Questions from You

1)     Did you think of hurting an innocent person?

I did attempt to kill my dad. At that time, I was incapable of feeling love and sympathy. The illness turned me into a sociopath, literally. My nature and the basic elements of my humanity were taken away by my illness. I’d do anything to kill myself and because my parents were protecting me, I was about to kill them as well. This explains why we hear stories of mother killing their own children when they were depressed.

2)     What do you think of the school shootings in the U.S. perpetrated by people who are mentally ill?

I can’t understand their action, but I can definitely relate to their mentality. When a person is at the end of their rope, they’d feel jealous of people who are better off than they are. That’s why those shootings always take place in a school, they seldom happen in a nursing home. Secondly, killing one’s self is a huge commitment. It takes a lot of guts to do it. By committing a horrible crime, they basically leave themselves with no choice but to kill themselves, better yet, the police could do the job for them. Again, a mental illness can strip a person off their humanity. I don’t think all of them are pure evil, they are sick and they don’t believe that they are treatable. If gun control is not possible, then extensive levels of education on mental illness might be the solution to prevent more tragedies from happening.

Questions from You

Did you seek for professional help during your acute stage? And are they helpful?

I was seen by one social worker, one family doctor and two psychiatrists before my injury. They were not very helpful. The social worker and the family doctor were not specially trained in severe psychiatric conditions. Again, like everyone else they were trying to talk me out of my depression. I mean, can you talk someone out of their diabetes? They failed to understand that my condition is a medical problem. As to the two psychiatrists, one of them wrote me a note saying I am not mentally capable of completing my high school exams. The other psychiatrist prescribed me with anti-depressant and discharged me back to the community after 3 days I overdosed myself with sleeping pills. I felt like they could have explained to me what was really going on and gave me more assurance that this was a treatable condition. When the anti-depressant didn’t start working right away, I quickly lost faith on the meds, and lost faith on doctors as a whole thinking if they could not even help me, who could? I thought I would remain crazy for the rest of my life and that was my last straw. After my injury, I saw my Psychiatrist Dr. Mccullagh for the first time. He was my doctor for the next ten years. Right away, he was different from others. He was compassionate. Had I met someone like him prior to my injury, I wonder if it would have made the difference. I think a good doctor should have the heart of a parent, when they treat their patients as if they were their child, not only are they a good doctor, but they are a great human being.

Questions from You

If my love one is depressed and suicidal, what should I do for them? 
 

Take them to a psychiatric facility to prevent this person from hurting themselves and other people. I have heard so many stories of family members trying so hard to prevent their child from committing suicide. They take turns to watch the person to a point where everyone is extremely exhausted. At the end, they still could not prevent tragedies from happening. Lock a person up in a psychiatric facility is the safest place. All of those psychotropic medications take at least 3 weeks to feel the different, I don’t even mean “effective”, but it takes at least 3 weeks to kick in. During this important period, a person has to be monitored to prevent self-inflicted harm.

This might only apply to people living in countries where a psychiatric facility is an ideal place for rehabilitation. But in other less developed countries, this might not be the solution. I will write about that in another post.