We don't all have health care staff

I'd just like to say a word about assuming.

We're so many coming to PC, different ages, situations, conditions and history. Some people here have diagnoses, therapy twice a week and seeing their psychiatrist once a month. But everyone doesn't have that. I just wish that this I see sometimes, assuming we all have that, would turn more into asking if we do... or something like that.

I know PC cannot replace mental health care BUT, for some people it is all we have. We try to manage best we can....

Some don't have money for therapy and meds, or insurance, some live where it is far to these, some live with parent that don't let them see anyone, some have suffered abuse from docs and therapists and would hate going back, some had no help from docs and therapists, and in my case, I live where health care is in a collapse state.

So when you ask us to see our health care staff, you might ask us to do the impossible.

I'll just tell you about my own situation. I entered care when health care still had money, so I have the privilege of belonging to a mental health outpatient clinic. People younger than me where I live (Nothern Europe), don't have that, they can only see a GP for mental health and get 5 appointments with a counsellor.

So I have had a steady doctor for some years. Now my privileged situation has deteriorated. My clinic that once had 14 doctors and serves a population of 150,000 people only have 2. So I don't have a steady doctor anymore. I have no one that knows my case. Since I'm not psychotic I don't get one of the 2 doctors at the clinic. Once a year my clinic hires doctors from other counties because they have to see patients once in a while, that is the law.

So once a year I get to see a rental doctor I will never see again. Some actually do their best to check that patients are not going to off themselves or have fallen into a negative spiral, but mostly it is a formality, to fulfill the law.

I then renew my prescriptions over the web. Any doctor who is at the clinic at the time will fill prescriptions. They usually just look at records and see what was prescribed last time and do that over. There is no human contact. The only safety net we have is that we have a form online that allows us to report side effects, we are not allowed to include other messages. We are not allowed to email the clinic. We can not walk into it and ask to talk to someone because the receptionist is just there to take care of people who actually have an appointment.

So if you ever want to tell me to contact my treatment provider.... please don't. I'm struggling alone.

And I'm sure I'm not the only one.

Sure sounds like a big loss for you.

Are there any free support or self-help groups in your area? I belong to one in my area (CoDA) and it has turned out to be the best thing I've ever done for my mental health. I not only have a support system that I can be open with, I have friends through this group AND a mentor.

Thanx, Jimi. Conditions are no different in some parts of the USA than what you're facing in Europe. It's the same where I live. There are no "treatment teams." The hospital psych unit closed due to lack of funding. There's only one psychiatrist for an area that covers thousands of square miles and he sees only psychotic patients to provide medication.

I am urging everyone in the USA, who hasn't already, to sign up for the Affordable Care Act (ObamaCare) when the next open enrollment comes around in October or November. Many people refused last year due to all the bad publicity. Under ObamaCare medical insurance has to cover mental health as well as standard bodily medicine.

I did get three people to sign up and they qualified for free insurance and they are now seeing private therapists, as well as getting normal medical care. All of that was out of their reach before.

When I read the psychotherapy forum and see how casually people want to dump their T's if s/he says or does one little thing wrong, how willing they are to play power games and sabotage their own therapy and how they expect their Ts to answer endless emails during the week, I wonder if they know how lucky they are to have the privilege of acting that way.

I love living where I do. But it's just not a good place for people who need serious mental health care. As a result, we have an alarmingly high rate of suicide and accidental drug ODs.

The most consistent help people can get around here is self-help groups based on the 12-Steps and various free classes put on by the hospital, community college and groups of doctors and therapists who know there are many suffering people in the community and not enough resources to go around.

I'm pretty sure (this is a guess) that doctors and therapists sometimes pick new patients from the audiences in their free multi-week workshops. If someone is showing real motivation by showing up on time, paying attention, doing between class homework and acting like they really want to get better, those people are the most likely to get into a treatment slot.

I attend a lot of these free classes and workshops, usually with a friend or two. I've twice been privately asked if I wanted to become a therapy client. My friends were not approached. I don't know if it's because I look like the one who's the most messed up and in need or because I look like the most motivated. I am highly motivated and have been since I was 14 years old to escape what has been called the "family curse" of self-destruction.

Fortunately, I'm already getting good care and I wasn't looking for a therapist, so I hope someone else was able to get into one of those rare empty treatment slots.

Therapists get to pick and choose who they want to see here. From what people tell me, if they don't get with the program and do the work, they suddenly find they had signed up for short-term therapy. That's just the way it is.

"Treatment team" makes it sound like I have an entire staff of professionals ready to jump for my happiness whenever I snap my fingers. I should be so lucky.

Thank you Jimi for bringing this up .. Was a much needed reminder that not everyone has the ability to just make a call and get X help.

Im sorry your in the situation you are in.. maybe one day everyone will be able to receive all the help and resources that we need . We can only hope.

take care

Excellent post, jimi. Thank you. Sometimes people need a serious wake-up call.

Unfortunately we have no real culture of self help groups, but if we did they would be like here.. but IRL.

And I also agree with Venus that everyone doesn't want to run to their doc for every minor question. I sure don't want to. If I can find the answer myself I do. Also when I ask something online, I'm not a slave to the answer, it's just some input I can put in the back of my mind while I keep thinking.

Thank you! I see this a lot online. I understand that if someone is feeling suicidal a forum is insufficient, but it just seems cold to have a support forum for people to talk about what's troubling them and then rebuff them by telling them to go talk to someone else.

I haven't been able to get any understanding online myself and have given up trying, but I do try to let people at least know that they're heard. Knowing that someone is taking what you're feeling seriously can make a difference, as can stories about experiences, overcoming struggles, and finding small ways to cope and maintain health. There's no magic fix to be applied that will simply shut people up.

What we're dealing with here isn't problems, it's people.

I've struggled with this as well. I'm not currently in or seeking a professional therapy relationship, but I find I end up tailoring my posts to address what seem like inevitable and sometimes derailing questions about being in therapy. It almost feels like a taboo here, not being in therapy, and this has surprised me, as I had presumed the objective to be wellness advocacy by whatever variety of means may work for a person, and not necessarily with practitioner involvement. There does seem to be a disturbingly strong bias though.

Disturbingly, because it seems to me to have the potential to be quite disempowering, suggesting with overt frequency how people can be better helped by professional therapy than by alternate means, such as by themselves (if indeed that can be considered "alternate"..!) or with the help of other elements of community within the sum total balance and scope of their lives.

It's the same for me, and I think that many more people than are given credit, including those with varieties of MI, are perfectly capable of being their own best health advocates (one scientific example is that there has been research which points out that depressed persons are able to appraise and self-rate with more accuracy than non-depressed persons). The few times I have relinquished that management in some way to a practitioner I have been hurt by the results, so I am particularly wary of the ease with which a strong dependency on one's practitioner can develop (and in my experience, is often encouraged by practitioners, both in direct and in covert ways), and the danger it can represent.

It's more empowering for me, to be my own best health advocate, regardless of a practitioner's involvement. For me it tends to be very hard work having a therapist, and I don't mean the work of getting brain-shrinked. I mean the work of being "on" all the time with critical thinking, and making sure that the actions of a practitioner, especially those actions they prefer to cloak somewhat, actually have an intent (and potential) towards bettering my wellness, and are not more closely aligned with a practitioner's desire (in some cases but likely more often than anyone would care to think) to make me into a better patient (i.e., more docile, long term attendance, consistent income, etc.).

Which is just reality, and truly nothing against the industry at large, in spite of having amassed a particularly unfortunate array of personal experience with it. Practitioners are people too, just as imperfect and faulty as the rest of us. I do wish it was an industry better at policing itself though, as the collateral damage of mistakes is soylent green (it is we), and I don't think persistent advocacy of depending upon the professional therapy industry can be helpful in fostering betterment of practices.

Disclaimer/warning: the opinions expressed here may not be yours. xx

My psychiatrist is fairly useless, except for signing prescriptions. He's nice enough, a bro-type dude who reminds me of one of The Beach Boys (not Brian Wilson, though, p-doc is too normal to be Brian Wilson). He acts like he doesn't really know how to handle my situation...kind of throws suggestions out, then seems to attach himself to one of his suggestions and prescribe accordingly.

I would love to see a therapist, but my insurance (Kaiser) only allows for one visit/month with a so-called therapist who doesn't do therapy, she just goes over mindfulness and DBT skills with me. Well, I've been practicing mindful meditation and CBT for decades - quite literally when the therapist herself was a preschooler. So besides spending 45 minutes with a young woman who is sweet and empathetic, it's kind of a waste to see her - and what she does is not what I call "therapy."

Bottom line - I, too, find that being my own mental health advocate is what gets me the best results.

While I agree that everyone has their own way of dealing with their issues, some through therapy, some through co-ordination with their GP's and some strictly on their own, I don't believe that those members here who assume or suggest therapy are being unsupportive. They are posting from a belief that they have or an opinion that they have which is what a forum is all about.

Absolutely, there are plenty of members who cannot get therapy or pdocs because of their life situation. And there are plenty who don't believe that taking meds or seeking therapy is the way to heal themselves. That is absolutely okay and should be respected, just as those who seek help from professionals should also be respected for their way of trying to heal themselves.

On an internet forum, it's difficult not to assume some things in reading about each other. We do not have access to one's whole story and life situation. Even though assumptions can really be off, I believe that in this case, they are meant with good intentions and a way of offering some help.

Since we are a "support" site, continuing this conversation could become unsupportive towards the membership, so at this time, this thread will be closed.

Thank you all for your input.