[nikon]

i always hesitate to say or think i've experienced abuse, but i think i've experienced emotional abuse from therapists in the past, and it still makes me feel really horrible now when i remember being with them. i was in an inpatient program and two of the therapists were like this. they were in a relationship and at times things felt like a game - like, they would compare patients with one another. i can't explain it properly. i am trans, and at that time i wasn't on hormones. they deliberately called me by my old name and by the wrong pronouns, which was supposedly part of therapy to make me more resilient to people in the "real world" doing that. the one therapist made comments about my body - not in a sexual way as in he was looking at me sexually, but in a way like assessing my physical sex - and that still makes me feel ashamed.

other patients said really transphobic things to me, and none of the therapists said or did anything about it. if i spoke up about how it was affecting me, i was told that i was being oversensitive. i was treated as though i should have been able to shrug off any offensive language/insults without having any emotion about it.

at one point i ended up in a more secure psych ward for a few days, and a nurse touched me inappropriately. the psych ward did nothing about it, and when i told a therapist in the program, he asked if i knew the nurse's name - when i didn't, he just said he'd leave it up to me if i wanted to pursue any complaint or not. there was a lot of pressure from the therapists to accept everything rather than question it or fight it.

there's other stuff but my mind is going nowhere right now. i think i was gaslighted but that's also something i always feel hesitant about thinking/saying. these days when i get angry about anything it's like all that old anger comes back and i feel like hurting someone or hurting myself. i had a really, really stressful day and i can't calm down now. when i think of this time i literally feel like destroying myself, but i know i have built up more in my life that i would lose now. so just try to keep that in mind.

[Skeezyks]

I've been hospitalized twice. And some of the experiences I had in those 2 psych wards are part of the reason I try to avoid doing anything that might cause me to end up back there. I hope you begin feeling better soon.

(((((nikon))))) I hope you feel better soon

[nikon]

thanks for the support

i've had other degrading experiences in psych wards but those were shorter - i only stayed there for a week or ten days, and the experiences weren't drawn out. at the inpatient program i was there for months, and when i look back on it is almost seems like a cult. many patients, and definitely the families of patients, were drawn to the therapists and believed they could cure anything with their maverick approach. they played people off against each other. when i left, at first i was heartbroken, but the longer i was away the more i realised i was lucky to get out when i did.

[Stone92]

That sounds awful, I would definitely say that counts as abuse. I'm sorry that group was so transphobic towards you. I've never heard of a therapist purposely misgendering someone to make them more resilient-- think about them using that excuse with any other kind of insult! It's absolutely ridiculous.

[nikon]

thanks. the therapist also told another group member to call me by the wrong name for a week, but fortunately she refused to do so. at the time i was so enamored with the therapists that i thought they must be right, and my hurt was weakness and resistance to change. now i really struggle to draw boundaries with what is ok and what is not ok in terms of how people treat me.

[Laurielrocks]

I am so sorry for what you had to go thru. Its not bad enough that you are living with trauma.. then someone violates you again.. Predators are everywhere.