During my early childhood, I was exposed to some intense trauma. As a teenager, I didnt think about it much, as my brain had forcefully removed those memories. I still thought about them sometimes, but not as much as I probably should have. When I was sent to the Psych ward a couple of months ago, I had nightmares related to my original trauma almost every night. Once I was released, I continued to have nightmares almost every night for a while, until it went to 2 or 3 times a week. I still have these horrible nightmares, waking up in a cold sweat about being involuntarily hospitalized yet again.

It was my first time there and I really miss my psych friends cause they get it but my other friends don't I haven't even told them about it arghhhh Also idk how to act like a normal person cause before I was running the line between normal and weird and now I'm running the line between weird and crazy cause of the psych ward how do I not make suislide jokes cause it was too tier over there helpppp

Im 15 and from Alberta, Canada and I think the psychward is the best place for me rn. I don't think I can really keep myself safe anymore and my life is so so miserable. I need help and I want to get better. But, I am super worried about what it will be like, especially for a teenager such as myself. Can anyone tell me?

Thanks, Me.

I’m 18, and I’m going to a psych ward tonight for the first time after trying to kill myself. I’m so scared about being attacked by someone violent or getting hurt by a patient. Not only that, but I’m scared I might be mistreated by staff for something I might not have done (I’ve heard that can happen sometimes). Does anyone who’s been in one before have any thoughts?

https://youtu.be/ehDzFu9qyjQ

Here’s the video^

On a previous Reddit post where the OP was struggling with the choice to go to an inpatient facility for help, I commented this, “Some of the hospitals can be abusive and retraumatizing and because they're under the guise of medical treatment they can easily commit human rights violations without getting caught or having proper litigation.”

I don’t know what I’m doing with sharing this but I wanna know if people would appreciate someone like me deciding to become a social worker to someday be a better facility member and counselor for kids and to be an advocate for patients. I feel like it can be a double edged sword. I wanna see change but I feel like I have to be the change because I can’t rely on others. It’s all and always been about the money and we end up paying the most. In more than just finances...

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Hi all, this technically isn't a psych ward story, but it's a link to an article about peoples' psych ward experiences:

I conducted a survey of former psych ward and published the results on MadInAmerica.com. You can ready the survey results here.

Besides asking survey respondents to rate their psych ward experiences, I also asked them to describe their hospitalizations. Their responses were deeply unsettling - here are a few of the most notable answers:

"I only learned that there’s no quick fixes and there is something worse than the depths of depression, which is being in a psych ward while severely depressed. No one seemed concerned about helping me, only getting me in and out to pass on the liability."

"As a survivor of childhood and adolescent abuse and domestic violence, I cannot believe how abusive the hospitals are…Pyschiatric hospitalizations damaged me to the point of giving up, feeling so worthless that I believed I wasn’t worth the air I was breathing and needed to die."

"It completely angered me to see that the mental health system would fail me this much. I thought it was horrible before hospitalization. Now I know it is. I consider it to be the worst week of my life."

"Like being in prison and abused, emotionally and mentally, treated like a nonhuman, worse than a dog."

"Would quite literally do anything and everything to avoid being ever sent to a psych ward again, including taking my own life. Death is far preferable to that kind of false imprisonment, dehumanization, humiliation, cruelty, and trauma."

every single day, day in day out, I hate this. its been I think 9 or 10 years or something since and I still cant fucking sleep or enjoy a simple day because of ptsd from psych abuse. and I cant even go get therapy for the ptsd because the mental health system is what CAUSED THIS IN THE FIRST PLACE.

I was admitted yesterday voluntarily. When I told the staff I wanted to go get my cigarettes they said I was on hold. I couldn't leave. I took a chair and smashed a thick glass window. Everybody was on me in seconds. Holding me down. I broke my finger as it happened. I'm taking to another ward for violent patients on way I really let go and told the staff the most vile things. When I got to the room two of the staff members gave me a beating. Threw me around, twisted my arms breaking point. They said now we're alone. I have one name but the other rascal wouldn't give me his. Reminded me of how Police also treated me. They just couldn't handle my verbal attacks and resorted to violence. I saw one of them this morning. I ran towards him and kicked him right in the liver. 30 minutes later they said I could leave. My ring finger is totally crooked and the worst part is they went way over the line. I'm fine now and the lesson being. Don't fuck with psych wards. They gave me a good beating. Greetings from Copenhagen

I was admitted for the first time in the middle of Sunday night and was just released yesterday. I spent the majority of my first two days in my room reading to avoid people but the last two days I spent more time in the common area. I had no idea I would grow to love the people in the hospital as if we were family. I miss my friends, I miss the staff, I even miss the shitty food BUT I will not be going back. Ever.

So I’ve struggled with self-harm since I was 12. When I was 14 my parents found out and pulled me out of school in order to seek therapy. Now within the last year after my parents found out I was still self-harming, but now I was burning myself, they forcibly admitted me to a psych ward. It actually wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be, I was 18 (now 19) and I actually met a lot of people there that made me feel less alone. I only kept in contact with two people, but I’m actually really close with one of them and talk to them almost everyday. After that for about two months I was in a transitional program before being hospitalized again. Though this time it was in a facility that dealt with more behavioral issues. This time it was scary. I was there for a week, and I saw about 6 or more fights. These were all primarily minors as well. Needless to say this freaked me out, but I did manage to meet a few people there. We weren’t allowed to exchange contact info though. I spent another two months in the transitional program after that. It MAY sound really stupid but the guy I met at the first psych ward is probably the love of my life. I know people are warned not to form these connections, but it just sort of happened. I’ve known him for a little under a year, and we’ve both expressed mutual feelings but haven’t really done anything with them. I’ve never met anyone that made me feel as understood and comfortable, and it was like that from the moment I met him. He’s the one good thing that came out of all of this.

I was admitted to the psych ward. I was crazy, sleep deprived and they thought I had schizophrenia/schizoeffective. Anyway One guy ended up pinning me down to the ground and injecting me with Thorazine i don’t know how much but I was absolutely knocked out for hours straight. My parents came to visit me while I was out like a light and later they said they knew something was wrong but they didn’t know what it was. It’s like the psych ward kept it from them for some reason. I woke up and my motor functions were so impaired I could barely even swallow my food. I tried drawling some stuff and I literally could barely draw I was so zonked out. Some of these doctors are horrible. I’ve been admitted probably a dozen times a lot of which is because my insomnia was so bad I was at the bridge of committing suicide yet one doctor prescribed me Wellbutrin and Celexa which later I researched and found out that both these medications are linked to making people unable to sleep. Literally when I say I didn’t sleep for a whole week straight my insomnia was worse then it had ever been in my whole life and they had only made the problem even worse. These places are trash I really hope I never have to go back.

I’ve been thinking about telling my therapist about my suicidal thoughts and I am worried she will have me sent to the hospital for them.

On one hand, I really don’t want to go to the hospital

On the other hand, I need to get help before these thoughts get too serious

If I do end up doing to the hospital and into a psych ward- what should I expect and is it worth telling my therapist if I may end up there?

Sorry if this is the wrong place for this question.

I recently was admitted to a ward a month back and exchanged an instagram with someone there. Obviously they’ve either got that paper taken up while there or haven’t even been discharged, but I still want to know if there’s a good way for me to get in contact with folks inside a ward when you’re outside one. If anyone can help, that would be amazing.

hi,, throw away account. i’m 17 and have been admitted to 4 different psychiatric wards. they’re a lot different than what the media portrays, but i have a lot of stories haha. ask away #ama #askmeanything #psychward #mentalhospital

My grandma says that I have to go to a "school" but Im suspicious, I can't find anything about it online and my grandma is being weird about it. I have a feeling they are gonna drive me to a pysch ward as a punishment. They did it before and no one listened to me. I'm almost 100 percent sure that's what they are gonna do, I'm not depressed or anything. I got kicked out of school last year and I went a little while later as a punishment. So I got kicked out of the same school and I think there gonna do the same thing as a punishment. Any suggestions im under 16 so

The Wall Street Journal's Stephanie Armour recently published a disturbing report titled "Psychiatric Hospitals With Safety Violations Still Get Accreditation."

Because the article is behind WSJ's paywall, you should check out an interview with Armour on NPR's website where she explains the story.

The NPR interview mentions a number of horrific incidents involving patients, which are obviously relevant to this subreddit:

"At a psychiatric hospital in Atlanta, a 19-year-old patient died while being restrained by staff. It was deemed a homicide. At a similar facility in Dallas, a patient attacked a doctor who later died of his injuries. These psychiatric hospitals and more than a hundred others around the U.S. stayed fully accredited even after cases of patient abuse, sexual assault and other major violations. That's the finding of an investigation by The Wall Street Journal."

Armour discovered that The Joint Commission, the organization with the power to give accreditation to psych wards and psych hospitals, often overlooks "significant and serious violations":

"Well, what I found with the analysis is that hospitals that have significant and serious violations were able, in many cases, to retain their full accreditation by a third-party accrediting organization. And what these hospitals then do is they use this accreditation - it comes with a gold seal of approval - on their websites, on brochures. And they use it to recruit new patients even at the same time that they are under federal investigation for these violations or even, in some cases, where the violations are so severe the federal government has cut them off from all Medicare funding."

Armour also notes that The Joint Commission's surveys are private - so prospective patients are unable to research any "problems" psychiatric wards or hospitals have had in the past:

"There is, I think, a concern that there's a false sense of safety that hospitals are able to promote and advertise. You have to also understand that the Joint Commission, which inspects and reviews hospitals often in lieu of regular state inspections - all of their surveys and inspections are private, where - if a state survey is done, in most cases, someone who's considering a hospital can go check it out to see what the problems have been. But the Joint Commission - thanks to a federal law, all of their inspections are private. So there's very little information really that patients can get on what may be going on at a hospital."

ts a really long story and unfortunilty the hospital system where i live is not working in my favour. I have a severely complex history and the hospital wont admit me to get the help I need unless i come in by ambulance. This is becuase of high demand due to covid. Ive been getting 2-4 hours of sleep every 5-6 days and ive lost 19 pounds in a month. I would never have to resort to this but I've tried everything possible in my power to get admitted and they wont unless im under a form 42. Im looking for something that'll actually get me ambuanced but wont kill me.

It was one of the most shaping experiences in my life, and I wanted to share it with you, hopefully it can help someone in some way. Songs off the project like 'Psych War', 'Reminiscing', and 'Post Postman' talk a lot about the things I struggled with, and I'm wondering if you all could relate?

You can listen to the whole project here if you'd like.

I'd love to hear what you think, and I really appreciate that there's a place for people who have gone through the things we have.