I am a 20 year old woman who has been diagnosed with dissociatibe fugue/prolonged fugue states, and hallucinations. As part of this, I struggle with extremely intense delusions. Sometimes it feels like im in psychosis.
This started on the 18th April this year, as part of my functional neurological disorder. As much as I know it is caused by long term trauma, to this day I still feel like I don’t know why it started, why it happened to me, and why my life ended up torn into pieces and still has yet to be recovered.
The first time it happened it lasted for 4 hours. My guardian phoned our local psych centre that I was under, who said they were of no help and couldn’t offer any support. I, a 20 year old woman, fully believed it was 2019 and I was 15 years old. As time went on, this regressed back in years again and again throughout the four hours it happened for. We went up to a&e, where I was seen by no one aside form triage. When my memory came back, I asked someone what to do and was advised to go back home. No question of why it happened, just “go back home”. Looking back, I don’t have a clue why I didn’t stay – probably because I was in shock and stupidly trusted the healthcare system.
The second time happened the next day, with my friend who had travelled near 100 miles to come see me. It lasted 5 hours this time and an ambulance was phoned for me. It did not turn up. People had to body block me from running out of the house at 2am, believing I was in foster care and 11 years old. For me, I couldn’t think of another reason as to why I wasn’t with my mum, and I was with these strange people instead. It was heartbreaking.
I feel the need to clarify – when this happens, I have no idea who anyone is. Not my boyfriend, not my guardian who I lived with for over 2 years, not my best friend of 6 years. I am terrified, aggressive, and a nightmare. When I come round, I am scared to find out what I may have done this time.
I cant tell you how many times this has happened since the 18th of April this year. But what I can tell you, is the impact of it. The struggle of it. The pain of begging anyone and everyone for help and being ignored by all of them.
On the 22nd of April, I travelled 84 miles to a neuro clinic for some help. They sent me to their a&e to see the mental health team. After waiting 11 hours and fighting for my first and only CT scan, I finally saw them. I explained everything, I showed them videos, the whole works. They disappeared for a while, then returned only to tell me they couldn’t help and to go home.
I broke. The dam broke and crashed and burned. I was there with my guardian and her then 15 year old autistic daughter, and yet I burst into tears, screaming and crying. I truly did beg for their help, to be sectioned, anything. I was so incredibly desperate but they refused.
That was a moment for me – a specific one – where my heart broke and part of me died. The trust, not tat there ever was much, I had left in the system died. I couldn’t understand why on earth I could be left alone to deal with such an awful and scary thing happening to me and my family. People and workers at the hospital had seen me running round like a crazy person believing I was 12. But did they care? No. No they did not.
It took me a week to ask for help after that, because I had lost all faith. And things like this kept happening, everyone dismissed me. I made myself everybody’s problem; I made sure everyone knew what was happening to me, but every single person in the healthcare system dismissed me, as if it wasn’t their problem, as if it was a normal, everyday thing.
My poor guardian, bless her heart, saved me from suicide many times. I was so close to ending it all because I couldn’t handle the pain and guilt anymore. The guilt of taking over everyone’s lives whilst losing my own was too much to handle, and I didn’t want to bear it anymore.
I have lost so much. Since it all began, I haven’t lived in my own flat. I haven’t been able to live a life. I have spent months sleeping and living on someone else’s floor. I miss my life. It was stolen from me, and no one in the system cared.
How anyone with a heart can discard a patient struggling so intensely will never make sense to me. And I will never forgive them for it.
There will probably be multiple entries regarding this topic, because boy I have so much. But this is it for now.
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