I've struggled with anxiety ever since middle school and I feel like over the past years (im 24 now) it's gotten extremely worse. I find it hard just to go outside and get lunch or try and do something social with my friends. I've been having panic attacks more frequently also. Most of the time if I try and go do something simple like buy groceries or go buy a new shirt somewhere I end up crying in my car because I'm just struck with fear. My Dr. gave me anti-depressants because she didn't want me to become addicted to anti-anxiety pills. I feel like my life i just caving in and I don't know what to do. I wouldn't say I'm suicidal but if something doesn't improve I feel like I might head that way. My close friend suggested that I commit myself into a mental hospital so I can have a little time off to just clear my head and get the help/meds I might need.

I have a few questions for anyone who might know or have first hand experience. How is it paid for? Does my insurance pay? How long am I able to stay? If I want to stay longer am I allowed or is there a time limit?

If anyone could answer this it would be very helpful thank you.

Your doctor, quite frankly, sounds terrible. I get she doesn't want you hooked on pills... but what do YOU want? A good doctor presents you with the options, gives you the facts and lets you make your own decisions like an adult.

If you have generalized anxiety disorder, you should NOT have been given anti-depressants (unless the pills were SSRIs).

Do you find the pills help?
If they don't help, you should speak with your doctor and stop taking them. They may just make things worse. It's unfortunate, but there are a large number of pills that do different things out there; some might work, some might not.

Have you tried behavioural cognitive therapy? I actually just started BCT for my own (and much more mild) anxiety problems. My second session is in a few days and I'm anxious to see if it helps.

Maybe you don't need medication at all? The difficulty is, when they give you medication they're ASSUMING what's causing your anxiety is a chemical imbalance in your brain. And there are a number of chemicals that can be imbalanced that can cause anxiety. Maybe it's not just one, but several? Maybe it's just one, but your pills aren't targeting that chemical?

Besides that, I don't actually know much about mental institutions. I wager the rules largely depend on what country your in, and what centre you're trying to check into.

Working on the ambulance I've taken quite a lot of people to be hospitalised in mental insitutions, free willed or under police supervision but I'm European so I don't have much idea about how it works for the US with insurance etc. I suggest the best source is either talking to your doctor or possibly even better calling the insitution you want to check in yourself so you can make sure.
Generally though, I don't think they can forcefully throw you out of a mental insitution if you insist on staying because you don't feel ready to leave yet.

Also, keep talking to your friend about this if you want to go through with it so you have another person putting in a bit of pressure to motivate you.

I can't be of much help as myself I maybe need hospitalization too, all I can say don't give up OP.
Having a mental illness myself I know how hard it is to get into a point when things starts to be manageable.
If you think your pill doesn't work, tell your psychiatrist / doctor about it as it may not be the right medication.

I also encourage this thread as I also want to know what mental ward are like myself.
Don't give up OP :)

Thanks for all the help! I'm not sure if the meds are SSRI I'll be sure to ask her at my next visit. I've never heard of BCT but I'll look into it as soon as I can.

I've been an inpatient in the mental ward of a hospital as an adult, and also have an experience with the youth version as a kid. As somebody who strongly encourages the benefits of seeing psychologists and psychiatrists, I will say based off my own mental hospital experience do NOT go if you can help it.

I committed myself when I was 22 (I'm 24 now) and was right on the verge of suicide and such. I drove myself to the "behavioral health services" wing of a hospital, and realized fairly quickly that it was completely the wrong environment for me. Besides the fact that there was a schizophrenic lady who either thought I was her son or thought I murdered her son, it was a giant waste of money, time, and now I can't legally purchase a firearm.

For one thing, 99.9% of it is waiting around with only mentally unhealthy people to talk with. You couldn't bring any outside items in, so no phones, computers, books, or anything that halfway resembles a kill-tool. On any given day I met with the psychiatrist for half and hour, had an hour or so "activity," and sometimes had a big group meeting for another hour. The other 21 hours you are on your own, with only the voices in your head to provide a diversion. When I complained about this, the nurse handed me a book about bi-polar and said "read about your illness." I spent 7 days in the hospital, and before insurance the bill was $15,000. I could have checked the book out at a local library and kept seeing my same psychiatrist and saved myself enough money to buy a car.

I was a pack-a-day smoker, and they wouldn't let me smoke. Most of my fellow patients were also smokers, and we all complained that no smoking was making our unprepared mental health even worse.

The mental hospital mentality is to give the patient a place to cool off without all the world's stresses acting as triggers, which sucks, because me and many of my fellow patients had entered with the goal of rehabilitation and improvement, which is not at all what these facilities do. As with most medical facilities, the staff was over-worked and tired. They also treated the patients like babies, which, as a college educated adult, I found truly condescending. In a week's time I had one intelligent conversation with a student nurse, but a full-time nurse informed me they were specifically told not to relate to the patients as peers.

Before you do something as drastic and expensive as a mental hospital, I would recommend you just spend some time talking about your issues for free, even if just on this forum. Anything I found helpful about the mental hospital was through bonding and talking with fellow patients who could relate to my anguish, and there was no reason why I had to commit myself to find conversation.

Basically, if you have a sound enough mind to think about committing yourself to a mental hospital, you have enough logic and willpower to improve without one.

Also, I'd be completely willing to tell more mental hospital stories if anyone was interested. It was a unique experience that some might be understandably curious about.

As someone whos been there tied down to a bed, avoid it like the plague, theres a lot more your doctor can be doing and anti anxieties really can help, such as valium and the like, true youve got to be careful not to get addicted but i really think you could benefit.

Hang in there, if you ever feel like you want to end it all and theres nothing left for you however i would advise you to go to an a and e and get yourself commited

Sorry i cant be more help on the insurance side, my country runs a nationalised health service so i dont have any experience there but surely if you have health insurance it should cover whatever you need?

Anyway yeah please just hang in there, life will get better

Ziadaine:
Your doctor doesn't sound like someone who knows much about mental Illness, I'd probably recommend seeing a different GP or even a mental health specialist. I can tell you right now, you should not resort to that, like adamsaccount mentioned, it isn't something I would recommend doing either.

That's a good point. Doctors are just a third party who provide a service. If your doctor is not providing appropriate care, find one who will. Ask your current doctor for a referral to someone more specialized, or use the internet to find someone who receives positive reviews from patients.

I dont know about how it is n the U.S., but usually if you really are mentally unstable, insurance should cover your stay.

I felt that being in an environment with rally crazy people can make you have a false sense of security that you are not as crazy as they are.
At least, that is how it was for me...

The ultimate turning point for me was when I hit rock bottom, and had to accept that somethings were just not for me and had to be avoided in order to stay sane.
You have to identify and learn to avoid the root cause of your anxiety while still in the same environment that you usually live in.
It is the same as drug addicts and prisoners. if you end up back in your same neighbourhood with the same drug dealers and same friends, the chances of you slipping back to your old habit is very high even if you clean up while in a safe and controlled environment.

Just my opinion, but I hope it helps :)

Angie7F:
I dont know about how it is n the U.S., but usually if you really are mentally unstable, insurance should cover your stay.

Maybe if you've got really good insurance. If you're the average person in their 20's, your insurance probably sucks. I know that my student insurance would cover 80% of my stay, so at least that turned $14,000 into $3,000. That's a semester's worth of rent that I wasted, and trust me, that money could have been much better spent.

I actually had two insurance providers, and my other insurance company denied responsibility because I went directly to the hospital, rather than waited a few weeks for a doctors appointment to be referred to said hospital.

Back in my youth I had another hospitalized experience, and I remember the staff informing my fellow peers that "we know you're not ready to leave, but your insurance only cleared 10 days. We might be able to clear one more day, but that's it."

So yeah, insurance in the US sucks.

[quote="Mr.Cynic88" post="538.397643.16418694"
So yeah, insurance in the US sucks.[/quote]

Yeah, I had heard stories about how bad insurance is in the U.S., and quite frankly I still half think that you re pulling my leg when you tell me stories like that...LOL

The weird think is, Japan has good insurance because after WW2, the U.S. came and worked on the reconstruction.
I think it is horrible that they can help other countries come up with a great system, and yet it doesnt get executed in their own country.

Here, no matter what doctor/ dentist you set foot into, you only have to pay 30% of the bill and the rest is covered by insurance.

That's the problem with fully privatized insurance. It's not in their best interest to actually pay, so they look for any reason they don't have to. I'm a big proponent of socialized healthcare, but Americans don't like taxes, so they'd rather get fucked by big business.