Timeline part 2

when i first met dr. stein, i thought i had met the one person who would be able to really help me. i believed i was going crazy and was torn between wanting to give in to it and being afraid. i told dr. steing everything i could about my life. everything i could remember and was even honest about the things i'd made up to tell the other doctor.

a week after admission he told me he didn't want to hear anymore of my bullshit and called me a liar. *sighs* he diagnosed me as bi-polar then changed his mind when i had a bad reaction to lithium. he then told my parents i was borderline, put me on meds and used *behavior modification* to treat me. in other words, everything i did or said was manipulation and corrected harshly. crying was attention seeking and ignored. any staff member who talked to me with compassion was then told by my nurse not to play into my games. etc...etc... etc...

after 3 months, my parents had exhausted our insurance. overnight i was declared well enough to go home. "much improved".

positives: i wasn't at home for 3 months...

I remember believing susan listened. she believed me when i told her about the emotional and physical abuse at home. she agreed that i had no reason to feel safe at home. then mum and dad started coming in for family sessions and i found out that susan would not back me up with them. she even supported my mother telling me i was the only problem and the only one who needed to change.

i blew up at her that day. i was enraged to find i did not have an ally in helping my parents see how their words hurt me. they didn't want to know and she didn't want to tell them.

after i blew up at her, she treated me with barely concealed contempt. big surprise. everyone eventually hated me anyway.

positives: none

i attended PACE from the last few weeks of my freshman year to graduation in 1987. in those years at PACE i had 3 different counselors. they were all good people and both ray and carl were both good at helping me get grounded when things would get bad.

i never really talked with them about things. by the time i left dominion i had pretty much given up.

positives: ray taught me a simple grounding technique that i use to this day. carl was the most laid back person i've ever met and had an easy smile. they were good people.

started seeing dr. polumbi after discharge from GWUH. dr. k would no longer see me. dr. polumbi was an analyst. he almost never spoke to me. he managed my meds. i never really believed i even existed to him. he was collecting a paycheck.

the sonofabitch is now a treating psychiatrist at dominion. *gag* what is wrong with this picture?

positives: none

when i spoke with him after being brought to the hospital by police escort, his attitude was "I told you so." when i told him i had begun attending 12 step meetings, he tried to transfer me to the substance abuse unit. not because substance abuse was a larger part of my problems than anything else. it wasn't and he knew that. he wasnted me transferred because he would not be my doctor on that unit.

he never really bothered during this six weeks stay. interestingly, i did better during this visit than anywhere else. no one else made an effort, but i did. i felt that by following the rules i could learn ways to manage when i got home.

when the insurance ran out and mum and dad said they couldn't pay for my stay any longer, dr. stein discharged me. this time he told my parents i would spend whatever life i managed to have in and out of hospitals. he told them the best thing they could do was to find a state run facility that could house me until i was no longer their legal burden.

positives: i was motivated to try on my own.

jim and brenda weren't professionals. still, i went to them for help. they took me in two weeks after discharge from dominion. i lived with them for the summer.

at one point during the summer, brenda offered to help me make some extra money. she sent me to clean and do some simple paperwork for a friend in his office... after fighting him off several times and walking home, i found out brenda had told him i'd sleep with him. he PAID brenda for an afternoon with me. when i confronted her she laughed at me. she said she'd never believed my claim that i'd never voluntarily had sex. she believed it was a tool to be used to get what you wanted and thought i was stupid for not trying it.

that wasn't even the low point of the summer.

positives: jim finally left brenda. he's grown a lot and is still a good friend. it was thru jim that i met charlie.

to be continued