[Victoria'smom]

In about a year I will be moving, I have always been deathly afraid of iop and hospitalization. It's to the point that I do not want to continue mental health treatment upon relocating because frequent IOP and hospitalization is REALLY likely depending on who I receive as a T and pdoc. I'm pretty sure I will not need IOP when moving but I would like to try it before being assigned a therapist. I feel like I need to know what iop and hospitalization is like to continue my treatment upon moving. Do you have to be in crisis to go to IOP or is a situation like mine a valid reasons to start with IOP?

If I do not continue treatment in some fashion it is likely that I will be involuntarily commited within a couple of months of moving. I want to be in as much control as possible and a remodel to my son but I seriously don't want the 'oversight' of mental health professionals when they have so much power. My current T has worked years on getting me to tell the the truth without fear that she will hospitalize me. I don't want that to go out the window when moving.

[sunrise]

Originally Posted by Miguel'smom

In about a year I will be moving, I have always been deathly afraid of iop and hospitalization.

I'm not sure I understand all that you wrote, but this sentence about your fear made me think that this could be something you work on in therapy with your current trusted therapist. You have a year before you will be moving, so could this concern go to the top of your list in therapy? You could create an exposure hierarchy about IOP and work your way up. Perhaps the culmination could be a "field trip" to an IOP and spending the day there as a guest so you can see firsthand what an IOP program is like. Before that, you could do other steps on the hierarchy, like thinking about or visualizing the IOP while present with your T, so she can help with anxiety symptoms and you can practice your coping skills, etc. If she doesn't do exposure hierarchies, she probably has some other method she uses to work with patients with phobias. Good luck.