- Hi everyone. My name is Rob. And I am Lauren's partner and kind of a co-founder of this channel, but I'm usually behind the scenes, and I'm usually the one
helping record the videos and doing the editing and stuff like that. But I thought that it
would be helpful for me to kind of do a separate
video talking about what the experience was like for me for Lauren's recent hospitalization. So something that we're going
to do a little bit different for this video is that you're actually
going to be able to see behind the scenes of Lauren while we're shooting this so that there's an
opportunity for her to react. And I also just kind of feel like that I want this to be more
of a collaborative video, but also for everybody to know that this isn't a video
that I'm just doing behind her back or anything like that. We've talked a lot about the things that I'm gonna talk about in this video, but I also do want it to
be really open and honest. Okay, so in this video, I'm basically going to
be covering kind of like what my perspective is
like from being a partner and being somebody who's
supporting somebody who's going through an
experience like this, and being the perspective of somebody who's trying to advocate for somebody who is going through
a mental health crisis and kind of working their way through the hospital experience and mental health care system. So I think the first thing
that I kind of want to bring up and just really corroborate
in terms of Lauren's story is kind of roughly kind of what
led her to be hospitalized. And I think that, in this case, it's mainly I think to do
with her going off her meds. But I think what's worth looking at is kind of the factors in her life that maybe led her to go off her meds. And I know that our healthcare
system is very med-centric, having seen it kind of firsthand that it's basically just about meds, but I think that it's really
worthwhile looking at, well, what was it that
made her go off her meds? And in this case, I think there was a lot of different kind of stressful factors. She had a weird work travel schedule, which kind of led her to
have a weird sleep schedule. We were dealing with some
relationship conflict. (Lauren laughs nervously) It was kind of a
particularly stressful week in terms of taking care of our kids. There was a birthday party. And then there was also the season change that is going on right
now from summer to fall. And she's previously kind of struggled with this time of year a few years ago. So I think that it was a
variety of factors that kind of, stressful factors that kind
of precipitated it being this situation where she
didn't want to take her meds, which is itself kind of a
problem with this illness. What I do want to mention though is that, kind of from the beginning
of this situation, I didn't know that she had
stopped taking her meds. I only found out that she
stopped taking her meds when we were in the emergency room and she was talking with the
resident psychiatrist there. So she was off her meds
for about a week and a half before hospitalization. Okay, so talking about kind of the week before hospitalization. This was kind of a period where she was kind of downward spiraling. She wasn't well. She was kind of dealing with
more of her negative symptoms and a bit of depression. She was spending lots of time in bed. She was kind of having
difficulty communicating with me. I could tell that she was really low. I could tell she wasn't doing well. One thing that she told me was that she was struggling with
thoughts of suicide, and that's something
that's difficult to hear. It's something that is
obviously really concerning. And I don't think that I really
knew how to deal with that. And just I think that it caused problems, me just not knowing how to deal with that and me wanting to support
her, but not knowing how. And I think that throughout
this whole process, it's been really murky in
terms of trying to sort out what is like relationship conflict and what is kind of just dealing with the symptoms and the
illness and stuff like that. And so it was really
challenging throughout that week to try to navigate figuring
out how to best support her. And so I went to a
therapy session with her, with her therapist. She had some time with her therapist, and then I went in with her therapist, and we kind of talked about communication and trying to figure out, I guess, how to approach things
that would be best for her. And it was hard because when I hear something
like she is feeling suicidal, I feel like it's the worst. "We need to go to the hospital right now." That's kind of where I'm coming from. But at the same time, and what was kind of conveyed
in that therapy session was, well, that's just her communicating how she's feeling, and she
just needs to communicate that, but it's not something she's
going to act on it, so. But at the same time, when we
were in that therapy session, the therapist was like, "Well, let's draw a scale. And on one end of the scale, it'll be this is time
to go to the hospital, and the others, I don't know,
not going to the hospital. Where are you on that scale?" And she put a couple notches
below going to the hospital. So it's like even though
it wasn't this situation where she wanted to go to
the hospital right away. Things weren't good. And she's also previously told me that she'll never want to go
to the hospital willingly. (Lauren laughs) It just, she won't go. And so dealing with that information where she's telling me
that she's struggling with thoughts of suicide, and she's identifying she's close to needing
to go to the hospital, and that she doesn't ever
want to go to the hospital, never go willingly. So kind of dealing with
all of that information, the rest of the week resumed, and this was on, I don't know, this was early in the week
on a Tuesday or something. And the rest of the week, it was kind of still
deteriorating from there. Just feeling low, and
spending a lot of time in bed, and more relationship or
interpersonal conflict between the two of us
trying to work through this. And then we kind of get
to the end of the week, and there's my daughter's birthday party, and she's struggling a lot, and we have to leave the
birthday party early. And on the way home
from the birthday party, she said that maybe we'll
go to the hospital tomorrow. I can't remember exactly
how you brought it up, but it was like, "Maybe
we'll go to the hospital," or something.
- You had asked me. And then I was like, "Maybe tomorrow." Yeah. - So that felt like a red flag to me in terms of if she said that she never wants
to go to the hospital, and now she's saying, "Well, maybe we'll go to the hospital." It must be really bad. The next morning, Monday morning, so Monday is the day that
she went to the hospital, she missed her therapy
appointment in the morning. And I tried everything that I could to get her to go to this appointment, but she didn't want to go. I called her therapist
and kind of explained what was going on and
that I was concerned. And he tried to call her,
he tried to email her, but there was no communication from her. She spent most of the day in bed. And then in the late afternoon, she got up and she
started to have a shower and started to get ready. And I kinda thought maybe
she was gonna go somewhere. And when I had talked with her
therapist earlier in the day, he was kind of like, "Are
you going to be home? Are you going to be with her?" And I said that I was. And so I was worried about
her kind of going off and being on her own given that things had been
deteriorating all week and that she felt like she
needed to go to the hospital earlier in the week. And things were far worse now. And she had already talked about maybe needing to go to the
hospital the day before. So I thought things were not great. And the idea of her just leaving the house didn't seem like a good idea to me. So I hid her car keys. - Not cool. - When she finished getting ready, and she tried to leave, and she realized her
car keys were missing, that's when things got a lot worse. I couldn't really reason with her about trying to arrange
alternative transportation. I was trying to say, "I'll take you anywhere you want to go. Your friends can come and get you. If you don't want to be in the house or you don't want to be around me, we can work something out so that we know that
you're safe right now." But she wasn't having any of it. All she wanted was her car keys, and she didn't want a babysitter. She just wanted to go. And she was searching around
the house for the keys, and I hadn't hidden them very well. And I thought that she was
going to just find them and she was gonna just leave. So it was at that point that
I called a friend for backup. And when she got here, she parked her car in
front of Lauren's car so that, I don't know if that was, she didn't like that. And she didn't like that
I had called for support. So I think I kind of need
to pause things a little bit and just say that I
feel like at this point Lauren was really not herself. She was furious, but she was
also, she was swearing at me, and she was threatening me. And I just knew that this wasn't
her, this was her illness. And so that's why I knew that I kinda needed support and backup. Shortly after our friend arrived, the argument kind of reached a peak, and Lauren ran out of the house. And she literally ran out of the house and ran down the street. And we haven't talked about this a lot, but she runs ultramarathons.
(Lauren laughs) So the thought of Lauren
running away from you is not a good one, because she'll probably be able to run a lot farther than you. But I got a bike, and then our friend chased
her as far as she could, which was good 'cause I needed to know which direction you went,
but I just got a bike. And then I rode around the neighborhood just slowly following her. And eventually, she
made her way back home. And when she did make her way back home, she tried to run into the house and then lock me out of the house. But I was right behind her. And then she tried to
run through the house, and out the back door, and
then jump over the fence. But I was able to jump
on top of the fence. And so I wasn't pulling her
off the fence or anything. I was just on the fence with her. And then she ran back to the house, again tried to lock me out, and then she went upstairs, and she locked herself in our bedroom. So it was good that she was back home. But I felt like at this
point we needed help, and we called the crisis services, but they weren't available. So we called 911 and police came. And I want to talk a little
bit about the decision to call 911, because I think that it was something that was really, really difficult to do. I wanted very much to believe that we weren't going to
need to go to the hospital and that we didn't need
to involve the police in terms of getting her
medical help like that. I know firsthand how traumatizing
the experience has been for her in the past with respect to police and with respect to the hospital. And so I know how much of a fear she has about going to the hospital and what the hospital can be like. I didn't know what the hospital
could be like firsthand, but I had a good idea just
based on what she's told me. I know she didn't want to go. At the same time, things had been getting worse
kind of on a daily basis, and combined with what we talked about in her therapy session
earlier in the week, in terms of her feeling like she was just a couple notches down from going to the hospital
then earlier in the week, then things had gotten far worse. And then also her own admission that like, "Maybe we should go to
the hospital today," when she's previously said that she'll never go to the hospital. I had an idea that things were really bad, and then with what just had happened, of running out of the house, I didn't think that things
were going to get any better without going to the hospital. On top of this, I was still under the
impression the whole time that she had been taking her meds, and I didn't know that she
hadn't been taking her meds at this point. Otherwise, I think I would have, it would have been easier, I think, for us to deal with trying to convince her to go to the hospital and maybe getting intervention
earlier, but I'm not sure. So the police came, and I was able to talk with
them beforehand a little bit, just to give them a background in terms of what her experience was like with police officers beforehand,
and my concerns about that, and for them to be really considerate. And it was a male police officer and a female police officer. Lauren had locked herself in our room, and she was just holding onto the door so that people couldn't get in, and the police officers were able to come and just open the door. And then she was kind of
hysterical at that point in terms of probably being really afraid, and probably being really mad and upset. - Yeah. I was really afraid. It was more like being scared of not really knowing who to trust and not really being
able to properly take in what was going on. - Yeah. And I think that experience
for her was really overwhelming because the police opened the door, and then both police officers
went in, and I went in, and the two friends that we
had there, they both went in, and somebody was trying to console you, but it was just an overwhelming
experience for everybody. So the female police officer really quickly identified Lauren, because Lauren had come
to her recruits class, and Lauren had given a
presentation about her experience, and this police officer remembered Lauren. And I think it was such
an amazing connection right off the bat to know that, okay, this
police officer knows her story, and that's gonna be really helpful in terms of how she
approaches this situation. The male police officer hadn't, I don't think he was
in that recruits class, or I didn't know, and definitely took more of a
tough guy approach to things. To be fair about this whole
police officer situation, Lauren was able to come downstairs. She was relatively calm, but
I'd still say quite paranoid. And she was sitting in a chair, and the police officers wanted to go. They wanted to just,
they're suggesting like, "Just go upstairs, rest, or
watch a movie with your friends, and try to just calm down from this." And they wanted to go. And then the male police
officer handed me his phone to talk to their mental health care team. And I was on the phone with
this mental health care team. And I guess so I wasn't present
when this was happening, but I guess Lauren wanted to
go on the deck in the backyard. And so she went on the
deck in the backyard, and then I think she tried
to jump over the fence again. And that's when the male police officer kind of pulled her inside
and threw her into the couch. And that wasn't helpful for her. And I think we were close to not having to go to the hospital maybe, but after talking to the
mental health care team, and them hearing me
explaining the situation, and then also the police
officer's decision, I think, after that incident of her
trying to get away again, that's when they decided that were going to bring
her to the hospital. And she obviously didn't want to go. But again, the female police
officer did a really great job of talking to you. And I can't remember
which of our friends was also talking with you. And you also talked with
me about being scared. I can't remember if
there was much paranoia in terms of you feeling like
I was with the police officers or something like that. - Yeah, I don't remember
super clearly, but yeah. I was definitely paranoid
about your involvement in it. But at one point, after talking with the
female police officer, I asked to speak with you, and then I kind of leveled with you about what I was feeling, and yeah. - So long story short, we all were able to convince
her to go to the hospital, and my friend was able to ride with her in the police cruiser to the hospital. So that was, I think, the best possible, well, it's not the best
possible experience, but it was a relatively good experience in terms of getting to
the hospital safely. - And they didn't handcuff
me, which was nice. 'Cause usually they do. So that's cool. - So they took her to our
University of Alberta psych, or University of Alberta emergency room, which has an emergency room psych ward. And they immediately wanted
to put her into a secure room, which she was not cool with, because the last time she was there, they tied her down, and
they forcibly injected her. So that makes sense why she
didn't want to be in there. So she was able to convince them, or they were able to just let her be in one of those curtained off rooms. In this room, I would say she
was pretty clearly psychotic. She only stood the entire time basically. For hours, she just
stood with her purse on. She didn't want to sit down. She didn't want to take her purse off. It mattered where people were standing in this curtained room, because maybe she wanted
easy access to get away. She stood staring at the
curtains for a really long time, just a foot away from the curtains, just staring directly at the curtains. She was transfixed with some fixture that was near the ceiling. She spent a significant amount of time just trying to overhear
what the nurses were saying. It was during this time that a
resident psychiatrist came in who was really wonderful. She took the time to
build trust with Lauren while she was in this psychotic state. And she spoke really calmly,
and she was very caring, and she basically did
an intake assessment. It was during this assessment
that I first learned that Lauren had in fact
stopped taking her meds about a week and a half earlier. And Lauren also mentioned that she felt like things
were getting worse. And she mentioned that
she was having difficulty with perception. For example, I think,
the curtains were moving. The psychiatrist recommended a dose of fast-acting antipsychotic medication, and through a heroic effort
of trying to convince her by the psychiatrist and by myself, she eventually did take this medication, which I think helps and
also helps let you sleep and stuff like that. So up until that point, we hadn't really needed to
deal with the psych nurses. It had mainly actually just
been waiting in the room for the doctors, but now that she had taken her meds, it was like immediately
power struggle turned on with the psych nurses. And it really never stopped her entire time that she was
in the U of A psych ER ward. And it started off with
this aggressive male nurse who had wanted to put her in
the secure room to begin with right after she took her
medication, being like, oh, I'm going to need to leave because visiting hours are over. And that was a really
frustrating experience. If the nurses had been present at all, they would have understood
the state that she was in, that she needed support right then. As soon as Lauren heard
the nurse say that, she just immediately left the room and threatened to leave. And I had to pull this
nurse aside and just say, "If you need to talk to me about that, we can go talk about this privately." And we did talk about it privately. And then I was able to
talk to the psychiatrist. We just managed to get
her to take her meds and build trust that way. And the psychiatrist was
able to sort of coordinate with the psych nurses. But the psychiatrist basically said that, in terms of patient care, we
defer to the psych nurses. So there's kind of an
unbelievable amount of power that the psych nurses have
over patients in the ward. And the deal that this
psych nurse made with me was that I needed to, I could stay, but we needed to go to the secure room. So Lauren has wanted to
stay out of the secure room because of how traumatizing
her experience was before. Instead, we're put into the secure room. And the secure room is
just cinder block walls and a metal bed. And that's it. It's horrifying, and it's not surprising why
it would be traumatizing. And that's the room that they
expected her to sleep in. But anyways, at least I
would be there with her. And she wasn't happy
about being in this room. She spent most of her time just basically standing right
at the edge of the doorway, staring at the the nurse's station. And she did that, and still standing, because she hadn't sat
down for hours and hours. And I think eventually
the medicine kicked in, and then she actually did lay down, and she got a bunch of sleep. The next morning she met
the actual psychiatrist for the day. It was just a resident
psychiatrist before. She met her psychiatrist for the day. And it was kind of at that point, just based on everything
that had happened, the psychiatrist admitted her. And so then it was just a process of waiting for a bed to become available at some hospital in Edmonton. Lauren was understandably not
happy about being admitted. And she walked away from the secure room, and the nurses took incredible
offense to this apparently. It's tough because I understand why she didn't want to be in that room, and I understand why she was
walking away from the room. She was trying to get away from the room, but I think she could
have been talked down and moved back into the room, but that is not the way the
nurses handled that situation. Instead, they called security,
and they all went in there, and they basically dragged
her back into the room. And I was terrified that they
were going to strap her down, and that they were going to be
forcibly injecting her again. And it would be the
traumatizing experience that we were were trying so hard to avoid. Luckily, they just locked her in the room, but that was not great. It was horrible. It didn't need to happen. There could have been an
attempt at communication, and there really wasn't. There was just this immediately, like, "We're going to be aggressive about it." So after they locked her in the room, they wouldn't let anybody into the room to just support her. 'Cause they said they wouldn't
lock anybody in the room, because you could've.
- I was a danger I guess. - You could be a danger to them. And so they wouldn't let
anybody into the room until she took meds. She did take meds, and it was actually quite
helpful in terms of, I mean, you needed it at that point in terms of how you were hyperventilating, and you were somewhat hysterical. - Yeah, but I think it would have been a lot smoother of a process if they had let you in
to explain that to me, rather than taking a really
staunch, stark approach to. - Well, and it's also, what is it, blackmailing you into taking your meds, essentially?
- Yeah, they wouldn't let anybody in until I took the meds and calmed down. - So that was such an unfortunate approach to dealing with that situation and trying to get a patient to take meds. It's pushing them into a situation where the situation's worse, and then kind of forcing them
to take meds to get out of it. It's pretty despicable. So this being my first
hospital experience like this, I definitely, it was eyeopening. It wasn't out of line from how Lauren had described
the experiences before. And I feel like if I hadn't been there, basically just being a witness, that things would have been a lot worse. I think what it is is just that these psych nurses are extremely
cynical about their jobs and their jobs have just
completely wore down on them. And they really don't see
the people they're treating as people, as people who
require compassionate care, especially in an area like mental health, where what you're treating
is a person's mind. - I think it's important to note that not all of them are like that. - Okay.
- But that it is very possible for the
job to wear on a person and to create that level of cynicism and that level of jadedness
when doing the work. - Yeah, and some of the nurses were better than other nurses. For sure, there were some
that were better than others. But overall, the bar of
care was so low, or yeah. They could have done, they all could have
done such a better job. And some of them shouldn't
have had that job at all. And so it was really disappointing. I stayed with Lauren most of
that day until dinner time. And then her friends came in and spent the evening with her. And at this point, I had
been awake for 36 hours, and I went home, and I slept for a bit. And I was back at the hospital
by 5:45 the next morning. Her friends, they weren't allowed in the
room with her overnight, but luckily, Lauren had her phone. So that was kind of good. She could contact me or she
could contact her friends if she needed something, or
she needed help, or whatever. But her friends were there in
the emergency room with her, well, in the emergency room overnight. And then in the morning when I got there, I talked to her nurse,
and her nurse was like, "You can't go until visiting
hours," which was 9:00 a.m. So I just waited in the emergency room. And then this is again where
more power struggle happens. I don't understand why
it wasn't a situation where they understood that a person going through
a mental health crisis, it's helpful for them
to have somebody there who's supporting them,
who they can talk to, who can just be a presence with them. Even if it's just me sitting in the room while she's sleeping. But they didn't want me there. And at nine o'clock,
when I tried to go in, security went and told
them that I was there. They said that the nurses were
doing rounds or something. There was some excuse. I waited for another half an hour. Security went in again to
tell them that I was there, and still nothing. And then I called the psych ER ward and told them that I was there. And they said that she was sleeping. And I know she wasn't sleeping, because I was texting with her. So I told them that. And I eventually was
able to go in after that. I don't understand why there
was such a power struggle with the nurses. And it was really frustrating
from a support perspective. So at this point, Lauren was admitted. She's just waiting for a bed. She's already spent two
nights now in the hospital. She started to have visitors
more, which is great. She's starting to stabilize more. The meds that they've given
her are taking effect. She's taking her regular medication. So, and the entire time she
wants to get out of there, but she's admitted, and so
she's waiting for a bed. And eventually, a bed does open up, and she needs to be transferred
to this other hospital. And her previous experience
of being put in an ambulance where they unnecessarily blindfolded her. So she's terrified to
go in an ambulance ride, but luckily, I was able to
ride with her in the ambulance, and she had some more tranquilizers, which really helped kind of
smooth over the whole experience of being in the ambulance and then having to also
go to this other hospital. The hospital that she
went to, Alberta Hospital, is this really old hospital. I think I looked up, it's like the building she
was in is 50 years old. She had to go to the washroom in one room, and then she had to go wash
her hands in another room because things were broken throughout. And this was just throughout the hospital. And I get that there's not a
huge budget for mental health. And it kind of shows just in terms of the wear of the building. But the staff there were, it didn't seem like there
was that power struggle that was going on with
the ER nurses there. The staff at this hospital genuinely seemed like they
cared about the patients, and they cared about their jobs, and they cared about
being a good human being. The psychiatrist that
she had there was also really positive and wanted
to approach her care in a lot more of a collaborative way. And she gave Lauren day passes so that she could come home and shower. She hadn't showered in, I don't
even know, five or six days, four days, three days. And get more clothes. And I had been bringing her clothes, but she hadn't changed out of anything. So that was helpful for her to be able to leave the hospital. And there'd be that trust there. I think that you kind of need that. You need that in terms of recovery. And I get that it's not always going to be that situation for every patient. It's gonna always be different. But you needed that trust. You needed trust with your doctors and your care staff.
- Yeah, I really need that collaborativeness in terms of receiving care. And I think that that doctor
did a really, really good job of working with me and working with us to figure out what was
going to be the best moving forward.
- Yeah, and you were already doing
a lot better at that point because you had been taking
your meds for a few days now. So despite this hospital being better, something that I haven't mentioned throughout kind of all of this is that, with respect to being
in the emergency room, there is no actual support there. All it is is a place for
them to give you meds, or for them to wait for you
to take meds and comply. I feel like that was the case too. Wait for them to give you
meds, and meds kick in. There isn't any sort of
therapy or support groups or anything like that. And then so we are a bit
more hopeful, I think, that it would be more of
a supportive environment at Alberta Hospital. And then there kind of
maybe is a little bit, there's an occupational
therapist and a dietician, and there's supposed to
be as a psychologist, and there's supposed
to be a social worker, and there's a rec therapist. The reality was that the rec
therapist was never there. She never saw her social worker once. She had one appointment with
an occupational therapist. There was no actual
psychologist therapist. There was no peer support group. And it was a better environment, and it was a more open environment, and you could walk around, and
you weren't in a locked room. But the reality of recovery
there still wasn't as good as I think probably just
being in the community. And it also felt just like
recovery is still something that kind of needs to be
self-directed and on your own, instead of having a coordinated
approach to your recovery. Beyond meds, because that's
something that was a big focus at Alberta Hospital. You met with the pharmacist there, and the psychiatrist,
the focus was on meds. And I get that that's an
important component of wellbeing for somebody who has a
diagnosis of schizophrenia and trying to figure out the best med mix. But I do think that there should
be a more holistic approach to it. I don't think that
there's a whole lot to say about the rest of the
experience of the hospital. It went pretty smoothly. Lauren was taking her medication and. And after meeting with her
psychiatrist a couple of times, she got a two day pass, and then she was eventually discharged. The discharge process
was totally hands off. Again, she didn't meet her social worker. There was no like, "Let's coordinate with your
care staff outside of this." And look at it like, "Is there anything
necessary for reintegration or anything like that?" And maybe it was because I was there, with you most of the time, and they knew that you
had external supports. But I still think that there's
a requisite level of care and just procedure that's missing in terms of how situations
like this are handled. Okay, I've talked a lot
about what basically happened and the sequence of events, but what I haven't talked
a whole lot about, I think, is what this whole experience
has been like for me. Trying to balance Lauren
in a downward spiral with also trying to balance keeping up with life
and kids and work was, it was pretty much impossible. I hope that moving forward, and it's something I think that we need to work on in therapy is figuring out how to better handle things like this in the future and approach things more sustainably. But this time it was really difficult. I think something that
I never really expected is how adversarial our relationship became in terms of me trying to
support her going through something like this. And it was really difficult because I could see that
things were getting worse, but I didn't really know
how to best support her. And I think there's
also an element of this, I think, in terms of her not trusting me, and then on more extreme levels, delusions of her thinking that I'm involved with the
the police or with doctors. That makes it a more of an
adversarial support relationship. I think it's, at least
I would feel it's easier to support somebody when they are actively wanting you to support them, but when you're supporting somebody or trying to support somebody and they don't want you to support them, that's really hard. It's really hard to deal with. It's really hard to deal with 'cause I think there's constantly this feeling of being rejected, and trying not to take that personally, and trying to trying to separate what is kind of relationship-type conflict from what is illness-type conflict is so messy. And there was a lot of
times throughout this that I felt really lost,
and I felt really hurt, and I felt. (sighs) I just felt really uncertain about how to best support her. And I don't feel like I did
the best job of supporting her. I think another thing I just
never expected to feel like, working through trying to support her, was just feeling unloved and having doubts about our relationship. When I found out that she
hadn't been taking her meds, it was this kind of big mix of feelings. First of all, just kind
of feeling relieved that there was a reason why
all of this was happening. But also feeling conflicted because I understand why her
not wanting to take her meds is kind of part of her illness. And but at the same time still
feeling a bit betrayed by it, by not knowing and by her hiding it. Overall, the experience of
leading up to hospitalization, and then hospitalization, and
also post-hospitalization, it was a lot more difficult
than I really ever imagined, could have ever imagined. And then I think that I really
underestimated the challenge that it could be in terms of supporting somebody going
through a mental health crisis like this. I want to end this video with some advice or
thoughts for caregivers, or people who are supporting
people with schizophrenia who are going through a
similar mental health crisis or hospitalization. First I guess I'll mention
is just not to give up hope, because the situation that
you're in isn't gonna be like that forever. Things are going to get better, and I think you just have to believe that. I think another important thing, that people kept telling me at least, is just to make sure that
you take care of yourself, because you're not really going to be able to take care of other people
if you're falling apart. I've heard people say that before, but it's such a tough balance to strike when you want to be there
supporting your loved one, but at the same time, you still need to sleep,
and you still need to eat, and you're just gonna get sick
or you're gonna fall apart if you don't. Something that I learned more
about with this experience was the role of being an advocate. People who are in the
mental health care system are a vulnerable population. And I do think that, especially witnessing
kind of the power dynamic with the nurses, and also hearing Lauren's
previous experiences in the hospital, I know that it's a situation where it's very helpful
to have an advocate, somebody who can be there for you, who can, where possible, I guess, be in doctor's meetings with you. And that's not gonna be
possible for every situation in terms of you supporting somebody. But I think that it was helpful
for her in this situation, especially in instances
where she was on medication, and she wasn't remembering
things very well, and she was extremely drowsy. There was appointments that she
just didn't remember at all, days blended in together. And so I think that it was
helpful for me to be there in terms of talking with
the nurses with her, in terms of talking with
the doctor with her, in terms of asking questions
and getting updates, and finding out what's going on and what's going to happen, and keeping track of things that way, and making sure that she
was getting the best care that was possible for her there. And also facilitating communication between her and the nurses. Because I think that that
was helpful sometimes in terms of I just don't
think that the nurses always maybe pay as much
attention to requests that are made directly from patients, because of them being
mental health patients, unfortunately.
- Yeah, I mean when you're in an altered state, I guess I can understand why
people would be less likely to take what I'm saying at face value or to value it as much. So I'm super grateful that you were there, and that you were there
to advocate for me, and that you were there to
bolster my voice and yeah. Thank you. - You're welcome. Okay, continuing advice for caregivers. It's helpful to be in therapy yourself and to have a therapist yourself 'cause you're gonna have stuff that you need to work through. If it's somebody who's close
to you, like a partner, helpful to be in therapy with them. Lauren and I are in therapy right now. Develop a plan about how you're going to handle
situations like this. We have talked about this in the future, but we didn't have a
firmly written out plan. And we still don't. It's just been so recent since we've gotten back from the hospital, but it is a priority for
us to have a plan in place that addresses all of the things that we kind of had to go through in terms of the decision making process when we get to a state where it's like you're
not in the best state to be making decisions. - I think that helps with
I guess building trust or building a collaborative
effort in terms of getting care. If it was something that
you and I had agreed upon when I was in a clear state of mind, it would be a lot easier to be like, "Hey Lauren, this is
what we agreed together. This is what you wanted." And it would have been easier
to take those steps then if it was something that
we had agreed upon before. So that is a priority for us to do. - Another thing that I would recommend is building the support network of people who you can bring in to help you. And loved ones, friends, I feel really grateful for
all the people in our lives who stepped up and offered their support and were there for us. So we were really lucky there. In terms of dealing with nursing staff, I would say understanding
that power dynamic that exists in terms of them just wanting
to exercise their power. But I think you still
have to deal with them as patiently and as calmly as possible, but at the same time still
being firm where necessary. And maybe above all, just
showing that you are present. - I think it also helped to humanize me that you were there and you were a person who cared about me, and you were, yeah. I think that helped in that regard too. - Yeah, I feel having
seen how this all worked, I feel really bad for people who don't have somebody there
for them, advocating for them. And then I guess, finally, encouraging, continuing
recovery post-hospital. I think I definitely understand that recovery doesn't
just end at the hospital, and ultimately, I think what I took away from this whole experience is trying to get to a place where, well, trying to get to a place where this doesn't really
happen like this again. Being able to identify stressors that are more triggers in Lauren's life and working on the relationship conflict and communication side of things, and having a plan, and involving a support network more. And maybe, I guess, above all, and I think Lauren
mentioned this in her video, I think early intervention
is really helpful. I think her going to the hospital probably earlier than she would have if she was living on her own, because I was there to be like, "This is not going well." If she had gone longer, then it would've taken her longer to get out of the hospital
and recover in the hospital. And so I think early
intervention is really important in terms of reducing the
severity of crises like this. I hope that this helped give a well-rounded and an honest look at what the experience was like supporting somebody through
a mental health crisis and in the hospital. And what that experience was really like. I feel like I'm going
to catch a lot of flak from Lauren's loving audience
(Lauren laughs) in terms of how I approached
the situation, and. - Go easy on him. He did his best, and I
am so appreciative of it. (both laugh) - Anyways, we made it through it, and I'm really grateful, and I learned a ton. And I'm glad that we are on the mend. So anyways, thank you for watching what is probably going to
be like the longest video ever on this channel. Thanks for watching. If you want to support the creation of future videos like this, make sure to check out our Patreon link in the description below. Thanks again for watching,
and have a great day. Bye. (mellow guitar music)
