A snapshot of psychosis

In October 2017 I was admitted into a women’s psychiatric ward in East London a couple of months after the birth of my son. I had become overwhelmed by thoughts of suicide and was barely able to speak to anyone. My mother and partner took me to A&E where I was then referred to this ward. My belief is that the deep fear I felt after being suddenly admitted onto a busy and fairly hostile ward, combined with my depressed state, were the reason that I became psychotic.

The word psychotic has particular connotations. For me, I would imagine someone raving, shouting incoherently, perhaps acting aggressively. A common feature of psychosis is powerful delusions and even hallucinations. In my case, I was extremely anxious and consumed by very troubling thoughts. I have tried to write down what these thoughts were. At the time they were unending, felt very real and, and that time, no one could convince me that my beliefs were mistaken. Here is what was going through my mind.

-I am disgusting
- I am a selfish person
- I am arrogant and deserve what is happening to me
- I want to die
- My baby will become unwell, be neglected, and die
- It would be better for everyone if me and my baby died
- I have been sectioned — section 2 will lapse into section 3 and I will never leave hospital
- I am not meant to be on this hospital ward. I came in through A&E and wasting NHS resources is a criminal offense
- I am going to be woken from my hospital bed and arrested by police
- The nurses know this and are watching me until the police can come
- I am going to prison
- I will never see the inside of my flat again
- There is no point in eating, drinking or washing. If I don’t do these things perhaps I will die
- I may be attacked or abused by other patients in the ward for using the bathroom or the laundry room when they need to use it
- If I don’t drink I will get a urinary infection and hopefully it will be bad enough to kill me
- My partner’s sister and mother hate me and I deserve it
- I do not believe my sister, boyfriend, parents, that the hospital staff are trying to help me
- I will never see my family again

These thoughts were so powerful. I couldn’t answer the hospital staff honestly because I thought I would be caught out. I felt like a fraud. Often I remained silent, or said what I thought they wanted to hear. I felt like I was there to be punished and never did it occur to me and that anyone had good intentions towards me or that I could be helped by mental health services.

The reality was that I was a suicidal new mother, admitted to a general psychiatric ward for the first time, and unable to communicate properly. Not once did a member of staff tell me that I had done the right thing coming to hospital and that they would support me to try and get better. Not once did someone say that I had all the signs of severe post natal depression, and that it wasn’t my fault. In fact, several members of staff were hostile and slightly aggressive towards or contemptuous of the patients at times. I believe that the initial standard of care I received on this ward was very poor, and the trauma that this caused me set in train a period of mental ill health that lasted over a year. Handled differently I might have recovered more quickly and certainly avoided becoming psychotic.