Mental health from both sides
Trust is not the same as belief. I would say that you can trust someone even if you don’t fully believe them, and this lets you consider what they say, even if you decide it’s actually rubbish. Trust does not require blind faith; in fact you often need to discard the latter when trust is…
Bipolar disorder is a rather all or nothing term, which can, at times, be quite misleading. It implies that you are either delving the depths of misery or riding a wave of elation – or maybe entirely normal, if you take your treatment like a good patient. Except it quite frequently doesn’t work like that.…
I am a psychiatrist, and I hope that when I see my patients I am helpful, friendly even. I don’t know if I am, though. For me it’s a job, a job I like very much (mostly), but a job that ends with the end of the day. I forget some of my patients; not…
We should all criticise psychiatry, all the time. We criticise many other things in life, and see it as a positive, which it is. We criticise art, literature and music; we criticise science; we criticise each other; and without this criticism we would never learn or grow. Our lives would not be interesting. I like…
Dear Friends 2024 is nearly over and I can’t think what to put. Something must have happened, surely? And then I remember, as I pop my teeth back in and pat my curly grey hair – I am a grandmother! And of truly the most wonderful child in the world! Little Leon was born to…
Up until now I have written about my life in excerpts, usually to illustrate some point or other, or to share something that I hope will speak to, or help, others. My memoir, An Improbable Psychiatrist, which is published this week, does this too, but is rather more. It is no necklace of events, polished and…
People with mental illnesses may often be thought by others to be lazy, perhaps because they don’t always seem to do very much. There are many reasons for this – the illnesses themselves, the treatments and the wider consequences of being mentally ill. Laziness is a word with a lot of negative emotion attached to…
So much of psychiatry is opinion. While there can be general agreement that something is amiss with an individual, sometimes gravely so, there can also be a lot of debate as to what that actually is. The discussion about their potential mental disorder may be stimulating and interesting for the clinician; perhaps rather less so…
As a patient with mental illness, I am very grateful to my partner. He has stayed with me throughout, been there for the difficult times, and still takes me to my regular ECT maintenance sessions. I hate going for these; the treatment is no fun, but I also hate having to go there with him…
Asking for help doesn’t seem to be very easy. As my maintenance ECT sessions stretch further apart, I am feeling more and more pulled between huge relief at stopping, and horrible fear – also at stopping. Obviously, the hope for me and my family is that I will stay well, be there for them, and…
This is a difficult post to write, and is probably a reflection of many things - my own illness and return to work, the challenges of trying to change things in a clunky system, and maybe even just the simple need for a holiday. But I am weary of psychiatry. I just don’t know where…
Why is psychiatry more value-laden than many other specialties, or at least perceived as such? I’ve been reading the views of the anti-psychiatry folk recently, and they trouble me; however, strangely I also find those who hold the opposite views quite troubling. And I think that this is because as soon as there are opposing…
I’ve spent much of the past year stuck in a depressive episode. Sometimes I’ve felt a bit better, and at those times I’ve tried harder than anything to haul myself out of the pit – sometimes it works a little, but mostly it’s just made it harder. But because I can talk a bit, maybe…
Next week I’m hoping to return to work after a few months off. It’s been a year since I became ill this time – I returned early last year, but it was too soon, and I found myself off again. I have a diagnosis – bipolar disorder – and I’m on quite a lot of…
I think I’m getting a bit better. But it’s always hard to tell. I have bad days and better days. I have days when I don’t have to do anything, so it doesn’t matter. I have days when I have to talk to people, and so it does matter. Some of these, I can manage…
Writing about ECT, as a patient, comes round for me, again and again. Perhaps it’s not a surprise that I’m not entirely sure what I’ve said and written already – indeed, perhaps that’s the whole point. I don’t know how many treatments I’ve had. I know I had quite a lot (?20) last winter, and…
This year hasn’t been great – quite ungreat, actually. Lots of depression, lots of horrible treatment, some irritable and elevated mood and some shorter times of feeling reasonably normal. The problem with feeling better, though, is that it hasn’t lasted, and it’s all very hard to predict. Here I am having ECT again. I thought…
I would describe myself as reasonably sensitive – after all, I’m a psychiatrist and, as such, would think that I am sensitive to other people’s needs. I don’t think that I’m particularly more sensitive than many others, and I know plenty of people who care and show empathy, both to friends and family, and even…
I am very happy to finally feel that I am shedding the last horrible remnants of my recent depression. I feel much better, possibly slightly on the high side, which I find hard to admit, much harder, actually, than saying I’m depressed. And it’s not too bad, so why worry? Nothing that can’t be managed with…
It’s impossible to describe what it’s like having a mood disorder, mainly because it will vary depending on your mood. I’ve written before about this, but make no apologies for doing so again. It’s something I feel compelled to think about and explore, while knowing that I will never properly understand it. Most people’s moods…