Gayle, that's nice of you to say. I hope so. So much of life is what a person makes of it, and almost all of that comes down to having the confidence and self esteem to do it. People who have been raised in loving, supportive environments seem to do well, those of us from troubled environments really struggle, and it does seem unfair.

My psych ward experience was traumatic for a much different reason than yours, OE. Mine was because of the thought of being sent. The place itself was actually calming, once I got over the fear. I did expect EXACTLY that -- One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. I guess in hindsight that wasn't realistic, considering it was a day hospital program, and people drove themselves, so they couldn't drug you up. But, that was what I honestly thought -- I would get there, and out would come the needle, and I would be sitting in a corner drooling on myself all day. I also thought they would lock me in. The first morning, I had to go to a general registration area to check in, and I was sure that they were going to send the security guard to escort me to the psychiatric floor, and that he would probably search me and pat me down, and possibly put some kind of restraints on me "as policy" -- all in front of the dozens and dozens of people waiting there, and the hundreds of people in the main concourse right outside. None of that happened, but I would have believed it if someone told me it was going to.

The program itself actually did help me = it gave me insight into the entire mental health system, it let me see that I wasn't nearly as "far gone" as I was lead to believe by the quack -- having a doctor tell me I needed to be locked up for my own safety wasn't exactly an ego boost -- and it did give me the tools to begin to fight back.

The thing itself wasn't bad -- no one was screaming or violent or weird, everyone was actually very nice, a lot of quiet sobbing now and then, especially in group therapy, and I did more than my share of that. But, we were free to come or go as we pleased, at least for reasonable things like to go downstairs to get a Starbucks or whatever at the food court or cafeteria. If you disappeared all day they might have issues with it, but 10-15 minutes was fine. And, we had an hour and 15 minutes for lunch -- mostly I hung out in the food court or cafeteria, but some days I would run errands, or just go to one of my normal haunts just to feel connected to the life I thought I had lost forever - remember, this was like 2 1/2 miles, at most, from where I work, so it was easy, and hard. The program psychiatrist was a joke, an old guy of about 70, clearly just going through the motions, and he was hard to understand, he had a heavy accent, Indian or Pakistani. The rest of the staff was actually really nice, though, professional, kind, worked hard, so I can't complain about them. The facility -- Michigan's biggest private health system, ranked in the top 100 in the country year after year, very nice -- the hospital has a food court, a retail concourse, all kinds of amenities such as a spa, a salon, a medical supply/pharmacy etc. It is right next door to a big shopping center, I went there a few times at lunch just to blow off steam.