An Issue I had at the ER - Trigger warning
Trigger warning: su!c!de
When I was su!c!dal in October and had a plan to k!ll myself, my best friend urged my to go to the hospital. So, I went to the ER in halifax and after waiting for a very long time, they brought me into a private room to be evaluated.
The woman who evaluated me was very dismissive and rude. She was like "so what you're saying is... you want us to lock you up for two days?" "you want us to protect you from yourself?" And her tone was just very rude and dismissive as well and I felt like she just thought I was attention seeking or something. Maybe I'm being sensitive and they were just genuine questions, but idk... Then I had to wait all night until like 8am. I finally got to see someone else I guess to figure out what to do with me. And she was nicer, but still it felt like she was more focused on suggesting that I go to therapy and stuff, rather than helping me to not k!ll myself when I was literally in a crisis. Then she sent me to stay at a family member's house for two days. Which is crazy, because how is a family member going to stop me from k!lling myself? It's not like they could monitor me or stop me if I wanted to do it. I mean, it's not like they could stay up all night to make sure I didn't do something to hrt myself.
And she was like "we don't have any hospital beds in Nova Scotia" as her reason why I couldn't be admitted, which I kind of doubt that there's no beds available in all of the entire province, in every psych ward or treatment center or hospital... but idk, I could be wrong. It was a really horrible experience and I left feeling way worse than when I came, and very invalidated about my struggles. It felt like they just thought I was attention seeking, it was very dismissive. I was just wondering if anyone had similar experiences. And where should I go for help if I ever have a mental health crisis like that again?
Because I don't think the ER will help me very much if I have this issue again.
(I am sorry if my post came across as harsh towards the staff. For one thing, I wasn't trying to say that they were lying about there being no hospital beds in Nova Scotia. I was just surprised and thought maybe they were misinformed. Also, it was not only the questions themself, but the tone. I feel like some of these comments are very dismissive. I might delete my post.)