Start shopping for the best hospitals, doctors and therapies while you’re feeling good, suggests Lisa Keith on her PsychCentral blog Bipolar Lifehacks, because when you get into psychiatric trouble, you may not be able to.
Keith lays out some of her tips for searching and questions to ask psychiatrists when you’re interviewing them about their background and respect for collaboration with patients.
Plan for Your Next Breakdown (Bipolar Lifehacks, October 2014)
Or you just stay the hell away from the whole mess altogether.
“Abandon all hope, ye who enter here.”
Seriously, Mental Health, Inc. is getting out of hand. It used to be that we had state mental hospitals to lock us up, now we’re supposed to keep track of ourselves with “mood charting” and “contact a mental health professional” when and if you show any “symptoms.” Oh, yeah, and the rise of counseling. They used to say “Those who do, do; those who can’t, teach.” Now I think that’s true of a lot of people in Mental Health, Inc., especially the counselors.
I guess once you’re socialized into the patient role, you have to fill your end of the bargain. You get a diagnosis, pills, maybe disability, a role–Bipolar, Schizophrenia, whatever–and you’re “free…” as long as you play by the rules, which apparently includes planning for your next crisis (which assumes you’ll have one, and also points out the reality of the brutal treatment of the distressed among us, especially those with few resources).
Ugh.
I would never investigate a hospital for myself. I would rather destroy myself fully than even consider it. I’ll just have my breakdowns at home and learn to work around them ,
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Or more like plan how to avoid being noticed during your next breakdown so the “mental health professionals” can’t find you until it’s over.
—- Steve
