American Psychiatrics

As many of you know from my writing, I have, and still do, experienced both depression and an anxiety disorder. I may have described my experience previously but I have decided to talk about it today. So, in my psychology class, we are learning about the law and psychology. We have learned about how psychologists and officers of the law interact as well as how difficult it can be to get psychiatric help. I will be telling two stories, one my own and the other not.

So, at the end of the eighth grade and throughout the summer, I experienced a lot of anxiety. Most people dumbed it down to beginning high school and being 'nervous' but I knew I wasn't nervous, in fact I had been wanting it for forever. I knew the extra freedoms you got when you left middle school and I wanted them. I was tired of being babied by teachers and administrators. I knew my levels of 'nervous' (I keep putting it in quotes because nervousness and anxiety are NOT the same and I had no idea what an anxiety disorder was at the time) were not normal but they were tolerable so I carried on. Then, came the beginning of the ninth grade. Every night, I couldn't sleep. Every morning, I would throw up and shake uncontrollably. I lost almost fifteen pounds because I was so 'nervous' I couldn't eat. Eventually, I told me mom that if this continued, I didn't want to live anymore, that it wasn't worth it to spend my days in paralyzing fear and drowning depression.

 My mom took me to a doctor (a pediatrician) and we talked to him. He told me that I was just a little 'nervous' and that I needed to fight through it and keep going to school and eventually it would be normal again. A lot of words for this man flowed through my head just then but instead of shouting them at him, I cried... a lot. He handed me tissues and left. He left. Seriously. Eventually, he came back and once again I tried not to yell at him. I asked him about therapists or psychologists nearby and he said he could give me a referral but he didn't think I needed one, that my 'case' wasn't that extreme. I told him that he wasn't in my head and that he didn't understand, that no one understood and he quickly started writing down a phone number after a ten minute argument. 

Later that day, my mom called the office and they said that they could have me come in to see a psychiatrist in two months. TWO MONTHS. I cried again because I knew I couldn't make it two months. I didn't even know if therapy would work or if the drugs they could give me would work but I knew it was my only option left. My mom enrolled me in online school and took me out of the school I had been going to. I still had to deal with crippling anxiety every day, but it was better. I was able to eat a meal a day instead of nothing and my ribs were becoming less defined. I felt like I was getting somewhat back on track. But, I still had my ups and downs and I even had one day that I got so close that I had a knife in one hand and a piece of paper in another. Thinking it through, though, I decided not to do it. I couldn't do that to my family. I returned the knife to the knife block and went back upstairs. I sat in bedroom and cried. It was pretty normal now for my mom or dad to come home and see my red eyes and tear stained cheeks but it would be too much for them to see me on the floor, wrists bathed in blood.  I didn't tell anyone about it. I kept it to myself. 

About a month after that I met with my psychiatrist. He listened to my story and prescribed me escitalopram (a drug for anxiety and depression). He set me up an appointment with my psychologist, Ingrid, for a few weeks later. I met with her and told her everything, including the incident with the knife. Since then, I have seen her once a month. I believe that through the medication and the talks with Ingrid, my condition has improved greatly, but some people don't have my luck...

Gus Deeds has a different story. He had been diagnosed as bipolar at sixteen and then lived a relatively normal life. In college, he told his father that voices were in head and he wrote on social media that his professors were plotting against him. Gus' father, Creigh Deeds, knew his son needed help. He took Gus to the only place he could get to, the emergency room. The doctors there took him in for a few hours but them let him go, saying he was not 'an imminent threat' and that they could not keep him in the psychiatric ward for legal reasons (the legal reason being he was not an imminent threat to himself or others). Gus did not want to be hospitalized and laws state that if someone is not an imminent threat to themselves or others, they cannot be held for very long in psychiatric facilities. Creigh took his son back home and they had dinner. Creigh ate and Gus scribbled furiously into a journal he kept. Creigh told his soon goodnight and went to bed, feeling like there may be an argument in the morning. 

He woke up and everything seemed fine. He had breakfast and went out to feed the horses. Gus came into the barn and Creigh told him good-morning and turned his back to tend to the horses. Gus came up to his father and stabbed him over and over again, also slashing at his face. Gus then left and went into the house. Creigh carried himself as far as he could and a neighbor spotted him. He was put into an ambulance and heard over the radio that a young male had been found with a gunshot wound to the head. Gus had known that guns in the house would not have been a good idea when he discovered his son's problems and had taken all of them, and their ammo, out out of the house. He did keep one though, but it was not loaded and there was no ammo in the house. His son must have found the gun and bought ammo at a store. Creigh survived and tells his story to anyone he possibly can.

Gus Deeds had been said not to be an 'imminent danger to himself or others' at the hospital and was let go. Only hours later, he stabbed his father and shot himself. The doctors at the hospital couldn't legally keep him and their beds were full. They could do nothing because of the law. The reason these laws were made were to protect the rights of people so they could not be committed against their will. It is a horrifying long process even for those that want to be committed. Those who don't tend to pose an even greater risk to themselves and others and their process is even longer. Something needs to change. Just because someone is not killing themselves of others right at this moment, does not mean they won't in the future. It does not mean they don't need help right away.