Hospitalised as teen or child

[needed_]

Has anyone of you been hospitalised with younger age? Did it help or make everything worse? I guess "young" is relative, I'm 30 now so 14 for me is rather young. I was hospitalised for the first time when I was 14 and I learned a lot about myself. But I was diagnosed wrongly and got the wrong meds so in the end it made everything worse. Back at home I felt so worthless and guilty, like it was all my fault... because despite all the therapy I was more depressed than ever and tried to ctb. I will never forget how disappointed I felt when I woke up in the icu. Sometimes I wonder what would have happened if the team in the hospital had gotten my diagnosis and my meds right when I was 14...would my life be totally different now? What kind of experience have you made with therapy and meds at that age? (I might add that afterwards I also had a positive hospital experience, but still mostly negative..)

 

[Sanva]

I'm sorry for what you went through. I was also hospitalised as a teenager and had a similar experience. They didn't take me seriously at all. I am pretty obviously autistic and I was very overwhelmed in that new environment but they kind of ignored me when I brought it up and just told me I was depressed and not thinking straight. It made me feel even more broken than I felt before I was hospitalised.
I do wish they had provided proper help because what I really needed back then was someone who could tell me there was nothing wrong with me and why I was feeling the way I was feeling. But I guess I wasn't worthy of that. I think my life now would be different, although maybe that's wishful thinking.

 

[empty]

I was hospitalized at age 17 after a suicide attempt. They changed my meds a lot, and I talked to some therapists, but the experience didn't really help me overall. I wasn't formally diagnosed with anything, but they considered diagnosing me with BPD or MDD. And I missed like a month of school, which was stressful because at the time school was very important to me. I've seen very few people online say they had a positive experience in the psych ward. I don't know how the system should be fixed though.

 

[poisonedminds]

My first psych hospitalization was at 14 too. I stayed two months and came back many times afterwards. Psychiatry did help me a lot as a teen. I learned a lot about myself and it helped me become a better person with a lot of insight. Then I turned 18 and completely spiraled. Adult psych services, be it inpatient or outpatient, are incredibly hard to obtain and when you do get them, they are unhelpful, oppressive and discriminatory. As much as psych helped me as a teen, I have now evolved to an anti-psychiatry mentality.

 

[maakies]

My brother was hospitalized at 14, which kind of kept me out. I was self-harming and already at year 7 of wanting to CTB. My first one was at 19, and again at 24. Both terrible times. Pretty dehumanizing when I first entered. Usually the nurses chilled out and let me get away with things by the end. I also have a decent amount of friends and family who would visit which probably made them treat me alright after a while. I was teetering a lot between then and now (outpatient services, etc.). I am not anti-psychiatry. I think it works for people who want the help. I don't want the help; never have, never will. It's really everyone else who wants me to get the help. It's not for me.

 

[needed_]

hey everyone, thanks for sharing your experiences. i can really related with what you all said. especially i've also made the experience that being hospitalised when you're under 18 is so different than as an adult - as an adult my problems actually have been taken a bit more seriously but nobody really cares about you at all. in contrast, i've spent almost 2 years of my teenage life hospitalised (we had school there so that wasn't an issue) and they did care about me, but they didn't take me seriously enough and therefore got everything wrong as mentioned before..

 

[Mynameisnotimportant]

Huge difference in success for me when I was hospitalized a week away from 18 and when I was 18. It made all the difference in recovery knowing that I got to leave on MY terms and not my dad's. And I got to have control over what I thought was wrong with me rather than parents

 

[LingeringUnreal]

I was hospitalized a lot from 12 til 19ish with suicide attempts, both short term and longer term. I definitely think it didn't help. At some point if I wanted a break I'd just self harm enough to get hospitalized just to get away from my family, it was like a fun little vacation lol. It had a lot of consequences, but at the time I only really wanted immediate relief for whatever. The more serious attempts were much more well hidden, but still usually ended up with me in the hospital.

Now I pretty much do everything within my power to avoid being hospitalized because that "lifestyle" is both very destructive and now that I'm an adult I don't have insurance so all it does is add more medical debt to my record....

 

[NearlyIrrelevantCake]

I ended up in the psych ward several times in my teens, and even more times in my 20s.

 

[Hirokami]

I was voluntarily hospitalized in a crisis unit for almost two weeks when I was 16. I had suicidal thoughts and anxiety/depression so bad, I could barely get out of the bed to use the bathroom. I was also withering away as I had panic attacks almost daily but I barely could finish a meal, and sometimes not even that. I got tired of having my parents call 911 every time I felt chest pain and trouble breathing, which was almost every day for about a month, so I desperately sought out help. They didn't want me to admit myself, but I was physically and emotionally weak and didn't know what else to do. I was tired of suffering and missed gaming, watching anime, and hanging out with friends. Eventually, they gave in.

The crisis unit wasn't too bad, I suppose. At least they got me out of bed. Though, they drugged me with so many pills, I felt numb and tired all the time. It also stung how the therapist there, that I got to see only once, said my anxiety was the worst she's ever seen. On the bright side, though, I got the number of pills reduced greatly once I followed up with an outpatient psychiatrist. I only had to take two pills at that point, Lexapro and Benadryl as an emergency/insomnia pill. Even the psychiatrist I saw told me that they put me on medicine I didn't even need to be on, medicine for people with behavioral issues when I just had anxiety and depression. He also said I didn't even need to be there in the first place, but I disagree. I was really fucked up and did what I thought was best. In any case, I don't plan on voluntarily doing that again. Feeling dead inside because of a bunch of pills isn't worth it, to be honest.

 

[Chaestergram]

I was hospitalized when I was around 11/12 and it didn't do shit, my mom sent me there for eating disorder and self harm but all it results in was me lying in order to get out of there and the day I left I was drunk around the streets with some friends, same for the second time at 14, which wasn't even intentional, I passed out drunk on the street and found myself in the hospital.

I went back to it a few more after 18 but none of it was useful to me, all they did is to feed me with meds, no psychological support/session and expecting me to feel good after a few days.

 

[Bleak]

Yeah I was 17 or 18 and had very similar experience. They put me on extremely high dose of antidepressants which has permanently screwed me up and altered my personality. I really hate how people who've never been in the system recommend that everyone who is struggling should be sent to it to be "fixed". Maybe it helps some people but it didn't help me, nor the people I was with in there from what I could tell.