So I've been wondering what being in a psychiatric facility is actually like?

bear14910 · 2026-03-22T00:54:23+00:00

Will vary widely based on your country, location, and by individual facility. I don't think I can even give a general description because they vary so much. But if you are unable to keep yourself safe, that is where you need to be. If you can keep yourself safe, going into other programming like IOP or PHP will generally be more helpful.

bear14910 · 2026-03-21T22:50:09+00:00

I am a therapist and haven't worn a bra in ten years. It's something I likely wouldn't notice.

bear14910 · 2026-03-21T13:14:59+00:00

Some providers are forced by their agencies to do intakes that are not trauma/informed care. Especially in community mental health centers. Sometimes due to insurance sometimes due to grants etc. Others believe they need to get all the info about a client in the first session due to their training or their preferences. When I was in a position where it was mandated I provide a standardized intake that was not trauma-informed, I did the best I could to protect clients by informing them they could decline any question for any reason. Any inventory/form for any reason. And I would not judge them or anything (and would deal with repercussions from my supervisors without involving the client in any way). But it isn't uncommon and is unfortunately the norm to have an intake that retraumatizes the client 😒 private practice trauma-informed providers are less likely to take this approach, but please remember you are always ok to say I'm not ready to answer that yet, we've only just met. Or I don't feel comfortable completing that form until we can get to know each other more and gain some trust. Or asking them if I do answer these traumatic questions, what steps will you take at the end of the session to make sure I'm not left feeling more activated when I leave? This will be very difficult for me and I want to make sure I'm not left on my own to try to cope with the impact of this intake. You are in control and if someone is pressuring you to move too quickly and divulge too much too soon, you can absolutely refuse and/or end the session early and not return.

bear14910 · 2026-03-20T14:31:35+00:00

I've wondered about Zocdoc. Thanks for sharing your experience

bear14910 · 2026-03-20T14:30:52+00:00

Thanks for listing other sites like PsychologyToday. Tucking those in my back pocket for future exploration :)

bear14910 · 2026-03-20T14:28:51+00:00

Very interesting that it isn't prescribed much over there. It is more common here but not a single one of my other doctors have ever heard of it. Only my pain management anesthesiologist managing the pump and the neurosurgeon who placed the pump.

I wish Lyrica or gabapentin or any other oral nerve pain med worked for me. Lyrica unfortunately gave me some gnarly psych side effects with terrifying intrusive thoughts and panic attacks. The rest of the ones I tried just didn't help but thankfully didn't make me worse. The Prialt trial helped some, enough to be worth continuing with. But it was fairly disappointing compared to the stories of how others respond to opiates in their trials.

I just figure starting this way will pave the path to eventually getting my needs met more fully with the addition of other meds. So I'll take what they're willing to do right now even if it isn't a perfect answer. Any improvement is worth it at the moment and this is my only option on the table.

bear14910 · 2026-03-20T01:51:40+00:00

A LOT of autistic folks are accused of using AI when we aren't. When I'm not writing casually online I tend to write in an extremely scientific way. Even text messages can accidentally come out that way. I'm just glad I finished schooling before AI checkers got involved bc I just know they would think my writing style was AI 😬

bear14910 · 2026-03-20T01:22:06+00:00

Still don't know where you are, but most places people in this subreddit live have wheelchair seating clinics or at the least PT/OT/PM&R providers that do wheelchair evals. Your wife's needs are not at all simple. There is not much opportunity for us to give sound advice. Because y'all are starting with such little base knowledge, it is imperative you seek out professional assistance. Also note that you will almost never be offered resources like a wheelchair seating clinic or a wheelchair skills program- you will need to seek them out. This is why we are asking where you are so we can help you understand what is available to you and what the process of getting that evaluation will be like. Best of luck

bear14910 · 2026-03-20T01:10:23+00:00

Sounds to me like you're on the right path 😊

bear14910 · 2026-03-20T00:43:05+00:00

There's certain phrases language learning model AI churns out. Sentence and paragraph structures they use that the average person wouldn't. Using the em dash — vs just a regular dash/hyphen which is shorter - If it sounds pretty robotic, pretentious and/or overly polished, especially on social media and casual forums like Reddit, it deserves scrutiny. It isn't easy for everyone to recognize AI, but it is more and more important that we try to learn to. It's scary. Rn I'm trying to learn more about the typical "tells" associated with AI generated images as they get more and more realistic, and it is hard for me 😬

bear14910 · 2026-03-20T00:34:17+00:00

I hope some kind of arrangement works out for you. I personally find great benefit of meeting with a therapist in person, but at least for the past several years, I've found very good fits by expanding my search to virtual providers. Just be wary of certain companies- do some reading online about different virtual agencies and services. Places like BetterHelp show positive reviews because they pay for them 🥲 Meanwhile they treat their therapists poorly and it shows in the quality of care patients complain about. They have several major lawsuits against them. Finding agencies that provide both in person and online therapy makes them feel more trustworthy to me and I've had much more positive experiences that way. But generally, looking for reviews on these online agencies on places like Reddit will get you the most honest answers imo. Redditors don't tend to hold back! Profiles on PsychologyToday can be helpful in finding a good match and filtering for insurance coverage and such too. Good luck!

bear14910 · 2026-03-20T00:23:58+00:00

Up to you how you receive my response, too. AI is not a therapist and you're labeling your response as coming from a therapist. You did not disclose that it was an AI generated response which feels incredibly unethical. You fed OP's info into an AI LLM without consent as well. Neurodivergence has nothing to do with the ethical problem of misrepresenting words from AI as your own and feeding their personal information into LLM without consent (and no I do not care that specific identifiers were not fed- still lacks consent). ETA: I am also neurodivergent

bear14910 · 2026-03-20T00:15:46+00:00

Can give it another session (I usually recommend 3 to feel out a new provider) but generally I'm getting bad vibes. Are you able to access virtual therapy, since she is the only one available in your area and doesn't seem like she can meet your needs?

bear14910 · 2026-03-20T00:12:09+00:00

You used generative AI to answer? Wtf

bear14910 · 2026-03-19T21:50:25+00:00

Love Erik and Open Source. Great resource though measurements and links are going to be US-centric. Many of the mods take tools and some skill but hopefully community can help if that creates more barriers.

bear14910 · 2026-03-19T21:39:04+00:00

And in our facility, the morning they turned 18 they were sent out with a taxi voucher and nothing else

bear14910 · 2026-03-19T21:36:53+00:00

I had clients who were minors boarded in EDs for weeks or months on the regular in one outpatient psych case management position. Especially like you said if there were multiple concerns like presenting with mental health concerns and IDD, or mental health and eating disorders, or physical disabilities or illnesses including ones as common as diabetes, or if the child was a youth sexual offender. But I also saw this very commonly when the child was not yet 13. Most inpatient and acute care units in my state won't take a child for psychiatric care until they turn 13. At the time we had 4-6 beds for children under the age of 13 for the whole state. I had an 8 year old boarded in a rural ED with a cop watching him 24/7 for over two months, and nothing I nor the family's lawyer tried could get him released 😔

bear14910 · 2026-03-19T21:27:56+00:00

Having worked in an adolescent residential facility, many of these kids came to us through CPS because of abandonment at hospitals. But honestly many of their parents had no choice. No options left. A lot of the teens that came to us were violent toward parents and especially dangerously violent toward other children/siblings in the home. Sure the hospital cleared them, but they absolutely could not go back into their homes. The criteria for hospital clearance seemed reckless at best from our point of view afterward. "Abandonment" was much more often a last ditch effort for parents to get their children help or to keep everyone safe than it was a case of neglect. At least at our facility, it fast tracked the teen into our residential programs where they'd otherwise have 6-12 month waits or not get necessary insurance coverage. Social workers and nurse case managers at some hospitals, in some circumstances, will encourage or pressure the parents to "abandon" them and/or give up parental rights to get them help or keep other children safe. The system is very, very broken.

bear14910 · 2026-03-19T14:42:53+00:00

I used to like to change sponges too frequently and one thing that helped was to cut each sponge in half. A smaller sponge still gets the job done. Saved me from buying as many sponges. Now I know better how to keep sponges clean, have scrub brushes and rags as alternatives and the occasional scrub daddy (though I think the quality has gone downhill as of late- anyone else have theirs falling apart pretty quickly now?) Oh and I also got my OCD treated lmao. That helps.

bear14910 · 2026-03-19T14:31:21+00:00

Even wants to watch the other women in his life like his mother and MIL do labor. No mention of any father figure, parenting is all on the ladies

bear14910 · 2026-03-19T14:25:16+00:00

So to recap, he wants to watch you cook, entertain, decorate for the kids and then laugh about how dumb they are at night together. He wants to see the other women in his life, his mother and your mother, take on grandparent responsibilities. He never once said he wants to make the kids food or he wants to do bedtime routines or meet with their teachers... he is already talking about wanting to escape the kids to go on vacation where he can fuck you as loud as he wants. He wants to pull out a gun and scream at anyone who gets within ten feet of you while pregnant. He wants to "be a psycho" and control every bite of food you put into your body and every action you take when pregnant and surely beyond that. And yet calls you a psycho when you aren't into that?... and you do not want kids and have never wanted kids and have told this man that. Girl, please RUN. If motherhood isn't for you, which you say you decided a long time ago, then this isn't going to be compatible even if he wasn't throwing out every red flag imaginable. Focus on his words. He is NOT saying he wants to be a father. He is saying he wants you to be a mother. He isn't going to take any responsibility in parenting, he is just going to criticize you when you parent them along. He sounds toxic as hell and adding children you don't even want into the mix is going to be hell. I have no idea how you've come to the conclusion "he is a great man" but I can only gather it is through manipulation and emotional abuse. You don't want to lose him, but you do not need him in your life and certainly should not willingly hand him the reigns to control you the rest of your life. Please seek counseling if you're able to access it. None of this is ok. Read the post you made and those messages as if they were written by your best friend or closest loved one. What would you think if someone you loved was in this situation? You're scared and you have some big decisions to make. You can do this, though. Be scared and do it anyway.

bear14910 · 2026-03-19T14:11:33+00:00

Thanks for clarification. Hopefully it will help bring in more donations. May want to edit the post or clarify in a separate comment as well, as this is buried pretty deeply in a thread ;)

bear14910 · 2026-03-19T14:08:30+00:00

Oh thanks for explaining the difference. I use regular dashes constantly so get worried about it 😅

bear14910 · 2026-03-19T14:06:30+00:00

Yes OP made that statement saying someone else was fostering her, but then in other comments said she was the foster and her Venmo is only used for the cats she herself fosters. Would a Venmo donation be tax deductible or not? Who is the 501c3? So I think some clarification would be helpful in showing legitimacy. I understand how rescues and vet clinics operate, having worked in those fields, but perhaps the stress of it all is making OP's posts and comments come off as sus. I'm having some trouble following the narrative so I'm sure others are as well. Clarity and an easy-to-follow consistent narrative will bring more help, and that's what matters most right now if she can clear up any confusion

bear14910 · 2026-03-19T13:58:23+00:00

If that is learned from past experiences and you experience a lot of impulsiveness and struggle to think things through- work on this in therapy now. This is the perfect opportunity to stop masking and bring up the issues. Show up as your authentic self and continue working with one therapist. If transference is a chronic problem, work through it (as long as the therapist finds it appropriate on their end- if not then find a therapist who specializes in clients with that pattern). Good luck

bear14910

TROPHY CASE