“Please Don't Send Me To The Snake Pit”: Modern Mental Health Care and the Scam of the National Suicide Hotline

My maternal great-grandmother was one of the most beautiful women I have ever beheld. But even in the earliest photograph I have of her, at age twelve, there was a deep sadness in her beautiful dark eyes which I instantly recognised. The beautiful girl grew into a beautiful woman, graduating from a teacher's college in Iowa in the same class as her dashingly handsome, rather shy future husband. But even in this photograph, of a happy occasion, the deep sadness is present. Later, there is a causal photograph of her with her sister and her first two babies; the younger, an infant, being my grandmother. In this, her head is bent 'like the stem of a broken lily', to use the Pre-Raphaelite phrase, and the depression is very clear. Later on in her life, she was swamped by this depression, and after much soul-searching, the family decided to admit her to an asylum, where she would receive electroconvulsive therapy (ECT). I remember keenly with what great emotion my grandmother told me of her poor mother begging her and her brother, 'Please don't send me to the Snake Pit!' - a reference to the 1946 book and 1948 film with Olivia de Havilland, which I had seen as a preteen, being enamoured of old Hollywood movies. So, I got the reference, and it was with horror and great sadness that I thought of that poor beautiful women undergoing such an experience. My grandmother said that the ECT 'cured the problem' but there are photos of her still-beautiful mother in great age, and the sadness is there. And I thought, but have never voiced until this moment, 'no, she only hid it, because she never wanted to go back to that horrible place.'

Depression, anxiety, and -based on behaviours of certain ancestors – probably bipolar disorder run on both sides of my family. The Celtic Curse. I myself have been anxious since I can remember (age two) and depressive since I was age seven. I have had varying levels of post-natal depression. As child, teen, and young woman, the worst part of this situation was being made to feel as if my mental health were a character flaw, in addition to all the symptoms. I was supposed to just pull myself together, bootstrap myself into normalcy and get on with it. None of this was investigated or treated until I was in my 30s, and then, having no health care, I made do with St. Johnswort, the Bach remedies, and various homeopathics. To say that these were not enough to forestall deep recurring depressions, general and social anxiety and panic attacks would be a gross understatement. When I finally did have healthcare through a long-term job, the plan with the least expensive copays was still too expensive for me.

But late in 2013 I was reaching a breaking point eclipsing any I had previously experienced, due to job stress and multiple health issues. Without real investigation, because I scored very high on assessment forms, the D.O. Wrote a script for a low dose of Paxil and sent me off to a counsellor (not a psychiatrist) in the Psych department, who recommended a meditation class and participation in the anxiety group once a week for six weeks. My boss complained about this inconvenience of missing two hours a week, and the HR department did not allow the therapies to continue, as the counsellor recommended. The Paxil helped take the edge off, but I was in a downward spiral of job stress, ill-health, and a problematic landlady. Throughtout 2014, my physical health worsened and landed me in the ER. Not getting much help or understanding from various doctors, my boss or HR department, I felt it was quit or die. But this also meant losing my health insurance.

We moved to the woods, near my siblings, expecting that the quiet environment would help. But the financial scene was bad, and my physical and mental health continued to deteriorate, even taking pregnenolone, inositol and taurine. After a lot of run-around from temp and employment agencies, I began the application process for disability (for which I have three qualifying conditions), but that is a long road. High doses of inositol were only asbout as effective as Paxil had been, taking the edge off, and I was regularly freaking out, crying uncontrollably, having panic attacks, and barely able to drag myself around. 'Passive suicidal ideation' (just wishing to quietly die) was constant. I did have 'plans'. I have had 'plans' since I was in my late teens, none of which involving anything messy or illegal. My understanding is that all people with such ideation have thought the matter through. I have always figured that a suicide in the family is bad enough; it oughn't be ickily traumatic as well.

I went through the long process of getting Medi-Cal, but due to bureaucratic cock-ups at the state end of things, my appointment with my Primary Care Provider was delayed for six weeks. If I had been able to be seen when I was originally supposed to be after the paperwork was 'expedited', I would not be telling this story.

Evenings for me have always been the worst, and a few weeks ago when my fellow was out at his restaurant job, I felt myself crashing and it all closing in. I needed help. I needed talking down, someone to be there and tell me that it was going to be all right. So did what we are always enjoined to do and called the National Suicide Hotline. Much red tape and misunderstood answers later, I was connected with someone 'local' (100 miles away!), who insisted that as I 'had a plan' and had 'taken something' – which was not the case – he was calling the police and EMTs and having me admitted to the local ETS (Emergency Treatment Services), which happened to be in Riverside, 70 miles away. I had a panic attack because my fellow had no phone, no house keys with him, wouldn't know where I was, and who would take care of our pets? I begged him, no no no, and hung up, in the grip of the panic attack.

The local police, fire, and ambulance all came roaring into our quiet little neighbourhood, banging on the door, rushing in, taking over the house like a SWAT team, demanding answers from me like MI5 interrogators of an 'Irish terrorist' in the Bogside, until I was hysterical on top of it all. Great bedside manner, guys, with someone with anxiety. Just saying. My fellow luckily came home in the middle of this. The police deputy told him (and me) that I would be given meds and 'looked after in a nice quiet environment'. He believed this. I did not.

It took three hours to go the 70 miles, because I had to be 'taken into protective custody', wait for another ambulance, and then they drove 25 miles an hour down our mountain road via the longest route possible. When we arrived at the prison-like establishment, I thought, 'Well here it is. Welcome to the Snake Pit.'I thought of my poor great grandmother. I thought 'I will never leave.'

All possessions and human dignity were removed. I was shown a straight hard chair in the brightly-lit, small cold crowded room with psychotics, schizophrenics, the violent, as well as the 'merely' depressed. Blankets, when they arrived in dribs and drabs, were 'first come, first served.' After several hours a doctor escorted me over to a card table in the corner and asked me what happened and why the police were called. I told him. That was all, no discussion of circumstances, history of depression, prior meds. Certainly no nice quiet dim restful private room with kind nurses and helpful meds. I could not sleep, but sat in that chair for a couple more hours before a nurse came and took me into a private room to fill in the admittance paperwork – because it had not been done before. She said that I would be 'released soon' and did my fellow know to pick me up. A woman who had been sitting near me earlier told me how to get an outside line on the phone. She who was given whatever drugs she wanted every ten minutes, rattling off, 'I need this, I need that', while I was struggling with all my strength of shut down my mind and appear simply catatonic, which wasn't far wrong, having had no sleep. I was in the anxious 'tired-wired' state – exhausted but hyper-vigilant. I phoned my fellow, who came directly, and then had to sit out in the waiting area for five mortal hours before they got around to actually releasing me. The only 'help' they offered at discharge was the telephone number for the county mental health services office, which I could have got from the phone book or the internet.

Finally, finally, a week after the experience in the Snake Pit, I was able to see my doctor, who took a very thorough history and made thorough examinations. I was given Lexapro and Xanax, which do help, though I am often dopey and lethargic and after the first doses slept for 15 hours. The next day -joy- was the examination by the psychiatrist required by the state for disability; a truly kind and sympathetic lady, for which I am grateful.

This is the state of our mental health system, and the ability or inability of doctors of every description to pay proper attention. Those with mental illnesses are still ignored, undertreated, or if they do ask for help, treated like cattle or criminals.

There is a better way.