Not to make light of this but if you *really* wanted to go in the mental ward all you need to do is go to the hospital ER and tell them you are going to kill your self. 9 times out of 10 that will do it. they will put you in an isolation room and call a psychiatrist to talk to you. as long as you keep saying you want to die they will put you in.

But Im guessing since you dont know why you want to go in and have no idea what you want to do there other than meet the other patients and because you havent been put in yet you probably dont *really* want to go. Im guessing you are curious about what goes on in there and who goes there.

when people are put in the mental ward they do the same things as they do outside of the mental ward - have support groups, meet with their therapist, meet with the psychiatrist, go to therapy groups. the only difference is that in the mental wards its talking about your problems and working on your problems almost every waking moment.

you wake up in the morning with someone taking your temp, blood pressure, vitals and giving you a paper cup with your meds. then you get up and go to where ever the lunch room is, everyone there is talking about their mental health schedules and what groups they have, what doctors they hate, what meds they are on, you see your therapist and talk about your own problems and how to fix them, you see your psychiatrist to monitor your meds, you go to groups and talk some more about your problems and how to fix your problem, somewhere along the way theres lunch and dinner and off to bed with your meds. everyone has an individual schedule that is set to meet their own problems. if you go in with depression your schedule is set to meet your depression problems and to solve them. if you go in with schizophrenia your schedule is set to meet your problems you are having. sometimes the groups you go to are all those on the unit with the same problems as you are having other times its everyone with the same diagnosis and other times its the whole unit doing a therapy group together.

people dont usually yell from the roof top that they have been in the mental ward so with out even knowing it you have probably already met some people who have been in the mental wards as some point in their lives. mental patients are just human beings who happen to need a structured way of dealing with their problems, and instead of dealing with their problems a little bit or weekly they do it 24/7.

the last time I was on the mental unit there were 23 people and 19 were there just to have their meds adjusted, there was one guy who had killed his wife and was on the unit for a psych evaluation ordered by the court, one woman who was catatonic and couldnt talk waiting for a bed in the long care facility down state and 2 teen agers who had a suicide pact with another girl who did not survive the suicide pact.