The place was great and some people were kind, but certain staff really bummed me out. It felt more like I was getting help from other patients— who were supposed to be getting help from the staff too but weren’t— rather than the people who were actually supposed to be helping like the doctors, nurses, counselors, and techs. Sometimes I felt misunderstood and got treated like a toddler— which I never acted like one either— and the work felt like going back to kindergarten instead of getting actual help. Before I came there, I’ll admit I definitely had issues but I would never get angry, just sad. Yet, when I was there and after I left, anger was the biggest thing I felt. I hated it. And not just any anger, the kind of anger where you wanna scream and punch the wall, which I’ve never wanted to do or even thought of doing before. I felt like the family sessions didn’t help much and neither did the normal sessions. Don’t get me wrong, Ms Alyssa was nice, it just wasn’t helping me. Also, whenever I’d cry I felt like I was getting punished for doing so. Like, getting extra days was a possibility if you cried because you weren’t “using coping skills”— but i feel like that just made me want to hold in everything more because I didn’t want extra days and I hated the way staff made me feel when I cried— except for one nurse. She was really nice, I just forgot her name unfortunately. She’s a night nurse. Also, Mr Kyle was a very nice person to talk to, too. I really hated nap time and whenever we’d go to sleep at night because the lights in the hallway were on and I’d always have to listen to people in the hall talking. The bed situation was rough, beds were super uncomfortable. The only time I had a comfortable bed was my last night there and it was because I finally got moved onto the girls hall instead of being on the boys hall. The shampoo made my scalp dry out and my hair started thinning again, but I started waiting days between hair wash or would just use the conditioner, which kind of worked. I am picky eater so I can’t really comment on the food, but sometimes it would be good. Also, they said there weren’t many fights there but there was an actual physical fight in my group while I was there and multiple verbal fights. There was a lot of drama, too, which was terrible. Also, since I’ve gotten out, I’ve felt so much worse than before. The thoughts got worse, not better. Very bad. Plus, my medicine makes me not feel hungry so now I’ve stopped eating as much because I genuinely don’t feel hungry, which I hate. Also, we had to do everything with markers, and they’d dry out. Some techs would be like “oh, yall always make them dry out.” When that’s literally the only thing we can use AND it’s also because they’re cheap, so what do you expect? So, overall, the place means well, but it mostly just made me worse, so, uhm, yeah. :)
