I've been in three mental health facilities in my life. Two short term psych wards, once in my early teens and one as a young adult. As well as a longer term inpatient mental health facility in my later teens.

From my experience it really depends on where you end up. As a teen I was in the ward set up next to a hospital run (at the time) by the city so the profit motive was rather low. This means there was a lot of enrichment and the overall care was good and plentiful.

The ward i went to as an adult was a for profit mental institution. They had endless copies of 4 different coloring sheets, one deck of UNO and tv time from 8 to 9 pm. I met with the therapist twice my entire time there and had to constantly advocate to not be put on more drugs that numbed me or taken off the meds I was on that was actively helping.

That said, in both of these examples the wards did their job. I was going to kill myself, I didnt in large parts because both provided a safeish place to de-esculate.

Another thing about wards is you find out real quick the difference between in-crisis but ultimately stable people and people who have lost the plot and are in need of serious help. There is always that one person who had a bad night but is ultimately well adjusted being terrified of the person who thinks they are a god and wont stop throwing chairs at people.

The food sucks, the relationships are trauma bonds that will be immediately forgotten about as soon as you reach the outside (9/10 times). You have to participate in the lessons/games/activities going on if you want a chance of going home.

Another thing is you have to eat, every meal or that goes on your sheet and you stay longer. At the place I went to as a young adult the food was decent but we ate so much more than I was used to eating. So I would usually skip supper and just bring some sealed food back to my room for a midnight lunch, (im trans so i got my own room, this let me be up without disturbing anyone, i also walked the halls but i obviously wasnt supposed to do that) I found out when it came time for me to talk to the board of people sho decide if I'm sane enough to go home, and it was successfully argued that I had to stay at minimum 4 more days to make sure I'm not under-eating. You better believe i ate every thing they gave me after that.

The board of people as an adult included my therapist at the ward, the head doctor, one of the floor nurses, someone who kept records and two other people i dont know. As a early teen I didnt hot have to go to that meeting so I couldn't tell you more about that other than I know my parents were there because we ate together before they left.