Thursday 19 November 2009

How Do I Begin To Tell The Story?

I fully intended to start writing about my encounter with the NHS mental health services but I realized that it wasn't going to be an easy or a quite task to start the ball rolling. This means that instead of sitting here in the library writing an informative post about how I ended up in hospital, I have been busy procrastinating and reading other people's blogs.

One of the problems with having been out of circulation and with very little access to a computer and the Internet is that I have become hopelessly out of date with some of the blogs that I like to read. Some prolific bloggers write several posts a day (I've even been amongst that number sometimes) but fortunately some write once or twice a week or even with less frequency. So today I have spent some time catching up with what I have missed over the last five and a half weeks and not been writing what I have promised.

The difficulty is that the whole experience has indicated to me how ill I had become without really being aware of it, and although I am definitely on the mend (can you say that about mental illness?) I still find thinking about how close I came to doing something stupid rather a scary prospect. This means that sitting here in the library writing these posts is perhaps not a particularly good idea if I don't want to cause a bit of a stir by sitting here crying onto the keyboard.

As a result of these thoughts I have decided that perhaps the best thing to do is to draft out the posts off-line, in the privacy of my room, and then publish them in the library when I come into town. The first instalment will cover the day that I went to see my GP, the decision to refer me to the hospital and the appalling way in which I was treated by the psychiatric staff in the A&E department.

Further posts will look at hospital food, nurses, recreation, stupid practices and the funny side of it all. Having to tell people that you have spent a month in hospital is bad enough, but telling them it was a mental hospital is even worse. But for all that, I have made at least one good friend (who I absolutely hated when I first met her) and have encountered one doctor who I would never hesitate to see in the future because of his compassion, consideration and humility. He wasn't bad looking either!

5 comments:

Ruby Tuesday said...

hehe, nice to hear of an attractive doctor - there should be more of them, just to make the whole thing easier! I'm interested to hear about your experiences and I'm glad that things are easing a little. take care x

Anonymous said...

I promise to comment on all your posts soon, it's almost 6.30am, I have just caught up and am about to depart for a day at college. I am glad to read you are out and at hope... keep well!

Alison
x

Anonymous said...

While i haven't been hospitalized, i have had some major depressive times. I feel for you.
Catching up on blogs after being away a long time ( i tend to withdraw from everything when i'm not well) takes a long time and is a bit hard. I end up get very frustrated with myself for having missed out on things.
hugs! Hope each day gets better.

Anonymous said...

The doctor I had was young and good looking as well... made the stay worth while... :)

steph said...

Welcome home!

I have found it cathartic to write about my own experiences in hospital but like you, I found it hard to know where to start.

I think this is all part and parcel of making sense of the experience.

Certain things would trigger off a memory and out would come a story, not in any particular sequence.

It might help you to start by writing about how it feels to be home again? The rest will follow when it's ready to come out.

No hurry. Take care.