Topic Tuesday Focus Group // Treatment and support for people experiencing personality disorders // Tuesday 6 March, 7pm AEDT

[Mum2eight]

I started seeing a private therapist since my diagnosis late last year. It’s very costly ($190 per fortnight) I can get 10 sessions subsided by Medicare but doesn’t cover after that. Considering recover is anytime between 1-3 years it doesn’t help. The only other option I have is get amitted into mental health unit in public hospital for 2 months to get access to DBT therapy. I’m to scared of NDIS and how they will treat me I haven’t tried.

[BlueBay]

I wish the mental health plan was more than 10 sessions.  That's nothing.  It is expensive seeing a therapist fortnightly and a psych.  Wish that would change.

[OhanaSystem]

@EliseSunflower

So, I've accessed a lot of different supports over the years, and it's hard to differentiate out exactly which support was for which disorder, so hopefully this won't skew research in the wrong direction.

Financial and housing services: I'm in social housing, which is similar to government housing, but has a slightly higher rental price. My experience there has *mostly* been good. I manage my money independently and while I'm sometimes impulsive and get myself into a small spot of strife, I'm not consistently poor enough to even consider financial supports such as public trust.

Mental health services: I have in the past accessed mental health support services (organisations designed around supporting people with mental illness to do daily/important life tasks etc) as well as mental health clinicians. I've seen psychologists, psychiatrists, and counsellors/therapists. I've done two 12 month bouts of DBT. My current team includes a psychologist/case manager (she's sort of both), a psychiatrist registrar (and her psychiatrist overlord :p),  and 3 mental health support workers who are funded through Disability Services Queensland. Someone I also consider to be part of "my team", although probably not officially, is one of the coordinators of my most recent DBT group.
My experiences have been a mixed bag but I'm very happy with my current team.

Support Groups: I've accessed mainly online support groups, and mostly my experience hasn't been all that good. I find a lot of places turn into wallowing-grounds, and that encourages people to stay stuck because you get more support the more unwell you are.

[EliseSunflower]

@Teej I hope you are finding schematic therapy to be helpful. And I'm glad to hear SANE has been useful too. 

What are the aspects of treatment that you have found to be the most helpful in the past? 

[Catcakes]

I have had mixed experiences ranging from supportive to traumatising from Gp’s, psychologists, psychiatrists, a social worker.
I participated in a DBT group a few years ago which was good but I needed to repeat it and it folded. I have had my 10 sessions of psychotherapy Medicare subsidised and then paid for many, many sessions myself . I did have some paid for by my employer after a traumatic event at work.
I have been on the same forum for about four months.

[NikNik]

Good evening @MDT

Tonight we are doing something a little different. We are running a focus group style Topic Tuesday for a research project SANE is working on about treatment and support for people experiencing personality disorders.

I suggest having a quick read of the first two posts of the thread if you plan on getting involved tonight.

We're up to the question:

There is a large variety in the types of support available - for example, some people access financial and housing support, mental health services, or support groups. What sorts of treatment and support services have you accessed, and what have your experiences been like?

[Mum2eight]

Too add- rural areas need more services such as DBT Therapy that is free

[Teej]

I’ve done DBT through the public mental health system. I’ve noticed a huge change in the way I’ve been treated as time has gone on. Through self harm I had many hospital admissions. Some were really atrocious and was treated really badly by nurses in particular. I had an experience about 18 months ago in hospital that I was treated like I wasn’t human 

[difficulthuman]

i went on Newstart allowance after my first admission to hospital which was difficult to search for jobs while dealing with sedation of medications. It wasn't until a few years later i could get the disability pension. I had to borrow from family to pay for DBT which is an expensive therapy. The public mental health system is terrible you spend most your time to wait for treatment if you're lucky you can go private but that's very expensive.

[Phoenix_Rising]

@EliseSunflower 

I have only ever had the support of a private therapist. I recognise that I simply would not have survived if I had needed to rely on the public system. After I attempted suicide in 1997, my psychotherapist felt he couldn't work with me anymore. Thus began a hellish period of therapist shopping (lots of super bad experiences in there!!!!) and chaos. In April 1999 I finally connected with a psychologist who initially was a good fit. As it turns out, that was the beginning of me being in a verbally abusive and occasionally physically violent relationship with this psychologist for the next sixteen years until I finally managed to leave him in July of 2015. 

After several months I found a new psychologist...who then closed her practice five months later. Since that time I've churned through twelve different therapists. Some of those I have sacked, and some have sacked me. With each bad experience, another layer of trauma has been layed down such that now I am so completely traumatized I pretty much don't know which way is up! 

Happily, about three months ago I connected with therapist take thirteen (known as TTT here in Forum Land) and she is AMAZING. She personifies what I believe every MH professional working with trauma should be like. Due to the nature of my muddle, I am very blessed to be able to see TTT under the NSW Victims of Crime program which fully covers the cost of my therapy. I am so very grateful for that service.

So...in summary, to answer your question of what my experiences have been like, they have been utterly traumatizing such that the original abuse stuff of my early teens seems pretty irrelevant relative to the constant and repeated re-traumatization I've experienced with mental health professionals.