Posted by Noa on October 25, 1999, at 21:57:06
In reply to Re: hospitalization, posted by el on October 25, 1999, at 19:17:24
Nowadays, I see two basic reasons for hospitalization: safety and major medication overhauls/observations.
Safety: the hospital will keep you from hurtin yourself (or others, for that matter) if needed.Meds: Sometimes someone needs such a sudden/drastic change in meds that doing it in the hospital makes the best sense because they need to be watched while the transtitions happen. Or, observations/testing of some sort is needed for psychiatric or combination of psychiatric/medical problems, until a stable med/other treatment regime can be in place.
Why do you think you need to be in the hospital? Would a day treatment center/partial hospitalization program be helpful?
When I went to the hospital about 15 years ago, it was at the beggining of managed care, before they were pushing people out after 24 hours. Still, the treatment in hospital was minimal. It was a place to keep me from acting on my suicidal feelings. I basically admitted myself because I was afraid I might actually carry out my plans. It was not a fun experience. It was a blow to my dignity, the way patients were treated--nothing like cuckkoos nest or anything, but still, major barrier between the staff and us lowly patient. They took away our shoes, and gave us goofy slippers that had, of all the %$^#&^ things, HAPPY FACES on the toe end of the shoe, looking up at us!!! OK, some hospitals might actually have some better care, but I agree with the previous poster who talked about the wish to be taken care of (I had that too, since I wasn't able to take care of myself) and was very disillusioned by the reality that you don't have your wish fulfilled in the hospital.. I guess myu other wish was to get away from myself and that certainly doesn't happen (Wherever you go, there you are, damn it). For me, though being disillusioned by the hospital experience helped me to see that I had to do something to start getting better. No one else was going to provide the "Magic" to make me better. Of course, a decade later, I was WHALLOPPED again with more depression, and harder to treat this time.
poster:Noa
thread:13880
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/19991028/msgs/13898.html