I can't sit at the same table as someone else because I have a mental illness that isn't dangerous to them and they have no mental illness. Exchange the idea of mental illness with gender or sexual-orientation or the color of skin or country of origin! Are any of those actually acceptable? No! I have NEVER been violent. I have never slapped anyone. I have never punched anyone. I have never been in a fight. I've been bashed, but I didn't strike back. I have never been a danger to anyone in any way that someone who doesn't have a mental illness could be a danger to anyone else.
Now, if they're being overtly violent, then okay... I can see them needing to be separated from the general populace. Psychopaths and sociopaths... murders. Okay, sure. But they're in a prison, not a psych hospital.
Just to give you an idea of what it feels like; imagine that you're someone who is feared or unwanted by the general public, so they put you all in a special place with people kinda-sorta like you in that you're feared or unwanted. You want a prime example of unwanted people being crammed into one place with the other people that society doesn't want? Two words: Nursing Home.
I'm sorry, I just feel like it's cruel to leave people in a state in which they can't care for themselves and are just pushed into Residential Living Facilities. Now, I'm very lucky that the medication I take works so well. I really am! However, someone who can't live a real life shouldn't be forced to live it. The quality of life is just so low for so many people and we just lock them away where they can't get seen and we can forget them. If I were faced with knowing that the medication I'm taking doesn't work anymore and nothing else does either... kill me. Please, kill me. I do not want to live as, basically, a vegetable. I'm breathing and my heart is beating, but my brain doesn't function right. I am no over-exaggerating when I say that there would be many days where I would be completely unaware of myself and anything around me. I would not be able to eat or drink because I would be unaware of it and couldn't swallow. I would soil myself and wouldn't even be aware of it or that it is even possible. What kind of life does someone have if they're not aware of themselves? Does that qualify them as not being alive. Being self-aware is who we are. If we can't be self-aware then we're not really alive.
It may seem strange to you, but I think that it is more humane to painlessly kill those people who are trapped in psychosis and have little-to-no quality of life. I'm all for figuring out what ones are genetic and which genes or combination of genes causes it and changing the DNA of a fetus so that it isn't born with a crippling deformity or mental illness. Heck, use the gene therapy to change the DNA of a teenager/adult who has a mental illness. In the interim, they should not be forced to live.
Believe me, if you've always been "normal" and all the sudden you're faced with something like Alzheimer's then at some point you'll think about whether or not you'd rather die than degenerate into a being that looks human but doesn't think or act human. If you end up with terminal cancer and you're in constant pain... at some point, you'll seriously think that you want to be dead NOW! You'll rethink your position on assisted suicide if you're against it. Until you're there and you're faced with it... you can't make an informed decision. You have no way to know with 100% certainty that you'd never commit suicide.