This is my 2nd blog.  

My daughter is still stuck on the acute ward she calls “prison”.   Still no news of when she will be transferred to a more specialised hospital and the hospital have been told to chase this up in two weeks time.   Meanwhile my daughter is inviting all the other patients to join her! 

I am now going back over time to look at the diastrous/dreadful care given to my daughter under the local NHS Trust which has led to her serious decline.

In the first instance, she was put on anti-depressants (Cipralix) by her GP but this did not work and made her skin itchy which led to her scratching her face and causing scars.   She had a job around this time which did not work out for her but then seemed to have no thinking ability once on these drugs.

The anti-depressant above also led to aggression and behaviour was at timesvery strange.   Anyway, my daughter was suffering more and more side effects including headaches that she decided to take herself off the , I would not advise anyone to do this without medical assistance.   At the time I knew very little about medications and trusted the doctors but I did look up the side effects of this drug but at the same time, supported my daughter’s decision.    She had been given a “once in a lifetime” opportunity to go abroad and work as a “companion” to a friend of a friend and she was at the same time placed on a waiting list to see the community mental health team and she had been waiting for months on end for this – suddenly the team were interested now that this opportunity had come about.   They highly recommended the trip abroad and diagnosed her with “nothing wrong” and felt her problems were within the home environment when in fact I had discovered shocking emails that indicated abuse – nothing to do with the family.  So, the trip went ahead, despite me having reservations and begging for them to keep her in under observation as I did not want anything to go wrong.   This was ignored by the team who refused to admit her under observation into hospital before the trip.    Anyway the trip abroad was a disaster and had to be rearranged as she missed the flight and then she was back within a week – lost luggage and money and not in a good state of mind. She was living at home at the time but other members of the family were at risk from such behaviour.    She was diagnosed with  Treatment Team) were involved but soon reduced their visits to the home.   At last she got the placement within the day hospital.  I thought that this would be good for her as I worked part time at the time and could not be at home with her all the time and was worried about the house as she had left gas on and gone out and left the front door wide open.   Key after key had been lost – once her entire handbag and other possessions besides.

Transport was arranged to pick her up to take her to the day hospital because of my concerns of her vulnerability.   I visited the day hospital and was shocked to see patients just sitting around with little to do and so many activities cancelled for one reason or another.   She was appointed a care coordinator within the hospital and I had been desperately tried to get her some kind of part time job/something to do outside of the mental  health but then along came social services and the hospital “care” which I soon found out to be dreadfully lacking.   Of course sitting around with other people with not much to do led to boredom and when another patient invitied my daughter out for the day to the coast she jumped at the chance.   The patient turned out to be someone on the wards who was allowed to mix freely and described in the files as a “predatory male” who “should have been escorted everywhere”.   This led to my daughter going missing all evening and requests received for money for her safe return and police being involved in trying to find her.  Of course even worse came to light after her disappearance but this was part of my complaint that they had failed to look after someone who was on the police vulnerable person’s list and a patient who should have been closely monitored who was much older and streetwise and all of this led to a shocking outcome.   At the day hospital my daughter was seen by a psychiatrist who prescribed her with Rispiridon which she did not get on with.   She was soon to be prescribed with Aripraprasol on which I thought she had developed an eating disorder (bullimia).   This dreadful medication caused my daughter to feel awful as did the Rispiridon which caused excessive weight gain – she begged to come off the Aripraprazol too and I supported her as I was so concerned to see the effects of this dreadful medication. Whilst at the day centre she had a care coordinator who herself came in crying her eyes out at work because of “marriage problems” according to my daughter and this led to her being off for weeks and weeks on end.   This led to the decline in care and nothing much being offered for my daughter to do and move on with  her life.   Noone wanted to take responsibility in the team for my daughter when she went missing stating she was entitled to do whatever she wanted as she was a voluntary patient and they could not stop her.   There was no apology and no support from the team about the dreadful incidents occurring whilst she had disappeared which led to me visiting 2 firms of solicitors as the Healthcare Commission had described the care as “satisfactory” however the Chief Executive of the Trust was forced to back down on her claims that the care was “excellent” and forced to be nicer in the way she responded to me in correspondence which was extremely dismissive.   The result of the findings of two separate firms of solicitors were that the mental health trust was “negligent” and “failed in their duty of care”.  This shows that the findings of the Healthcare Commission at the time were simply not correct because on each occasion my daughter was there in person to see the solicitors and tell them in her own words what happened as I wanted decent care and the team to listen.   Things did not go to court – one firm did not offer legal aid and the other said the amount of compensation that would have been offered would be less than than costs and I was left with little hope of success and felt more harm would be done to my daughter in the circumstances.   This incident duly led to my daughter not being able to go to the local mental health facility group she attended because the manager showed concern that she was at risk through further incidents occurring within that environment.    So, I felt I had to pull her out of the day hospital and the other group she attended elsewhere as a result of everything so suddenly my daughter was at home coming off medication with no support, no help – nothing from this uncaring team.   The hospital had washed their hands and the social services were hopeless and uncaring.   I did not want her to have a care coordinator who herself had huge personal problems who had been off for weeks on end and suddenly returned to work.   I wanted her transferred to the team of my father where there were good social workers who listened but the team said this was not possible – in other words no choice.    The only good thing about the hospital was the social group run by an ex patient who used to pick my daughter up in the evening and take her home after various social events/evenings with a group of other mental ill people but decent people – I was so happy that she was in nice company.   Once leaving the day  hospital these social outings came to an end and there was nothing to do and only myself to try to get things put in place.  It was as though the team had just washed their hands of her.

Anyway she was no nil medication and doing well but then a night out at a theatre changed all of that.   Something triggered her off and then came the behavior that I could not cope with but because of what had happened I took h er in the car to another nearby mental health trust as I did not feel she was safe under the local one.  I will not go into detail what  happened on arrival but she got admitted there and I felt this was good

My new website is dedicated to my 25 year old daughter who is severely ill right now and a patient on an acute mental health ward.  What I will write on a weekly basis (as that is all I have time to do) is an account of her progress and will appeal to anyone who is either in a similar position or carers looking after people who are mentally ill.    I will talk about my daughter’s care under the NHS and the care in the community from a personal point of view.

Before I commence writing I would advise you that the views/opinions and content of this website are purely that of my own.  I am not advising any patients to take themselves off medication, neither am I professionally qualified to give out medical advice in this connection. 

My daughter is one of many mental health patients in the system but she has become severely ill and has been in and out of hospital 8 times in a short space of time.  I have challenged the team to the hilt.   I would like to see changes made in mental health care and have researched this quite a bit.   At the moment there is no choice and not everyone can afford to turn to the private sector to get advice.  In desperation this is what I had to do.

Background.

I will refer to my daughter as “Elizabeth” for the purpose of this website.

Elizabeth seemed happy as a child.  She had a small circle of friends from primary school and got on well.   Problems did not start until secondary school when her best friend moved to another area.   I then noticed a change in her.   I was caring for my father who had Alzheimers and later went on to care for another family member at the same time.   Elizabeth started to skip lessons and this came to the attention of Child Guidance who became involved.   Elizabeth seemed to be unable to communicate as it later turned out she had difficulties with a certain lesson as it was a regular occurrence.   I immediately paid for private lessons to help her in this regard.  I then became engrossed in my caring responsibilities towards 2 other members of my family and unfortunately thought that Elizabeth was by this time doing well.   She had left school and gone on to college, was chosen to go abroad to work, she left college after passing her exams and went on to a leading college to train to be a chef but it was not until the age of 18/19 that I really saw a change in her and put this down to a phase and change in her eating habits.  She had become a vegetarian and then vegan.   Her whole appearance had changed and she became forgetful, losing everything, key after key, handbag, coats, everything!   She had a job and was in this job around 2 years  – I told her to cut down on things as I felt she was doing too much.    In addition to college she was learning to drive, she had passed her theory, she was learning french as well as piano.   She had become withdrawn and secretive and I felt something was not right.  She was constantly on the computer which was quite unusual for her as she never took an interest in this before.    She dyed her hair, her appearance and behaviour was strange.  I questioned whether she had taken drugs as she was out a lot.   Throughout this time, I was heavily involved in the care of my father who was deteriorating and living in his own home.   Elizabeth’s behaviour became more and more strange as time went on but I hoped this was just a phase but one day took a look at the computer she had left up and running and I was shocked and horrified by the content ……………………….   I took emails to the police and later looked around in her room for more evidence.   Police and social services became involved and a year later Elizabeth was called to the police station to give evidence but it was all too late!    I cannot mention anything more (except to say that there was no family connections in these incidents).  Elizabeth had become secretive and I was extremely upset at what I had read and found out and perhaps I did not go about things correctly as I wanted justice as a parent and questioned her to find out not in a calm manner which maybe added to the stress she suffered.   I then was extremely watchful of her and wanted to know where she was going and did not trust her to tell me the truth.   The awful truth is that when someone has been abused they turn back to the person who abused them and continue with contact.   This I could not bring myself to understand.

Anyway, by the time the police interviewed her there was lack of evidence to present to the court because of her decline – the decline being as a result of one drug after another prescribed by the various Psychiatrists under the local NHS Mental Health Trust.   There are several diagnoses as I have the medical files up to the most recent ones and this is what brought me to challenge the doctors and team as a whole when I read the shocking content of the medical files.

This is just a bit of the background surrounding my daughter but I will soon be posting some pictures – pictures of the local area where I live and pictures of the gorgeous pet kitten which I will be filming in my home.

Next week, I will be writing all about the huge lengths I have gone to in challenging the team.   This will be of interest to anyone caring for someone who is mentally ill and patients themselves.   In fact I have invited my daughter and the patients themselves to write if they so wish. 

I will end my first blog to describe a picture I saw pinned to the notice board of the acute ward.  The picture was drawn by a patient and I could not put things better in words.  The drawing showed a patient being given an injection and on the syringe was the words “poison” and the words in large capital letters “THANK YOU NHS AND THANK YOU CAMERON”.

My aim is to draw people’s attention to the abuse going on under mental health care which I will do on a weekly basis from a personal point of view, although as I have said other patients are keen to submit their comments and views.    I hope that eventually I get the attention I would like at Government level and I would be more than happy to appear on TV as I feel that there should be changes  made in  mental health care and choices given to the patients who are often just dismissed and a Government who wastes money left right and centre and does not care.