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Fuzzybear · Nov 05, 2019 at 03:54 PM

Thanks for this reply ((( safe hugs )))

Yes, misdiagnoses “suck”. Sometimes they are more harmful than others. I’ve also experienced therapy abuse.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lilly2

Hi @Fuzzybear

I've had that experience. I was misdiagnosed with a bunch of things (ranging from psychosis/psychotic/schizophrenia or something to bipolar to bpd to many other things that, when DID was finally diagnosed by different professionals in different institutions and OP treatment centers, that all the other misdiagnoses were found to be incorrect). I also experienced therapy abuse, which made it even harder for me to deal with treatment. I've tried the different treatments for the different misdiagnoses (at the time, truly believing that I had those misdiagnoses), but none of them worked. The meds made me lose more time and become more depressed (though that's not the case with everybody, but with my system it was), so a good Pdoc understood dissociation and weaned me off the meds and monitored me. I was way better with only talk therapy. DBT didn't help me at all! But for some people in the group I was in, it did. CBT really helped me, especially since it was simple, easy to remember, easy to use repeatedly, and transformed to my needs for dissociation and trauma. CBT comes in different forms, so if one type of CBT doesn't work, another type might. But until I was diagnosed correctly, I couldn't process trauma (still can't), EMDR didn't work, brainspotting made me dissociate more, and other options definitely didn't work. I have PTSD and DID as well as IBS, CFS, insomnia, and sleep-apnea. I also have a painful IPR stress fracture that never healed properly, so I cannot run without pain, and I can barely walk a few miles before the pain in that area (groin) starts hurting. IBS = irritable bowl syndrome, and CFS = chronic fatigue syndrome. The VA considers both IBS and CFS as related to PTSD and service-connected. It may differ for others who are not veterans. So the idea is for me to find a treatment team that can help me with all of those things in some order, I guess.

It's not so easy to do in civilian treatments because records on physical and mental disorders are all disconnected. Thus, it's easy to get misdiagnosed and for T's to miss the signs of physical disorders, etc.

I've gotten diagnosed in the span of an hour or a 30-minute quick visit by a psychiatrist. 30 minutes is a long time for psychiatrists, considering that they typically see patients for 10 minutes to assess medications. But still, without going through a full history, it's easy to misdiagnose someone. Further, I think that professionals should spend more time in getting to know their patients before making a diagnosis.

(((safe hugs))) to all who struggle with misdiagnoses.

It's hard to be misdiagnosed. I'm rambling here because I had the hardest time with misdiagnoses and mistreatments. I felt like I wasted my time and money on so many wrong diagnoses and treatments. It hurts, too, when you believe in one diagnosis and feel like the T is making it your fault for it not working, when in reality it's the treatment and misdiagnoses that were at fault.

I hope this all makes sense.

(((safe hugs))) for those who have had negative experiences with misdiagnoses and treatments and T's who were insensitive.

I'll write more later, but I wanted to ask if there's anything I didn't cover.