PTSD and involuntary hospialization

Do any of you guys have PTSD from being involuntary admitted to a psychiatric hospital against your will? I seem to have it and it wont go away I've been discharged from the last time I've been admitted and it still seems that I'm still in there spiritual wise. The last time I was there I was almost raped by a male patient, The staffs didn't do anything when he kept approaching me, one of the staffs told me that I liked the attention (essentially told me that I was a slut, without using the word “Slut”) that i was getting from him because I didn't do anything. I knew deep inside that if I was to slap this guy, I would be thrown into the padded room and to be injected with anti psychotics, ugh!

Has anything similar happen with any of you guys that end up giving you PTSD?

I'm sorry that happened to you. I wish you could report that staffer's comments, as they were completely out of line, imo. The problem is, well, they take a staffer's word over patient's usually. Did you tell the doctor about it though?

I think such an experience while traumatic, doesn't generally cause something as severe as PTSD. It can be a lingering fear though, that you need to think about and then set aside and later work through with your doctor. It might be that it's because you haven't told someone with authority that this happened, that you are keeping it in mind?

Good to see you on again (((Helga)))-

I did not feel comfortable at the hospital that I was in at the time. I didn't feel safe and I especially didn't feel comfortable with the staffs. If I had the decision to get up and leave I would of gotta my butt the heck out within secs.

I'm the paranoid type. I was raised by my surroundings and peers that if something happens, you keep your mouth shut. I know this sounds ridiculous, however when I'm inside of a hospital with another patient who wants to rape me, If I go and tell the staffs what hes doing to me, It will only anger him and he might think of something else. I just want to leave the hospital ALIVE and not inside of a body bag.

I often think about suicide but deep inside, I want to live because I know that life is worth living for. I need to be strong to survive and to see the beauty of what mother nature gave us.

I'm not diagnose of having PTSD by a psychiatrist, however I've done a lot of research about it and I have almost all of the symptoms of having PTSD. I get so damn angry for what this hospital did to me, It makes me sick.

Glad to see you again Sky

i want to post a response!!! but i'm so tired right now i'm falling asleep....don't let me forget!!!!

You could always reply back in the morning when your fully awake

Hi HelgaDE..

Yes I have some PTSD from being involuntarily hospitalized..primarily dealing with restraints and since one of my primary issues during flashbacks is to either flee, escape, run, I had to be placed in restraints until they subsided. Unfortunately, I was abandoned in a pulic area while in them at a facility I was being transferred to, which has compounded any treatment I currently receive, i.e. as my providers no that I adamantly refuse that intervention (hospitalization) due to this event.

Restraints are now better regulated, I recognize that, but what happened only reinforced the traumatic memories of being restrained, trapped and humilated and now incorporates the hospital enviroment as being apart of the trauma drama which I relive. I am terrified of being a patient in any type of hospitals primarily because of what happened with the use of these restraining devices.

I hope you have a therapist, and continue to work thru these traumatic episode(s).

Evangelista..

whoops.. Sorry about all the spelling errors, it was rather early in the AM here when I responded to your post..

Again, I hope you are finding support to help deal with the reactions you’re having..please take care..

Eva

Yes, I truly believe you were traumatized. I have to wonder how much of the situation though was created by the meds you were on. That the staff didn't do anything, in your eyes, that means they had a different perspective. But I do believe you were scared, and I do understand your "reasoning" at the time.

Since you do feel like it's ptsd, you need to be talking with a professional for it. PTSD doesn't improve with time, in fact, it can become worse, esp as you feed the anger and feel the fear over and over, you know?

What I do know is that for anyone who went into a hospital already suffering from some trauma, then anything like this can exacerbate that original traumatic experience. It's never good.

((((hugs))))

Sky_ ...

hi HelgaDE...sorry took a while to get back here...

i don't know much about PTSD or what would cause it - other than rapes and war...stuff like that...

but i do know that you can be majorly, severely traumatized by hospitalization

i was hospitalized when i was 19 back about a dozen years ago (like Evangelista said - restraints were not as regulated) though i was not restrained many of the elderly dementia patients were. i heard unanswered cries for help at night. lots of scary sights and sounds.

i was sedated one night. the next day an elderly dementia patient stripped naked and laid in a girls bed. it scared me to death that the patients were so easily lost track of. the girl walked in and found him. like your story - the staff just laughed...i demanded to see my social worker and was released against medical advice - stating i feared for my safety!

although nothing happened to me in the hospital - i was NOT sexually assualted. the fact that i was sedated so heavily combined with the fact that the staff did not keep track of patients combined with the fact that i was in a room with no roomate and two young men were just across the hall...i had this irrational fear that i was pregnant! i KNEW logically i wasn't!! it was not until 9 months later that i started to feel some relief about the entire situation...9 months and no baby...i was truly safe!

i was just recently hospitalized in the same facility. i was terrified!!! when i arrived at the facility - my blood pressure (which is usually normal) was something liek 160/117. the nurse was worried i would have a stroke. they had to give me medication to bring my bp down.

i turned out that the years since my first hospitalization many changes had taken place. patients weren't left to wander unattended. restraints were used only in the most severe case - and not in front of other patients. it was more orderly and well mananged. so i felt much safer...

so as far as i'm concerned - i don't know about PTSD - but i am damn sure about being traumatized in the hospital

It made me cry when I read your post and the responses. I guess I'm not alone but I wish to hell I was, because I know what it does to a person.

One night a week after my father's death I had a flashback and my family panicked and called the police. My therapist was called, but he had been sexually harassing me for months. Anyways my therapist left that night and filled out a form involuntarily admitting me to the hospital.

Police came the next morning and placed me in hand cuff (triggers) and drove me to the hospital (fear) and placed me in a locked room with a guard (triggers). Finally the psychiatrist came and she decided to admit me against my will for observation because she was relying on the therapists word and I was agitated. I was escorted by security (triggers) and placed in a room. I wake up from a sleep and completely freak out. I start looking for away out and someone starts following me(triggers). When they are almost on my heals I start pulling fire alarms because I am frightened and dissociating. I get tackled from behind by 3 security guards, dragged to an isolation room, injected with major anti psychotics, stripped of my clothes and left in isolation for 7 days with no contact, no food, no water, no bathroom. After I was released from isolation, they released me from the hospital 3 days later. I finally got to explain that all I had was a flashback which started off the whole event.

I was already diagnosed with PTSD before this. But now it's has gone extreme. Not one doctor in my city knows of another case as extreme. This hospital trauma only re-enforced the trauma of when I was taken hostage, raped and murder attempt.

It's a year later and I barely leave my house. For 9 months I cried for about 6 hours a day. I slept for 12 - 18 hours a day. I was also suicidal for 6 months and I have never been suicidal in my life . I'm lucky I didn't die in the hospital and didn't take my life because of what happened in the hospital.

I don't think that I will ever feel the same way again. It's like I'm still stuck in the isolation room or that I died in there.

((((((((((crackers))))))))))) i know, i was stuck in solitary confinement for 4 days without any human contact! i'm so terribly sorry you had to go through that. it should never be done, really.

Crackers, what happened to you is horrible. I suggest you contact immediately a lawyer and seek reparation – what crime you did to have you isolated without food, human contact and water for seven days?

The hospital states that they only did what was necessary because they had the right under the law. So first I have to prove that my therapist negligently provided the wrong care which resulted in my arrest and hospitalization. I do have a document filled out by the therapist that only a doctor is suppose to sign. Then I can sue the hospital because they were aware of the document and didn't provide me with a lawyer before they treated me against my will.
It's been four months that the College has been investigating the therapist. I should have word in a couple weeks how this should proceed. Either way I expect that it will take many years before this gets resolved in the court systems. Which means years of being triggered which results of flashbacks of sitting on the mattress in the isolation room, drugged out of my mind pleading for help.

How did you survive 7 days without water? You must have been near death towards the end. I've read that most humans can survive 3 days without water. Did you have to go to the hospital and get IV fluids afterwards? I can't imagine you were able to walk out of that room after 7 days without water.

Yes, you are set up for a long road ahead. I missed whether you are in therapy or not. You need continued care, imo, even if it's by means of phone sessions or online. It's one thing to have had a trauma that is in the past that triggers and haunts you, and another thing to have that trauma continue on with active remnants in your daily life.

Please tell us how you are doing good self care. You are, I'm sure because you are still here, and fighting.

I had to look it up:
You can go a minimum of 11 days without water without having serious side effects from dehydration, several weeks before death would occur.

I was very weak when i left the isolation room, to the point that I had to be assisted out. I assume that I was not given IV because I was able to hydrate on my own.

Hospitals are horrible places. I will not be put in one without a fight. I was admitted against my will because my nosey neighbor told the police that I was planning on killing myself. I was not planning anything.

Anyhow, While I was admitted a patient was exposing himself to me and other paitents. I was raped in the past and did not take this well. I told staff who did nothing but tell me to stay in my room if I did not like it. Which I tried to do. But this paitent forced his way into my room and shut the door. I kicked him he yelled and the staff came running for help so I thought. Instead I was stripped by male security guards and put into restraints for over a day.

I still have flash backs of this. I do believe that it is posiible for you to have PTSD

Yes I was diagnosed with PTSD before hospitalization due to an attempted murder. Then I was hospitalized and came out and was diagnosed with Extreme PTSD, Agoraphobia and Panic Attacks......all a result of the hospitalization.

I'm really sorry that you had a similar experience. I have written an Advanced Health Care Directive in case someone tries to admit me to the psyche ward again. They are restricted from using med's, restraints, isolation. They also have to have a lawyer present for examinations and have also requested that an appeal goes immediately before a judge.

I also told my new T that if I ever went in again, that I wouldn't be coming out and I would be causing as much damage as possible. He knows I'm dead serious. Wanna tell me I'm incompetent, I'll show them incompetent.

I think that would be totally freaky and i would probably have PTSD too.... course i already do. maybe you already did and didn't know it and then that made it worse? I found that to be true for something in my life. I already had it and just felt numb towards it because i was used to the panic and flashbacks for so long. But then with hurricane katrina disaster relief i *really* had it worse. Had nightmares all the time, flashbacks even when i was back home and knew it couldn't be real. And still i have adverse reactions to stuff that reminds me of being there. It is far worse than just the original ptsd from my life!
Kiya