TW: discussion of suicide
On Saturday I woke with a start. It was sudden. And just as
suddenly, I knew something wasn’t quite right in my head. Ever since it came about,
I’ve struggled to explain it to people… which is really challenging to me
because – as some have said – I’m quite an articulate person so being at a loss
for words is particularly difficult.
After taking an overdose I finally made an attempt to explain
things to the Doctor in A&E the following day (Sunday) and completely botched
it up! It felt like I was flailing around the dictionary and decided on the
world ‘alien.’ I knew before I said it that it wasn’t the right word and I knew
how it sounded… you know, I go on about mental health stigma and not being
ashamed to talk about anything but the
first thing that came to mind when I heard myself use this word was that I
sounded ‘crazy.’
As afraid as I was, I think that the progress I’ve made through my
recovery outweighed it, and I was less hesitant than I would’ve been a few
years ago to attempt to describe this new thing in my head. I used the word
Alien to try and get across that this thing was… foreign. That I could recognize
it wasn’t meant to be there. But I think that scarier than that, was the fact
that I couldn’t control it. I didn’t know how to get rid of it; how to silence
its… presence. And for that, I was also angry. Angry that no matter how hard I
tried I’d still overdosed to cope with things.
When I went to Hospital for the overdose, one of the Doctors told
me that sometimes, when we panic or are scared, we revert back to old coping
strategies. And once upon a time if I couldn’t control something, was afraid of
something, couldn’t understand something… whenever I had any feeling that easily
became overwhelming, I self-harmed.
After I overdosed, I think that ‘recovered Aimee’ took some
control and took myself off to A&E to get treatment for it. Going into
Hospital, I had all the best intentions; I thought ‘I’ll just sit there quietly
and let them stab me with needles and I’ll take my book and my iPad and sit
through the treatment.’ But being back in that setting and under those
circumstances didn’t help my reverting back to old coping strategies and when I
felt overwhelmed by reminders of the past, I ran away. Literally. I stopped the
treatment and ran from the ward. I took a bus home because being scared and
overwhelmed had me desperate to be in my own home, with my pets and surrounded
by all of my own things rather than the many beeping machines in the Hospital.
Apparently, my blood tests from A&E showed very high levels of
paracetamol in my body and – as the Doctor said she’d put it bluntly – I was at
imminent risk of going into liver failure, so the Police were called upon my running
away. The Officers that came to my home were initially very understanding and I
felt able to voice to them that if I got scared or anything again, I might run
again. When they took me back up to the ward one of the Officers stayed with me
whilst another spoke with the Charge Nurse before both coming into the room. I honestly
couldn’t tell you everything that was said between the four of us but there were
three key bits that stood out; for obvious reasons:
Charge Nurse: you’re just as important as a person down the
corridor on end-of-life treatment
Police #1: if you kill yourself, I’m going to end up in the Coroners
Court, I’ll lose my job and when I can’t pay the mortgage, my wife and children
will be on the streets living on benefits!
Police #1: if you choose to go and kill yourself after the
treatment then that’s up to you but you will have the treatment!
Me: why are you still talking?
Police #1: I’ve said all I need to say
Me: Yes, right now you’re being intimidating and you’re treating
me unfairly
At one point, the Officer who had barely spoke left with the
Charge Nurse and I was alone with ‘Police #1’ so I set my phone to video and
put it under my bad to record the sound; he’d just made the comment that he’d
said all he needed to say but I didn’t believe he had and wanted proof if he
said anything worse. Whilst he didn’t say a word until the other Officer came
back in, I should have never felt that I needed to do that.
When I continued to refuse to resume the treatment for the overdose,
they called a Doctor in who then said she was going to call the Psychiatric Liaison
Team and asked if I’d be willing to talk to them. I told her that I’d ‘actually
quite like to’ speak with them. But when the Team came to the ward and spoke
with the Doctor, the Charge Nurse and the second Police Officer, he returned to
say that I could go home. ‘Police #1’ asked what the ‘crack’ was, and he
replied “they said it’s same same. Nothing she hasn’t done before.”
I’d wanted to speak with the Team for the same reason I spoke with
my Community Psychiatric Nurse (CPN) the following day (Tuesday), I believed that
talking about this new thing in my head would help me make sense of it and the
reassurance would help me to be able to guarantee my safety. In fact, I know I
shouldn’t second guess or attempt to predict, but I fully believe that if I’d been
given the opportunity to speak with the Team then maybe I would’ve been more
receptive to completing the treatment.
Since voicing all of my thoughts and emotions to my CPN around the
new thing that she has labelled a delusion, everything has become more
manageable. This delusion is still there but I’m no longer scared of my
feelings around it and I’m no longer unsafe. There’s also an appointment scheduled
with my Psychiatrist with a view to possibly increasing my anti-psychotic
medication.
I made some phone calls today… So far, I’ve had an apology from
the Psychiatric Liaison Team and an explanation that they didn’t come see me
because they were told I was refusing treatment and made the assumption that included
speaking with them. The Team Leader has now instructed the staff to check
whether a person is reluctant to see them rather than making the assumption and
the ward whose staff told them I didn’t want treatment have apologized and
promised to raise the concern in their next ward meeting to inform staff that
they must be more specific when communicating with the mental health staff. And
finally, I have a complaint lodged with Northumbria Police around ‘Police #1’s’
attitude and remarks.
Please never be afraid to speak up when you feel you’re treat
unfairly; it takes strength to stand up for yourself and sometimes it’s scary,
but it becomes worth it if you consider that speaking up has the potential to
protect others from having similar experiences.