Every Story Needs Told

Anonymous

I was diagnosed one day before my 15th birthday. I had snapped and threatened to kill myself in front of my psychiatrist (I am also depressed but not diagnosed with depression, which is why I saw him regularly for meds). He committed me to a ward at Duke Hospital for mental patients and I swear it was the scariest thing ever and ever since then I wanted to scream at anyone who makes a joke about padded rooms or straight jackets because they do exist and they were used on the other patients and it was not fun. I stayed in the waiting area for seventeen hours. After about six hours, it was close to ten at night, a doctor pulled me aside and started asking me questions relating to my weight and my school and my health. They then called my parents in. After the seventeen hours in the waiting room, I was finally placed in my own padded room, where I stayed for another night. It wasn't as bad as the waiting room because I had a bed and a blanket, but I didn't have a window. I was meant to stay two weeks but my father got me out with a contract from me, and the nurse I talked to earlier told my psycatrist I might have bipolar disorder, and a couple weeks later I got the official diagnosis. My parents think it's all a load of bullshit which is why they never thought about it earlier and why I ended up in the hospital before getting help, I suppose. I really hope other people don't have to go through that. And I'm medicated now so I'm not as bad as I was before.