I think when I was 13 I got put into a children’s home, for my own safety, because my Mum had battered me unconscious. And after going from hostel to a children’s home and I was there for about nine months before they returned me back to the family home. But if during that time I’d had some form of, I don’t know, would it have been a talking therapy, or counselling or would it have been I did see a psychologist who thought that I was an ordinary 13 year old with ordinary 13 year-old worries. And maybe that’s how I did come across but I think if they probed a wee bit deeper, it would have been more apparent what was wrong and I think it would have saved a lot of what happened then to me, you know, in later years, but can I sort of go on what ifs and if what’s? You know, so but I do think, for children’s services, you need to be on the ball and you need to, because if we can stop a lot of, or in my opinion we can stop a lot of illnesses escalating at a later date if a child is treated rather than letting it just build and build. It kind of feels sometimes as if I fell through the cracks a bit, because there was obviously services involved with me as a child and you know when I was in a children’s centre and things, children’s home. But yes, I kind of feel that I kind of got lost a bit.

I did go through a lot of counselling a couple of years after ECT treatment. And that really helped, but I think it was because the depression had become better, so I was able to speak more openly and I was able to grasp what people were saying to me in the counselling sessions. You know, where with my first admission here would have been no point in trying to put me through counselling. Seeing as I didn’t know what time it was, let alone trying to take in what people were saying. I did na have the concentration. But ECT was definitely the first step to me being able to recover.

I would say, you know, for people who are very, very poorly, who are very, very ill, as a last resort It’s worth, it’s worth doing. I do think it should be left as the last resort. And it is horrendous to go through. But I do think that if I hadn’t gone through ECT I don’t think I would be alive today, because I think that I would have gone on to commit suicide. Most definitely. I don’t really know what else to say.

I think it’s a good option if you’ve tried everything else. But it’s horrendous so use it as a last resort, but it does work. It definitely worked for me. I wouldn’t want it to replace other things, other therapies or medications or things, I wouldn’t want it to be a first option. But if you’ve been through everything like what I was, It’s definitely worth considering. It’s definitely worth going, as horrendous as it is, it’s definitely worth going through it.

How many admissions have you had?

Oh I don’t know. I’ve lost count

You’ve lost count?

I don’t know. I don’t even know if it’s 20, 30, 40. It could be anything. My last admission was two and a half years ago. And then before that the last admission previous to that was ten years. So I’d gone quite a bit of time, which I think was when the doctors changed my medication and it kinda knocked me back. But you know, these things happen. I’ve got a new psychiatrist and the first thing I said to her was, Do not change my medication. She said, It’s okay I won’t if you don’t want me to. That was fine, you know. Yes.

I kept running away from the hospital, because now I just knew that this treatment sounded horrific and I didn’t have, I did na want anything to do with it.

So then eventually they got a Court Order to say that they could give me treatment. My Mum had to sign papers to say that we could, that I could receive the treatment as well. Which I didn’t like because the relationship had broken down with my Mum, so in my eyes she shouldn’t have had any say in what my treatment was, or wasn’t going to be. Which was why I’m really glad now that named persons are available, because if I had, if I had to go through that again, it would have been a family that I was staying with at the time that would have made the decision for me, because they were people at the time that I trusted. And for a long time I felt that ECT was something that my Mum did to me, because we were nae getting on.

Personally I just think that my mind had to shut down because it had to, sort of, almost self-preservation. So then it was decided that they would try a treatment called ECT and they did, from what I can remember, because I was so ill at the time that I don’t know if this is a truly accurate account, but it’s what I remember as happening.

Is that a nurse sat down with me, and told me that I was going to receive this treatment, because I was very poorly. They asked me, they went over what would happen to me during the treatment. That I would be taken along to a room. I would have an anaesthetic and then I would waken up and I would no know anything. And that was basically how it was put to me.

I asked what ECT stood for. And they said Electroconvulsive Therapy and I ask why was electro side in it, and they said, Oh because we give electric shocks to your brain. But at 18 years old it was really, I just really did not want that, and I did rebel. I kept running away from the hospital, because now I just knew that this treatment sounded horrific and I didn’t have, I did na want anything to do with it.

So then eventually they got a Court Order to say that they could give me treatment. My Mum had to sign papers to say that we could, that I could receive the treatment as well. Which I didn’t like because the relationship had broken down with my Mum, so in my eyes she shouldn’t have had any say in what my treatment was, or wasn’t going to be. Which was why I’m really glad now that named persons are available, because if I had, if I had to go through that again, it would have been a family that I was staying with at the time that would have made the decision for me, because they were people at the time that I trusted. And for a long time I felt that ECT was something that my Mum did to me, because we were nae getting on.

But yes, so they applied to the Courts and it was decided that I would have ECT and I was put in a locked ward because I kept running off. And I just remember being really, really frightened, just petrified. Being wheeled, they made you sit in a wheelchair for some reason to take you into a room, being wheeled down to this room and just being, yes, absolutely petrified that I didn’t understand what was going to happen. I knew the basics that I was going to get an anaesthetic and I wouldn’t really remember much about it. Or I wouldn’t remember anything about it, but I would probably have a really sore head afterwards. But I didn’t understand how it would work. You know, I couldn’t understand well you’ve tried all the medication, you’ve tried all the talking therapies and things, and none of that’s worked, so why is this going to be any different. And I thought I’m going to go through all this, and I’m still not going to feel any better, because mentally I just couldn’t ney figure out why putting an electric shock through my brain was going to make me feel better.

They kept assuring me that I would feel better but I wasn’t convinced. And I remember going through treatment being absolutely petrified and, I remember being put to bed after treatment and I remember having a really, really bad headache.
What happened at [name of hospital] was that after your treatment you were wheeled back through a ward in front of everybody, after your treatment, but you would come in and you’d may be, be drooling, or you’d be I suppose you kind of looked as if somebody who had had a stroke or something and the knock on effect was that it really affected the other patients. So much so that one of the boys that I’d met there, he was actually a soldier who had been in the first Gulf, that he totally flipped out and thought that they’d harmed me somehow.

The headaches were like something that I’ve experienced, sort of before or since. It’s completely indescribable. The headaches that I had afterwards. I do think that ECT is given that there should be a way of getting the patient back into bed without have to trail them through in front of everybody. Because everybody is in hospital because they’re ill and it becomes really frightening for them, and it may be that one of these patients that are witnessing somebody coming back are going to need that treatment which is going to make it even scarier for them.

And it’s really good that you had these supportive interactions now and you trust your friends and your husband and your daughter and so on. Has that always been the case when you’ve talked about either mental health issues or ECT or?

[shakes head] No, a lot of people get really, really frightened, but its people that don’t understand. You know, some doctors don’t even understand. You know, so these, you know, if doctors are medically trained how’s Joe Bloggs in the street going to fully understand what mental health is? In fact everybody has mental health. It just depend on whether It’s good mental health or bad mental health, but hopefully stigma, the barriers will be broken down, but I do feel that theres a lot employers need to do to help support staff. But it’s like everything in life you get good and you get bad, you know, so, but I’ve had some really bad experiences of manager who have almost treated me like a leper and then they’re realised. I’ve left jobs, not because I don’t like the job but because I couldn’t cope with how colleagues treated me. But I suppose I’m quite an open person and if somebody asks then I will say, you know, because I don’t think theres anything to be embarrassed about, but just there is a fear, you know, theres a fear, theres a fear.

Yes, I’ve seen quite a few psychiatrists over the years. Personally I get on better if the psychiatrist is female. But that’s just because of the history that I’ve got. But the psychiatrist that I’ve got now is very encouraging and she doesn’t clock watch, you know, and that means a lot, because theres nothing worse than you know, I’ve had psychiatrists saying and I would have started to open up a bit and right that’s your time, you know, and you’re like I’m not going to see you for another two months. You know, but yes. If they do ney talk much, I mean I know that they’ve got lots of patients and they have to go through each day, but they’ve got time slots and you do try as a patient to keep it within, but if you were to overrun by five minutes it’s fine and you can do it, you know, with her and shell not check it.

And you were saying that when you were so young you didn’t really know about mental health or?

No.

.anything at all. And you said that it was other people around you who were noticing that there was something wrong.

Yes.

What was, sort of, happening at that time, what you know, looking back now, what was going on?

I suppose, you know, I was living with a family who, I thought they were very, very good to me. They weren’t my own family but my, I had a really good friend at the time and I’d be saying things to her that were really bizarre and was saying things like I thought that somebody was trying to poison me. Saying things like, that I’d been on holiday to maybe a America’ or where and I’d already seen her a day previous, you know, so there was no way, you know, it was just completely like, the things I was saying doing were out of character, but completely unbelievable at the same time. So but I do think that I built up a reality for myself, that I could cope with that at that time. But yes, it was just, it was quite bizarre, and I was get, I would get annoyed with people that they weren’t believing what I was saying and you know, becoming really quite frustrated and then realised that I was just very, very ill.

I’d grown up, when I was young, my Mum’s an alcoholic and she was drinking alcoholically like, so I took on a lot of responsibility with myself and my sister trying to, trying to be Mum I suppose to my younger sister and there was a lot of abuse within the relationship that I had to try and cope with. Which I think probably, well very much definitely resulted in the first breakdown that I had.

As I say it was when I was 18. I didn’t have, I didn’t realise that I was ill. I’d never heard of mental health before, and you know, it was twenty years ago, so things were different then. And I remember being with a family that I was living with at that time, and going to my bed and I’d taken an overdose and I was serious, that was it, I just didn’t want to be waking up in the morning.

I had taken 20 tablets and I’d woken up in the morning and gone to work with what I can only describe as a Mother of hangovers. As soon as my supervisor had seen me she knew something was wrong and I got put into a like hospital.

A mental health team quickly became involved, and a psychiatrist came to see me and asked if I wanted to go to [Name of hospital] for a weekend’s assessment. So I agreed, not knowing what [Name of hospital] was. I thought they were sending me to a spa or somewhere for a rest [laughs]. How wrong I was [laughs].

I think my diagnosis just now more than of a personality disorder and chronic post-traumatic stress. I have had a few diagnoses over the years, and the first original one was severe clinical depression. But these words did na mean anything to me then, you know, they were just, whether it was because I was so ill, or I wasn’t able to it in, or just because I wasn’t familiar with the terms. I don’t know.

Nowadays I’m more clued up, but I don’t think I would be clued up if I hadn’t gone through it. I think I would have still been one of these people that you know, just didn’t understand. So it makes me glad I’ve gone through it, because it makes me more tolerant of people. It makes me understand how people work better but my current diagnosis is chronic post-traumatic stress.

Nowadays I still get ill if I’m not careful about what I’m doing. If I work too hard, too many hours, get too stressed. Then I can become quite ill, quite quickly, but I have an amazing support network around me now. Which I didn’t have years ago.

My husband, he reads me very well and he knows before I do that I’m becoming ill. My daughter whose 18 can read me very well. And I’ve got the Haven, like a drop in where the staff have known me since 1993, so they know, you know, they see me most days and they know when I’m becoming ill and are able to say to me, you know, I think that you should may be slow down in your work or I think that you’re becoming stressed and I trust the staff, the same as I trust my husband, and my daughter, because I don’t always see signs, and I’m usually quite poorly before I realise I’m poorly.