Mental health treatment – my broken leg won’t be fixed

Imagine this..

You broke your leg and called an ambulance SIX months ago as you were in pain. Feeling frustrated, you walk to the A&E department – with your broken leg. They ask you loads of questions and tell you that due to a lack of funding, your leg cannot be fixed but you can fill in a questionnaire about how much pain you are in.

When you challenge this, you get told – sorry you will have to walk in pain with a limp as this is the best we can offer. Just take some pills and everything will be OK.

This is how mental health treatment is in many areas of the country at the moment – “broken” people not getting treated or getting inappropriate care. Yet you have a broken leg and it will be fixed as a matter of urgency. Once your cast is off and the bone is healed, if needed you will be offered physiotherapy until you are fully fixed.

I have been suffering with depression for many years and following a referral last December, a couple of months ago I was asked some questions over the telephone by a person from the local “mental health business” and then put on a waiting list for Cognitive Behavioural Therapy. Earlier this month I was called in for an appointment to start said “CBT” for six sessions each half an hour. I sit with a “Psychological Well being Practitioner”, answer some questionnaires, discuss what I have been doing then book the next session.

I went to see my G.P. to discuss this so called treatment, had my medication changed and told that “this is the best you will get as there are not the qualified staff, nor the funding to provide a comprehensive service”. I could see a private counsellor, but I would have to pay for the service.