I started to see a therapist when I was 17 years old that was near the valley youth house shelter. I saw my therapist once a week and I had a psychiatrist too. It was very hard to understand the psychiatrist and he was diagnosing me with ADHD, Major Depressive Disorder, and Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) . He put me on a SSRI and an ADHD medication at that time. I continue seeing my therapist and she was amazing! She helped me through so much hardships in my life and I could rely on her.
My Very First mental health hospitalization was when I was 17 years old from a suicide note that I wrote….
I had a notebook were I wrote everything down that was happening in my life. Usually when I go to see my therapist, she would read my journal and we would talk about what I wrote in my journal. I wrote a suicide note and ripped it out of my journal and I folded it on another part of the notebook. I forgot about that note and when I was with my therapist, she opened my notebook and the note came out of the notebook. She asked me what that was and I told her it was nothing and I got up from my seat to grab the note and she grab it first off the floor. She read the note and realized I had a date and time when I was going to commit suicide and what I was going to do. I also was saying goodbye to everyone and my therapist got very worried. She said if I wanted to walk with her to the crisis part of the hospital that was next to my therapist place. I was so scared and I didn’t know what was happening and she called my foster mother and told her what was happening. My foster mother told my therapist that she will meet her at the hospital and my therapist and I walked to the hospital.
Once we arrived at the Doylestown Hospital, my therapist told the front desk person what was happening and the front desk person unlocked the door and let us into the crisis center of the hospital. My therapist continued to stay with me and one of the crisis people came to talk to her. My therapist told her what was happening and showed her my note that I wrote. The crisis caseworker asked my therapist to follow her and they left the room for a bit. While I was in the waiting room, my foster mother and father came into the room. My foster mother asked me what was happening and I started to cry and told her I didn’t know. Then my therapist walked back into the waiting room and she told my foster parents what was happening. My foster mother told her that they were going to stay with me and support me. My therapist was happy with that answer and she said take “care Brionna, I hope you feel better.” The crisis casewoker asked me to follow her and we went into a white wall room that had a round table and two chairs at it. She ask me to sit and she asked me what was going on with me.
I told her about my caseworker from children and youth and how I wasn’t allowed to interact with my family and friends and I wanted to die because all this is reminding me of my past of what my biological family was doing to me when I lived with them. The crisis caseworker wrote everything down and she called my foster parents into the room. The caseworker told them that I had to get hospitalized and a shock look went onto my foster father’s face. My foster mother was asking her where was I going and the caseworker said that Horsham Clinic had spaces open and I could walk into that hospital and get admitted. My foster mother asked if I could go home with her and I could pack up my things for the hospital and they would take me to the hospital. The crisis worker was edgy on that idea and she then said she will trust my foster parents to take me to the hospital. So, my foster parents took me back to their house and I started to pack up clothes and my personal hygiene things. I didn’t know what to bring because I was never at a mental hospital before and I didn’t know what to expect.
After I was packed up, my foster father took me to Horsham clinic and I was so scared, I didn’t know what to expect from a mental hospital and I thought it was like what I saw in the movies I’ve watched. Once we arrived to Horsham clinic, We were in a taken to another room with security guards there. They told me to put my things into a safe and they checked to make sure I didn’t had anything else on me. They use a wand to make sure there wasn’t weapons on me and they told my foster father to put his keys in a basket and they wand him too. Then they took my weight and blood pressure and they took us to another room which I guess was the waiting room. There were toys in there and a TV and my foster father and I watched some TV as we were waiting for our next steps of me being admitted. It took them like an hour for me to sign myself into the hospital. I was so anxious and I just wanted to go back to my foster home. After a long wait, they told me that I was going to Adolescent 3 unit of the hospital, and my foster dad said okay and he got up and left. A nurse came from the unit and grab my things and took me to my unit.