I am going to visit a therapist tomorrow for the first time. I figure it can’t hurt. But how much information do I share with her. I don’t even know how I would describe my suicidal thoughts to her. It’s just something I feel, not something that can be explained. Has anyone visited a therapist before? Any advise or anyone want to share your experience?
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Whatever you do DO NOT share your suicidal thoughts/ideation with her, she is legally obligated to report that to the emergency services and you will be detained in a psychiatric facility. That place is absolute hell, demeaning, degrading, humiliating and suffocating, it is not worth it. Describe your depression to her but DO NOT mention your suicidal inclinations.
Are they legally required to report all thoughts of suicide, so if I were to mention that I have thought of suicide before, she would need to report it? I’m sorry, I’m so new to this and I don’t want to say the wrong thing and get detained in a psychiatric facility. Thank you for your help!
I think the trick is to tell them that OCCASIONALLY you have suicidal thoughts, but not right now. That’s what I used to do before I stopped going. Ask for advice for when you have these thoughts, but tell them you are fine right now. Because if you tell them you are having suicidal thoughts right now, yes, they have to report you. This has happened to me before, that’s why I devised that trick.
I don’t know that it’s so cut and dried, at least here in the UK. I discuss my suicidal thoughts and feelings quite openly with my support worker and care coordinator, and they don’t rush to ‘section’ me. In therapy, it would wasting my time and theirs if I wasn’t able to be open about what preoccupies me 90% of the time.
In this country there aren’t the resources to lock up people for having thoughts. Quite often even those who attempt are sent home after medical treatment and maybe a night or two in the psych ward for ‘observation’.
Your workers need to understand that it is helpful to be able to talk openly about what’s on one’s mind, and makes it less likely that you will actually do anything…but obviously, given what Stendarr’s said, be cautious in the first instance and find out the lie of the land.
In the US it is very rare to find a psychiatrist or psychologist that doesn’t freak out if you talk about suicidal thoughts. So be very careful. What I told my doc was that I’d voluntarily hospitalized myself twice before and it only made matters worse. Psychiatric institutions don’t help – they don’t really provide therapy just drugs. I used to just say I’d had them in the past but, if asked, wasn’t having them now. That way you can talk about them without scaring anyone. Surprisingly, my current psych doc actually agreed with me about how many hospitals don’t really provide help. It blew my mind. We have been using monthly no-suicide contracts.