Psych Hospital Abuse Storys

If any readers of this essay have never listened to someone so harmed by psychiatric drugs and hosptital abuse that they tried to kill themselves, I hope you will. It will break your heart. These people are among us, and for many, it is all the more tragic, because people close to them pushed them to take the drugs by saying, "If you love us, you'll take the pills"...

The more people who know the truth about psychiatry, the fewer such tragedies there will be.

And to top it all off they LIED on my medical records and tryed to not give them to me, we didnt get your request... we didnt get the fax... we sent to fax... its in the mail...

They know the lies and the lifetime DSM IV diagnosis and the commitment to a lifetime of psych drug Rx that went with it was a misdiagnosis and malpractice. Get your medical records, you might be shocked.

It is common for them to lie and put lies in the chart. It is so they can win in court and get you commited and force drugged with anything they want. I did two years in a psych hospital and they put plenty of BS in my chart and told the lies to the judges in hearings. They tried to have me force drugged with haldol but lost the medication hearing. The state attorney appealed and lost. After two years all the state's legal options were used up and they let me go.

The last time I went to a hospital, it was in Columbus. I'm not from the city, and the last ward I was in was helpful and friendly. This one was different.

They automatically assume things about you based on the people they get in there. I understand that the staff have dealt with a lot of manipulative people, but they're so condescending and there's no reason for that.

There was no time to be alone. No reflection. No therapy. You just went to the gym and socialized. I was undergoing serious culture shock.

They didn't give me my meds for a long time. I was a nervous wreck and couldn't sleep.

Some of the other patients ganged up on me, sensing my weakness since I was the outsider. Teenagers do that. The staff did nothing.

I never got to talk to my parents. The staff never called to give any report despite me being a minor at the time. They didn't call to ask permission before putting me on new anxiety meds that I didn't want/need.

Once I became a nervous wreck because of my tense social situation. I literally BEGGED the staff to either let me be alone in my room or to move me to the adult ward, but they refused. I panicked, so they called my dad to see if they could medicate me. He said not to. They gave me a shot and it put me to sleep all night.

When I met with the psych, I told her I wasn't comfortable and wanted to settle my issues at home because I couldn't concentrate there. When I was crying she gave me this lecture about how manipulative I was being and how that wouldn't help me. I called my dad and he got me out of there.

They threatened to put me into the ward with the aggressive, dangerous adults if I ever came back. It scared me and even when I went back into old habits, I just hid it because it'll be OVER MY DEAD BODY that I go back to that place.

I was on the high security ward for a couple of months and it was actually better than the low security. Sure there were killers there, but they were less annoying than the little old lady who screamed constantly for 6 months. Plus on the high security ward you had your own room as opposed to two room-mates. And there were plenty of fights for entertainment. As long as you have your wits about you none of the agressive ones come after you.

My bad experience was at Northern Nevada mental health (a state hospital in the USA) I went there originally for help getting ADHD medication (job was threatening to fire me if i did not pay better attention) as I had no insurance and it was my only option at this time.
I will admit I was going through some pretty rough times and was also depressed as hell, self mutilating and contemplating suicide.
I knew the horror stories about the inpatient treatment there so i figured if i didnt let on to anything major I would endure their beurocracy and maybe get some medication help and be on my way. (i would rather be crazy and free, than crazy and imprisoned in that palce, so I resolved not to discuss my more serous problems there.)
First they made me sign a contract giving up my patients rights to refuse treatment. Then I had to go through an evaluation where a psychiatrist shot-gunned questions at me. From the beginning i got the impresson she hated her job and hated her patients. she asked me about my height and weight. when I told her she said: "well, well you are veeery underweight" and laughed. I said my weight was fine and i had always been this way, I commented that she should not rely on some arbitrary hight-weight chart to make an evalutation of overall health. She made an expansive and mocking gesture and said "well we cant just rely on air." I said the opinin of a medical doctor carried more valididty and my doctor thought i was in fine shape. she didnt seem to like that and spat personal questions at me almost faster than I could answer them. The "test" also included inane things like her holding up a pencil and asking me to identify the object and reciting what my name was. Backwards. When it was over I told her that it had been about as pleasant as being strip-searched by nazies. (my attitude worsened as the evaluation progressed, but for some reason they didnt lock me up for that.) several people repeatedly asked me if i was thinking about hurting myself, it was as if they were frothing at the jaws in anticipatin of a yes so they could imprison me (hey, they get more money from the state if they do). one person commented that when i was asked if i was suicidal i did not answer no fast enough.
well I got through that and finally got medication (stratera) which made me feel like i had brain damage. then they sent me a bill. I threw away the medication and never went back.

I know that this is not nearly as bad an experience as some of the people on here have had, my heart goes out to them. I felt the tip of the iceberg of how nasty the staff at mental hospitals can be and how they seem to dehumanise their patients. This kind of treatment prevents people who need help from getting it and worsens the mental state of already fragile people who are forced through the system. These hospitals need to be sued, alot. So they learn to get their s¤%t together.

In 1992, while attending the University of Kentucky - my junior year I had to take medical leave since U.K. Student Health Medical Offices, and U.K. emergency room could not diagnose my current medical problems, lethargy, mental malaise. After U.K. e.r. finally said you need to go to Eastern State Hospital, I did. They diagnosed a critically failing thyroid (which causes the above problems), and E.S.H. also tacked on for good measure Bipolar diagnosis. After being given meds for both issues, I continued to get sicker. Signed self into University of Kentucky psych. ward. What a smart decision that turned out to be. I'll make this brief because flashbacks are a Hell of their own reliving U.K. psych ward experience in '93. U.K. is a teaching hospital - so they practiced many different medications on me - nightmare!!!!!!!
One of these @@$*&(^*&) so-called experimental treatments made me completely void of ANY feelings and I was unable to express self period. I was experimented on with various drugs that made me feel like I was fully losing touch with what little reality I'd came in there holding onto. I was so screwed up from trial "practicing" drugs and residents - I was released approx. 3 weeks later.

But while there, a young man and recent new father, who was admitted for a critical head injury due to a tractor accident - tractor had overturned and his head was hit, etc. Throughout his admission there on U.K. psych. ward, he was running amok due to brief inattendance by nurses, staff, etc.

He snuck into room next door and tried to suffocate female patient with her pillow; he exposed himself while on elevator on way to x-ray with nurse and another female patient on elevator; he went into various rooms stood and stared at patients while they were sleeping and would awake and scream, etc. Came into my room (had female roommate) and he touched my thigh and I awoke screaming and saw him running out of room. After reporting to staff - we females still had to walk up to meds counter at night with dim lighting and made to walk back alone without staff protection, all the while this unfornate fellow was amok, amok, amok. (Add on) On January 18, 1996, a Dr. Allen Marshall Dawson, gastroenterologist, here in Lexington, KY decided to pull up my street clothes top and (no bra) and begin to massage my left breast. He'd been told pre-exam that I had an appointment with Dr. Mike Guiler (ob/gyn) for annual full female exam. I was there for constipation. I had asked for a nurse. Dr. Dawson had pointed out into hall to two (2) nurses and said "That's what they're here for." Prior to molesting me, he wrote notes (or so I thought) on his pre-exam notes (after I told him I had been molested as child) also told him I had Dr. Guiler appt. thought he wrote that down too. Later received his office pre-exam notes and none of what I told him was written down. NONE OF IT!!!!!!!!!! He never placed me in exam gown, he never intended I believe to do anything other than play with my breast. While he was massaging my left breast, I for the first time (so I thought) blacked out, came to, he's still massaging, blacked out, came to, same thing, over and over; then I came to and he was standing at office door with it open, and I was coming off exam table - like a dream, I passed him, then nurses' sta. and said to them "I've been raped." Why I used the word raped - I still have no clue. I should thank the monster Dawson, for immediately after, I began to have horrific nightmares about my step-father molesting me and my sister in California. Buried deep down it all came out in horrific nightmares, and nightmares that you think you

I was not able to go back in and finish. Quick and to the point, 20 years later, I am told that I do not nor have I ever had a bipolar illness. That back in '92 when thyroid (thyroxine depletion) mimicked bipolar that is why the bipolar diagnosis was added on. Gratitude because of Dawson I now as of 3 months ago have a "correct" diagnosis of P.T.S.D., and am being tested for dyslexia, ADHD, (depression, and mood disorder NOS is part of P.T.S.D. diagnosis. I have had E.M.D.R., still suffer flashbacks, and am on anti-anxiety med called clonazePAM. Helps but still have to deal with all of it now. I'd quit dealing with anything after '93 diagnosis. Now I am working hard on flashbacks and trying to deal with paranoia of people, places, and things. Check your thyroid - there are still mistakes by M.D.'s to be made, they are fallable just like us; and some are monsters. I have been in intensive therapy weekly since 6/2006.
I hope anything I've shared helps someone out there, you all are certainly most-definitely helping me with your stories that reflect mine, and I am not alone anymore with psych. issues. Thank you for this.

HIGHGATE MENTAL HEALTH CENTRE, NORTH LONDON - stay the ###$ away from the place.

3 times 6 nurses restrained me held me down and forcibly injected me. Just because I didn't agree to take medication. My body was covered in bruises.

RESTRAINT IS ASSAULT.

Psychiatric hospitals are not working as well due to so many problems with people working there, protocals, etc. I don't want to go into detail about my experience but as an adolescent i was in one for 9 weeks, in the last week I was ..raped by someone who was working there at fifteen. I call it rape, it was statutory rape but still wrong. Later a psychiatrist brought it up when I was seventeen. "That's unfortunate" was her empathetic response. She also got me on the wrong meds and the whole team of them lied to me about my behavior in order to condition me to accept something I hadnt' done. I had walked to the doors and told them all I was fine, then tried to walk out. They construed this as yelling at everyone and having a psychotic episode. You see how this is dangerously bad. I was manic or a little stressed before my parents got me there by exaggerating/lying about things to get me well...but the meds did cause me or somehow triggered me to hear voices after they got me to take them but this was after all that or something. It was called Geodon.

They explained it as my Bipolar symptoms that were repressed coming out due to medications or some quackery. It is very confusing. I never heard voices before...ever...and they haven't gone away since Geodon messed me up really really bad....so...I don't know if they were right or wrong. I do know I didn't scream at everyone. They called some guy to put me on a stretcher and I think he pretended he did it or refused to. Because i was sitting calmly at a table, and he took one look at me then left. This probably was more of a misunderstanding but you see the danger is how inhumane they are to the person on the other side of the glass. It's sickening. It's disgusting. It needs to change.

I acknoweldge that I suffer from symptoms of mania sometimes, but I don't think they have the right approaches at least, in my personal experience. The only thing the hospital can offer is medications which sometimes don't help people. Only one med worked for me, the rest were worsening it. The problem is the trauma was so severe it CAUSED me to question my illness endlessly because i couldnt differentiate from the harm of abusive treatment and the illness itself. And I still struggle daily with that. It seems all hospitals are places of abuse. It seems like they can get away with so much bs. Even Sheppard Pratt, the top mental health facility in the country or one of them, and this is where an event like a counsiler telling me that the psychiatrist will determine if my memories are correct or not...that she's in charge of fact checking, not me, the crazy girl...whose questioning their authority...so...yeah.

Havent been back in 6 years!