What happens if you admit to suicidal thoughts?

This is bad information that is going to prevent people who need help from seeking it.

Your first sergeant will escort you to a special facility.

There is no firm answer on what happens when you let someone know you have SI. Many people do not go to inpatient. Also the facility I went to sent a nurse to accompany me on my flight to the location, my chain of command was not involved in that manner.

You will be locked up in a mental hospital.

It's very difficult to involuntarily admit someone to inpatient, they can't just decide to do so at the drop of a hat. Unless you were there involuntarily, you could request to leave and they had to release you. There was a time frame between when you made that request and when they needed to comply by but it was short, if you did it during the normal business week everyone I saw who requested to leave was gone by the end of the next day.

Also, I only met one person who was there involuntarily and could not leave, and many people had severe situations with criminal / legal issues at stake (myself included) and we were all free to leave at our request.

Aka "mental rehab" until you prove to them you aren't suicidal. You'll go through a gauntlet of doctors, psychologists, and classes.

There is a lot more to it than that, but once there I saw one medical doctor once a week, a psychiatrist for like 5 minutes daily and one therapist several hours per week, not a gauntlet. Yes there were a lot of classes, that is what takes up most of your day.

You're escorted to and from meals and smoke breaks but you'll remain on your wing until those times arrive.

At least in the facility I went to they had an outdoor common area you could go into at any time and smoke, no escort required for that. For meals, the escort was more like an orderly who walks along with a large group of people, it isn't like a prison guard or some shit. But they do have to maintain accountability for suicidal people, so, yeah.

The best part are all the therapy classes and activities they force you to participate in. You can choose to do nothing and not participate, but it will inevitably prolong your stay.

So like you said in your second sentence that contradicts your first sentence, they can not force you to participate. Do they encourage and even pressure people who do not participate to participate? Yes, that's literally their job. Everything there is part of the treatment.

What you said about not participating is true though. Many people get recommended to be extended to 6 weeks regardless of participation, it all depends on what your doc and therapist agree on.

If you're lucky, and your "guard" is cool, you may get to go outside for basket ball or to toss around a football etc.

We had a class that had physical activity every single day and we as a group were allowed to choose often, and if there were disagreements if they had enough staff they would split us into several groups. There were a lot of choices too, not like you were stuck with one thing. Not only that we had a makeshift gym with some basic equipment in it so you could workout after classes were over at 4. Hell they would even let you run around the outside fenced in area of the complex. Oh and they had a pool we could swim in.

Physical activity is one of the best things someone can do to help fight depression and improve their mental health in general. They actively encouraged it.

Then fun begins once you're out. You have to attend mandatory classes at mental health, see the shrinks on base, doctors, etc.

Yes, inpatient is just the beginning. Mental health recovery is a long road, many people spent years getting as fucked up as they are and it often takes just as long to undo the damage. There isn't a magic cure.

Source: Went to Laurel Ridge for 6 weeks fairly recently.

I'm not going to say it's the best thing ever, it was the worst 6 weeks of my life and I fucking hated it, but I'm glad it happened in retrospect because I would 100% be dead if it wasn't for that place.

A lot of what I learned there was not applicable to me. There were many things that I straight up disagreed with, and a few that were very helpful. Not every coping skill works for everyone, I think they are often happy if you find one that works for you out of the dozens they teach you about.

The biggest problem I had was that they endorsed AA, and I despise AA and their fakeness about not being a Christian organization, but AA is what is recommended by the medical community in general so that isn't a fault specific to that facility.

/r/AirForce Thread Parent