Mental Heath Fun and Joyness Part One

So I've spent the last three weeks on a psychiatric ward. Let me give you an overview of the events of the first week:

• Saturday 16th November - Went home to see a friend on a psychiatric ward in Shrewsbury, went to another friend's birthday party, stayed the night at my parents house, slept very badly due to anxiety.
• Sunday 17th November - Went to a great church service, saw friends in Shrewsbury before travelling back to Nottingham again.
• Monday 18th November - Went to the hospital to get the cast removed from my wrist, which had been broken- doctor gave it the all clear. Went into school and did teaching assistant style work in some great lessons.
• Tuesday 19th November - Went into school and did teaching assistant style work in some great lessons, followed by community choir.
• Wednesday 20th November - Went into the office and did some coursework in the morning. Had an appointment with the Early Intervention in Psychosis Team where I saw a horrible doctor, a student nurse, and a lovely community psychiatric nurse named Chris.

Now this Wednesday was the day it all kicked off. I've been hearing voices and having strange hallucinations for the past 12 months or so, but they'd been controllable, kind of. The Early Intervention Team, I had hoped, would be my answer, yet during my appointment they seemed to offer no solutions or help whatsoever. The doctor did not listen to me and was very removed from my situation. I was extremely distressed by the time that I left the appointment, and this was obviously evident to Chris, who apparently tried to follow me in his car so he could give me a lift home, but to no avail as I'd already started walking back into town.

I was so upset I couldn't face getting the bus so I walked through the driving rain from West Bridgeford to Nottingham, across Trent Bridge which was particularly difficult as the voice kept telling me to jump off it. I has arranged to visit my friend Fiona as she was unwell, but I was so distressed and preoccupied I cancelled. I'd been texting my friend Sam and we'd sort of made plans to meet in Nottingham. By the time I got to the Broadmarsh shopping centre, the voice was mostly in control of my body. It wanted to kill me, and knew I had multiple tablets in my bag. I went into Wilkinson's and bought a bottle of water for 29p. 

After this, I went upstairs to the toilets- a place where I'd self-harmed before. It kind of felt comforting up there, I don't really know why. The voice was completely in control at that point though I was still trying to text Sam. With shaking hands I took the pills, one at a time. 14 paracetamol, 8 fluoxetine, 4 codeine and 8 amitriptyline tablets. As soon as I realised what the voice had done to me, I text Sam and asked him to come and meet me. When I told him what I'd done, I expected him to panic, but fortunately, he was really calm the whole time.

He took me to the walk in centre, where I remember vomiting a few times. After that, my memory goes almost completely blank, aside from a few images of A&E, particularly my boss looking at my with concerned eyes. I remember thinking 'uh-oh... my boss knows what I've done... I'm in real trouble!' My next memory after that was when I arrived onto the medical ward. The nurses were very kind and one time I tipped a bowl of sick over myself and they helped me get changed and changed the bed. I had a drip running into my hand and can remember retching endlessly, my stomach totally empty but my body still fighting against the overdose. I was on the medical ward for two nights, but thankfully no permanent damage has been done.

• Thursday 21st December - Chris from the EIP Team came to see me, and we agreed it was best for me to spend some time on a psychiatric ward as an informal patient (not sectioned under the mental health act) He went back to my host home and collected some belongings. Sam and my boss came to visit me in the hospital. Sam bought me a white hot chocolate from Costa and it was really tasty. I felt really guilty about what I'd put everyone through, but was grateful for the company too.
• Friday 22nd December - I was still waiting for a bed on the psychiatric ward, and was getting increasing frustrated at the fact I still hadn't got one. My parents and my sister came to visit, and they were much more supportive than I'd expected them to be. I got a bed on a ward in Mansfield and so my parents drove me up there. The ward was very strange- I'd never stayed on a psychiatric ward so it was all new and weird. The other patients scared me but the nurses and health care assistants were nice. They sorted through all my belongings, removing anything I could possibly harm myself with (shoelaces, needles etc) I also saw the duty doctor that night, and he was extremely arrogant and rude, focussed entirely on my eating problems and refused to listen to me, or even give me time to answer his questions.

This is the end of part one, I'm going to be writing part two soon, but will write each part as a whole week.

Love you lots,
Alice xxxx

© Alice Daley 2013