I want to tell you my story, giving you my thoughts and feelings of a journey that has taken me through many passages of services. It all started in an ordinary psychiatric hospital in 1972 where it was old school, everything was hush hush, and my family treated me like some sort of leper and couldn’t understand why I had been sectioned in hospital. Whilst there I had ECT which was barbaric you just went through the prongs and that was that, no support, no advice nothing just the treatment and then you were left to try and work out what was happening and why, I tried to explain things to my family but they just saw me in a different light as though I had two heads.
I had been sectioned and I was aware that 3 people had been involved in this process but again with no real information to go on just the bad feeling of how they made me feel and treated me, the stigma was and still is bad.
I was made to feel like an outcast and again not knowing the reasons just left on a ward with a lot of people who to me seemed very unwell I couldn’t understand why I was there and not in the comfort of my own home.
I tried to do all the right things so that I could get out of there, but I was continually made to feel as though what I had to say was not of importance and didn’t matter. Why was this happening to me? Who had the answers? This was as frightening for me as everyone else, but no one saw this they just made me feel worse.
Following this episode of my life I was then introduced to Forensic Services and transferred to Raeside in the early eighties. It was like a closed shop. My family were too frightened to come and see me as they thought the other patients were too violent and wanted to know what crimes they had committed, even though they may not have committed any crimes, they were clearly unwell like me, why could they not see this, did we all need to be wearing a plaster stating this. It was becoming more and more obvious that the stigma attached to my illness was very much in my face and no one cared no one.
Whilst in Raeside I had to go to the local hospital for out patient’s appointments and again I was made to feel as though I wasn’t of importance as the nursing staff only wanted to know why I was at Raeside, asking my escorts and not even me, was I now invisible as well. I remained at Raeside for eighteen months all the while things staying the same. Following this I moved to Ashworth and Rampton this was another episode of my life of more stigmas, no one wanting to explain things to me, leaving me to feel alone, afraid and wishing this was not happening to me.
"My Journey Through the Services"
About: Nottinghamshire Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust Nottinghamshire Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust Nottingham NG3 6AA
Posted by 12w4r (as ),
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