Man accused of stealing $5 in snacks died in jail as he waited for space at mental hospital

I have a psychiatrist, but I honestly don't believe he listens to me. I'm a small woman placed on very high doses of medication I can't even cut because the worst offender is a capsule, not a pill. I think the dosing he was suggesting before I never came back was 300 mg Effexor, 4 mg risperidone, and 2 mg clonazepam a day. I refused. I said I already slept most of my days away. I couldn't work and go to school and everything else I was supposed to do on those doses. He told me to quit school then. I'm three classes away with an M.S. and a 4.0 GPA for it. But you know ... quit ... for medication changes. There wasn't some behavior event to trigger those changes, either.

If I wanted to make a life choice, all he would say is, "Let's see what your husband says." When my husband inevitably agreed (because we would obviously discuss these things first), the psych would then address my husband to explain why I didn't really want that choice. I was not welcome to involve myself here. If I tried, I was shot down.

He routinely refused to talk about my history of physical abuse (which led to an injury I cannot have fixed), sexual abuse, someone else who had just recently died, work/school, anything. The week someone else died that I was close to, he chose instead to talk about my dad. Again. The day I mentioned my sexual abuse, he asked the race of the perpetrator and moved on. He refuses now as though they don't affect me. I have never received help for the abuse, although I have tried.

No one else is seeing new patients. He's the attending doctor at the local ward. If I see anyone, it's him. I'm trying to wait out the total lack of care with a high head, but it's so hard.

I'm not even a demographic that ought to be experiencing so many roadblocks. I'm white, middle class, and worked from home often enough I could just use lunch and no one would've known. I can't even fucking imagine the people who need care without the resources I have, because even in my case, I'm not getting care.

/r/news Thread Parent Link - ashingtonpost.com