Woeful mental health care ...

My neighbour was recently sectioned and was released after just over a week. She needs long term care.
While she was in hospital her flat was broken into twice on the same day (it took me ten minutes to persuade the 999 operator to send the police the first time). Then, a few days later the police executed a search warrant and broke her door down even though they had been in the flat with their forensic team earlier in the week and the neighbours had all told them that her family had been going into the flat. They also smashed the window to her car.
No one told her and she came home from hospital to find she couldn't get in and had a wailing fit in the street. I wasn't home or I would have gone out to her (she drives me frantic because she keeps us all awake but she still needs help).
We are dreading her coming back because she makes bad choices about people and so she gets targeted and there is nothing that we can do when the systems are all breaking down. The ambulance was called out at least 5 times before they eventually took her to hospital and I think that was because the police were insisting.
She is a difficult person to help because she thinks people are trying to take control but so far as I can see there are lots of people having meetings but no one actually helping her.
If she is speaking to me when she comes back (this varies), I am going to try to suggest that she speaks to a mental health advocate (there is a service in the borough but I don't know how good it is) as she is fighting on all fronts. Sometimes she'll say that she is going to be ok because the Goddess Isis is looking after her and other times she will go away muttering that I am watching her.
One of the neighbours is getting up a petition and although I don't want to go back to sleepless nights for months on end which made me seriously ill and I do think the neighbours need to work together, it feels wrong.
I think society falls apart without good mental health care (and that does include care for anxiety and addictions).

Oh Jaycee that sounds awful. The 'community' is no place for her by the sound of it. I often used to think that some of the people I saw just plain needed some looking after and a break from all the worries of life.
Its a complex area to address. Psychosis is really scary and needs proper psychiatric care. Then there are affective disorders in a wide range of severities, drug and alcohol abuse/addiction and all tapering into anxiety and depression/depressive illness. Its unfortunate that words like anxiety and depression are commonly used by everyone at times as we can all feel a bit worried or low but not nearly at a threshold for psychiatric care. Then there are developmental disorders ASD, ADHD, dyslexia, dyspraxia etc etc then add in learning disability (aka mental handicap) and its a recipe for a perfect storm of need and confusion around responsibility, training need and funding requirement. Sadly I see no answer to it all. Just throwing money wont necessarily help. It has to be accurately targeted and resourced. Sorry. Rant over. You'll not be surprised to hear that my blood pressure plummeted when I retired!

It is a massive umberalla . A physical problem and the .GP refers one to a consultant. A mental problem and it's just one consultant who has to cover the lot .

Society does fall apart as you so rightly point out Jaycee but in my experience the majority of people who are lucky enough to be unaffected by mental health issues simply do not want to know and regard sufferers as simply "nutters" who need to take control of themselves and stop inflicting their condition on everyone. My DD is bipolar and is going through quite a severe episode at the moment and members of my own close family simply cannot see that she is ill rather than a gobby cow with an arrogant personality defect. I'm on my own trying to deal with this - her dear dad having passed away 17 years ago - and, as I'm the focus of her anger and the target of most of her verbal abuse, it's a very lonely place to be. She has pulled through in the past and when she isn't in the grip of an episode so loving and caring. She's my daughter I can't abandon her I just wish there was a better system in place to help us help ourselves.

Same for me Patricia , the verbal abuse is distressing , I cope with dismissing it as 'that's the illness not my daughter ' . What makes things much more difficult is the - sorry we can't discuss her, patient confidentiality ' . She is now being treated for PTS , useless because she didn't suffer what they are treating her for, it's false memory.

A 10 year old with mental health issues was recommended by the school to get advice and an appointment was eventually given for an assessment - and then postponed to a later date! This is a child in need of help who with that help should be OK. The service is dire for the young, the middle aged and the elderly. Thank goodness the young royals are trying to do something about it because noone else is. The situation is increasingly worse. My mother had severe mental health problems and though her care was sporadic it was at least there and I'm talking about 50 years ago!!!

And me, over the years I have absorbed a lot of abuse - bless him, I know he has been unwell,, he has all my support, but it does take its toll. We have a well-documented history of depression and bi-polar in the family.

I am beginning to feel I need to make my voice heard, but not sure where to start. This week, my feelings of anger have been compounded because a.n.other family member has been poorly. She is a vulnerable young adult. She travelled some distance to be with her father who is her main supporter and was so psychotic he took her to A&E only to be told ' We cannot help her, she needs to travel back to her own health authority,' (hundreds of miles away).She attempted to take her life later that day ...

If I was visiting out of area and, for example, was involved in an accident, hurt and in need of treatment, I would not be asked to return to my own health authority.

In this instance, I have no doubt that being turned away at her point of dire need, contributed to this poor girl's trauma.

When I am not so raw and when I am in a stronger place, I do feel I need to start petitioning somebody!

I disagree that no one else apart from the Windsors are doing anything, they made a TV appearance and no use at all . The charities such as Sane and Mind are giving support but are depenandant on the public for funding and volenteers.

I was irritated with the Windsors comparing their grief with mental illness and telling people to seek help to talk .

Annie I get irritated by the Windsors full stop....and by the way usually quite sensible people think they are godlike and wonderful people.....thats baldy Willie who only worked 16 hours a week and managed to have several homes ALL refurbed at huge expense ..he has to use the royal PR mill to keep his standard of living...this time its mental health ..I'm sure theres another bandwagon due soon for them to jump on

Thanks for responding anniebach it really helps. And thanks to to imperfect for starting this thread. It makes me feel less alone and I will join you in your campaign when we're in that stronger place.

I agree patricia. The neighbours have just decided that she is on crack but she went to a school for people with problems like hers so it is obviously long standing. I have been with her when she had an episode and thought she was possessed and she was very frightened. They get cross with me when I say that she is targeted but she clearly is. She is also attracted to them but that is part of the illness.
I could help her if it weren't for the sleep problem. I tried when she moved in and she was soon knocking at my door at 3.30 am and buzzing our intercoms through the night. The police think she needs to be somewhere with staff but it is hard to know who actually makes the decisions. It seems like teams passing the buck to each other.

'Them' being the men not the neighbours.

Could you contact Social Work Jaycee ? Might be worth a try. She's a vulnerable adult. Doesn't sound like she has capacity to make safe social judgements. I don't know where you are but up here there's the Mental Welfare Commission which can be contacted (possibly worth talking to them paddyann?).
I'm not bothered about the windsors but if they can somehow bring attention to the area of mental health care that's fine by me.

Patricia, you are not alone x but I admit I feel alone at times, things have been so bad this year I now live in almost total isolation , will be when my granddaughters go back to university this month. When you get the verbal abuse do tell yourself it's the illness not your daughter speaking

Mental health doesn't need attention it needs understanding Jane

You seem a very kind person Jaycee to be there for your neighbour when she is so clearly ill and experiencing such difficulties.. it's really not many people who would do so. And it's a total scandal that there isn't more support for you supporting her. Talk about "care" in the community it's throw people to the dogs and the ones who don't make it are just collateral damage on some government spread sheet. Bloody hell it's depressing isn't it? Think I'm going to have to dig deep this afternoon and get out for a long walk in the sunshine to cheer up a bit! Blessings to all

And thanks again for your supportive words anniebach I hope you find a way through the isolation x

There's another aspect to this which I don't understand.
Over the last ?25 years there seems to have been a huge increase in the number of people suffering from mental illness, from mild to severe. Why is this?

Jane10 She told me that she now has a support worker but I don't know how supportive she is. She just needs someone efficient whether it is a CPN, social worker, support worker or what. It would be an improvement if she were off the ground floor as these men can get to all her windows. Before she went into hospital her family were more involved but I don't think that they can always cope. Social services wouldn't talk to a neighbour and we get more information from the police than the Housing Office.

TriciaF, Drugs maybe!!!!

Anniebach I was talking in much broader terms. Understanding is lovely but doing something to change services, far less just improve them, is something else altogether.

Drugs, alcohol, break up of families, the internet , breakdown in society , people too busy with their own lives to listen

Sorry Jane

TriciaF I think there always have been a lot of people suffering from mental illness in the same way there a lot of people suffering from cancer. Things are just talked about more and there are so many ways of disseminating information we are all more aware. People with mental health issues or learning disabilities were out of sight in large hospitals in years gone by.
Those hospitals were not all as bad as we imagine providing a place of safety and care for vulnerable people.

Christinefrance
I totally agree that the old mental hospitals gave support and safety to vulnerable people.
My mother was a psychiatrist in a big mental hospital in Nortumberland in the 60's.
She was in charge of a modern unit with the male and female side separated by a large lounge area and dining area where the patients could meet for social events under supervision.
The patients used to come and stay when they "were unable to cope" with the outside world.
The did have a padded cell, but it was on the female side, as some of the patients could get very aggressive and I was always nervous about going to that side.