MikeyMul

Not a nurse or anything like that but my friend's father once had her put on a psych ward when she was 16 because he and his wife read her diary and found out she had sex with her boyfriend.

Hi ya Tookie! :) Thank you for your post, I really enjoyed it! I think your story is a great example of not needing to do a whole lot at all to put a smile on someone's face and make their life better! All it takes is a little effort! You are my go to person if I ever have questions about Alaska! Big HUGS 2 YOU TOO AND you please take CARE TOO!!

I am glad to hear that your hospital made an effort to address the issue and I agree about now having an entire floor of acting out psychotic patients which obviously isn't safe for anyone either, certainly a case of give and take.

Good post. I agree about the more severe patients actually helping others to want to get better faster, lol. Although I think they can also deter others from seeking help knowing of the environment they could be heading into.

Yeah, that is really scary to say the very, very, least and I agree totally with the rest of your post. I just think that situations like these have the potential to have devastating effects and at the very least, can lower the level of care on the ward because of the attention needed to be given to the situation. What would scare me is if someone was really determined to hurt someone, they might find a way to do it and even if they don't, knowing a person wants to hurt you is not easy to deal with for a person not dealing with any issues in their life, much less a person who is dealing with issues.

I see your point, just think that in the other areas, you don't have to be concerned with the way patients act and what they do to each other like in a Psych setting.

From my personal experiences and also from my general opinion, I feel that the many varying degrees of mental illness in a psych ward can be extremely harmful and interfere with the treatment of patients and also have negative effects on doctors, nurses, staff, etc. For example, you have a person who is in for suicidal thoughts but is not violent at all and might not be too good at defending himself and then you have a person who has a history of extreme violence and severe mental illness, hallucinations, etc. that could potentially be a danger to the latter patient and this also has effect on the hospital staff as I think it can create a situation where the hospital staff has to keep a keen eye on the severely mentally ill patient while at the same time trying to not allow it to effect the care of the overall ward and it's patients. I have heard nurses say and experienced for myself that on the same ward, you can have patients who you have no problem being with alone, no problem allowing them to give you a hug when you come back from vacation, no problem taking that person out to eat with just you and that person alone and then you have patients who you don't want to be on the same ward with without what you feel is adequate backup available in case they are needed. I am bringing up this issue knowing that resources are nowhere remotely close to what would be needed to modify this situation ideally and I do not have any specific solution to suggest but I was wondering what people's thoughts and maybe experiences were with this issue. Sorry if this is too long of a post!

being nosy can lots of times be good. :) i struggle with major depression that stems from having a very traumatic childhood, being exposed to domestic violence for the majority of my childhood, being shunned by the majority of my family from my mother's side due to being born out of wedlock to an interfaith unwed couple, being sexually molested, very rarely having friends due to the living environment i was in, always felt like i was considered to be abnormal, alcoholic mother, and not interested in me father and family from my father's side, and being in foster care. i love to hear stories like yours because it is proof what people in your situation can accomplish, i dislike hearing about this person can't accomplish this, can't accomplish that because of this and that. thanks for the welcome!

Thanks!

I would be happy to get a friend request on any site or forum that is not a spammer or a scammer, been getting way too many of the latter two for awhile now!

You did an awesome job, thanks for sharing!

Thanks!

Thanks for the welcome! I totally understand about nurses needing to vent, I think we all need to vent, we are all living in the same world and are exposed to it in one fashion or another.

I know this thread is an old thread but IntheSky, I think what you did was very brave and the right thing, lots of people don't take stands like you did and just follow the same routine over and over without questioning it, without thinking of other ways. I don't know how strong the possibility is of you seeing the girl ever again but I think she will remember you and what you did and that someone acted in a caring way towards her which was rare in her life and that gave her hope for her future. I hope you don't get desensitized as you progress as others in your field do, please stay the same for you and your patients. All the best to you in your future!

First off, I am not sure if this forum is exclusive to nurses or not so I apologize for the intrusion if if is as I am not a nurse or anything similar. But if it is not, than I think I would like to serve here as the voice of the psych patient, in particular, the misunderstood psych patient in addition to voicing my views on other topics as well. I have lots of life experiences and think I can provide insight on lots of topics. Regardless, I hope everyone is doing well and continues to do so! :)