hello all,

This man has lost a great deal of faith in the psychiatric profession and I would like to ask if people could venture an opinion on the diagnosis for the following descriptee.

He is 54, single, lives in London UK. At 2 he nearly died in a choking accident, though he never forgot a strange calm that had overcome him. He was very withdrawn, bullied at school and sought refuge in a fantasy world.

Alcohol at sixteen arrived like a saviour. At 21 cannabis, lsd, amphetamines, downers, and heroin followed in hot pursuit. He survived some heavy voilence and once had an nde with what seemed an obe. At 30 in rehab, he told them eveything and they said he was an addict so he prayed to jesus, sought the way, and felt suicidal. He saw a shopping mall full of psychiatrists, counsellors, healers and embalmers not to mention various encounter groups and soothsyaers. He has been on various tonics prescribed by his psych hospital for manic depression.

At 37 he returned to smoking cannabis which he believes is a medicine. At 38 he returned to rehab to make sure. At 39 he returned to cannabis where he remains to this day. He lives alone, and rides a bike to avoid people as much as possible. Is currently seeking employment as a hermit.

many thanks for any comments

Hello PJ, welcome to the forum. I can completely understand your thoughts, I guess I just picked up on these things pretty quickly and changed my own path. You cannot heal trauma by being supported only, you cannot heal trauma through medication, self medication, religion, or any other method in which requires little to no hard work on your behalf. Only one person can heal your trauma, being you.

How? A person just can't wakeup and decide to heal trauma, because they often don't even know what they are looking for or where to begin. The simple facts are; education is key. The more you educate yourself, the more you ask to have something explained in a way you understand it, the more you learn, means then you are armed with the knowledge to help yourself if you want too, because still nobody else can do it for you, nor does any magical method exist to do the work for you.

Plain and simple... you have to do the work, you simply need to be guided in the right direction and supported when it really hits home with you.

Welcome aboard, and look forward to chatting more with you.

welcome to the forum, pj

Hell I saw this post and jumped on it! The title is totally something I can talk about for hours, and hours. I am disgusted with the psychiatric mental health system in the UK, and have a lot of views on this!

Your history stands out as someone who clearly has used extreme escape methods for so long, and though I have not touched heroin, I can relate to using drugs to get through. Confronting truma is so hard at times, but eventually I believe you do start seeing the positive difference. Support is paramount to me, and will help either way, it's good that you are here!

Take care,

Lisa.

Hi, I agree that cannibas is much better than any of the crap that psychiatrist dole out so they can get free trips for their vacations form drug reps. I am very bitter about "professionals" at this point. I have never done any serious (heroin, coke) drugs, but I have cut and burnt myself rather than feel the internal pain of having suffered abuse at the hands of "trusted" adults when I was a child and on into my young adulthood. I wish you the best. I live in a cave emotionally.