Sectioned in Hospital - 5 months 16 days

Written by Fox.

DAY 170 - 24th January, Friday

Keri's energy levels are actually pitiful. That's down to both her not eating (or eating and making herself sick) and the battle between her and Sally. They're the dominant ones at the moment. I'm sat here wondering how long it'll take before Keri's personality is completely suppressed and Sally takes over as the host personality. That would be terrible if that happened but Keri's losing a lot of strength just doing day to day things let alone doing extra things like visits etc. Her little brother is supposed to visit tomorrow. Keri is really looking forward to it but she's extremely tired. She didn't get up until midday. The only reason she got up was because they were waiting for her to go into ward round, she was the last person that Dr. Harland was due to see.

A few changes happened during her ward round. Her Diazepam dose has been lowered another 1mg so she's now down to 27mg in total during the day. Going well so far. She's been on Alder Unit since 2nd December and has managed to cut down by 3mg. Her observation levels were also changed. She's not on one to one anymore. Not good! I don't like this at all! She's taken a dip dive this evening and has been considering jumping over the fence herself let alone having Sally telling her that it's the best thing to do! She's got a CPA in a week. That's plenty of time for Sally to mess us all up. Let's face it, she's not going to not doing anything for a week if she knows she's got an hour to sneak off or cut Keri's body. Maybe that's what's been causing Keri to cry, she's had more crying episodes tonight; complete 'fuck life, I can't deal with this pain anymore, just kill me' kind of crying. I may not want to die, but I can't stand and watch Keri feel like this. So what do I do? Let her or Sally go and do something or keep trying to give Keri hope that just gets trampled on by Sally?

Keri ended up completely conking out on her bed for half an hour at about 10.15pm. It was almost like her passing out. She wasn't even lying on her bed properly. She was half on her bed with her legs off the bed, weird positioning. She definitely snored though for once! She was in a really deep sleep. Normally if she's snoring then you know she's not having a nightmare and is completely comatose. The problem is she was woken up at 10.45pm as she needed to have her medication so she had been asleep for half an hour. When she first woke up she felt a bit groggy but now she's completely wired and her crying is just... I don't know how to deal with it! How do you stop someone feeling suicidal?! Thankfully, it's nearly 3am and Keri hasn't gotten undressed yet as she's very strongly fighting between her own urges and Sally. I'm very grateful to Ade has gone out with Keri while she's been smoking tonight. Maybe the staff know what she's thinking. She's not talking very much and it's very hard getting even a smile out of her. The staff aren't idiots. She's not officially on one to one anymore but it is down to the nurses' discretion. I don't care whether it's coincidence or whether they're doing it deliberately but thank you for going out with her!

Her psychotherapy appointment consisted of talking about Sally. Fiona actually managed to get Keri down to Woodside which is the outpatient and therapies department. They went to Fiona's art psychotherapy room although Keri did no art, it was all psychotherapy. David had written a letter to Fiona that she'd read which is why most of the appointment was focused on how to deal with Sally. Fiona spoke about secure hospitals and whether it would be an idea to sacrifice two years to spend in a secure ward as it would mean Sally would end up having no choice but to start therapy, even if it started with her just coming out for ten minutes and throwing chairs across the room. Fiona talked about a couple of secure hospitals but the problem is they're quite far away! Plus the downside is that she'd be put in a ward with people with personality disorders. Apparently Keri's psychiatrist has refused the DID diagnosis, even though it's written all over Keri's care plan, treatment plan, admission papers, section papers... I think her psychiatrist sucks. And if Keri went to one of these secure wards she wouldn't get to see her foster carers very often, she wouldn't be able to see her mum very much (which she doesn't want taken away from her) and Fiona would no longer be her psychotherapist. The reason they spoke about secure wards is because they were talking about what Sally could do between now and her CPA in a week. 

Keri went on to our DID page and asked for advice and someone replied with a specialist centre in London that deals specifically with dissociative disorders on the NHS. Keri's doing her research. She wants to be clued up on all these places just in case Sally crosses a line. She's thinking suicide would be a lot easier. Otherwise her choices are bouncing between Alder and Lime Unit, or sacrificing two years before coming back to Alder to stay for another couple of years. It's all been really complicated and I think it's the only way to get Sally out. A lot of people say that she'll come out for therapy when she's ready but that's not going to happen. Keri's thinking "it will" but no. That's unrealistic. Where do we go from here when Sally is just focused on destroying everything? Relationships, leave, obs levels, Keri being able to deal with basic needs... It's just not working! And no one here has any idea how to help before something serious happens! It actually says on Keri's care plan that she's medium risk and death could be caused by "misadventure". Erm, no. For god's sake. Keri didn't have an issue but I do. Death would be caused by suicide. Whoever wrote that is an idiot. That's almost challenging Sally. We don't need anymore complications!

Sectioned in Hospital - Day 113, 114 & 115

Written by Fox.

DAY 113, 114 & 115 - 28th, 29th & 30th November, Thursday, Friday & Saturday

I went to visit Alder Unit with our psychotherapist on Thursday! It seems a very nice place. I wanted to see it for myself so the psychotherapist was kind enough to arrange that she could take me over, and also introduce me to the staff so they knew who I was. Most of the time we were with a guy called Matt who seemed really down to earth and was quick to cotton on to the fact I didn't talk. It was nice having the psychotherapist there as she could explain things a lot quicker than me having to write it all down. All in all I think we will like it in that unit, but it could cause some problems with the sudden freedom.

Keri didn't get up until 2pm on Friday. Even when the physio came in and tried getting Keri to do her exercises! She still refused to move. She gave the shock machine (whatever it's called) to the physio as the battery was running low. According to her it was working fine, bearing in mind it had been sat on Keri's bedside table all night. Fifteen minutes after Keri had put it on for the day and the battery thing started flashing again so she ended up buying some more batteries. She's keeping the receipt so she can get reimbursed after seeing how expensive the batteries were!

Keri had her psychotherapy session on Friday even though it was planned that I was going to attend. The truth was, we were all way too tired. Sally sucks all the energy out of us when she's going to do something and the rest of us are just left feeling like vegetables. The psychotherapist explained my alter map to Keri. I'd drawn out a map of our alters (Keri didn't even know about most of them) and Keri had seen it but not understood it. She explained what I'd done and what we'd spoken about when I'd had appointments with her. Keri was still confused by the end of it but it was explained as well as it could have been!

She didn't risk any unescorted leave yesterday as Sally was very restless and Keri was scared about what might happen if she went out. She asked the staff if she could have escorted leave to the supermarket (she's only allowed ground leave on her own anyway). The nurse said she was taking another patient out and that she could come along if she wanted. It was planned that one nurse was going to take both Keri and the other patient but it was later decided before leaving that another nurse should go because of Keri's risk level. It's a bit silly as she's moving to Alder Unit soon.

That night was bad! Keri had all her medication, and her sleeping medication, and by 4.30am she was still pacing and unsettled so she ended up being given some Lorazepam. That didn't work either! So she's had no sleep besides the point when she quite literally collapsed on her floor at around 10am. The staff were unable to give her any medication as she was out for the count! She woke up in the recovery position a few hours later but I've no idea whether the staff did that or whether Keri did it subconsciously.

So this afternoon Sally decided to screw us all over. I did wonder what she was going to do as we'd all felt so drained. She decided to cut open Keri's wrist again except she took it a step too far. She needed 16 stitches just for one cut, each having to be doubled over because of the depth. Keri was very lucky to find the cut when she did. Given the chance Sally would've cut it deeper and would've likely hit some serious blood vessels or a vein etc.

While at the hospital the nurse who escorted her said she was lucky she hadn't been moved to ECH. Apparently due to Keri's self harm there had been much discussion about it, especially due to the length of time we've been sectioned. For those that don't know, ECH is the secure female ward for patients that are deemed too dangerous to be in an average acute ward. You can't have pens, CDs, headphones, anything electronic, you're constantly on 5 minute observation, you're confined to the ward and the garden is kept locked until the patients are allowed to smoke every hour, plus there are alarms covering all the fences so even if a patient touches one the alarms go off, the fences are also ten feet tall rather than on Lime Unit where they're only about eight feet. We found out that the only reason she hadn't been moved is because most of her coping techniques would've been removed. She wouldn't be allowed her laptop for movies, she wouldn't be able to have her phone to text or chat, she wouldn't be allowed her iPad for games, she wouldn't be allowed her internet, she wouldn't be able to write due to the fact she wouldn't be allowed a pen, and she wouldn't have her iPod which she uses when the voices she hears (including us talking inside) are getting too loud for her to bare. That was a massive shock to me when I heard it, especially as they're moving her to the rehab ward! The nurse even said "If this carries on then we'll be seeing you again, if you're not put on ECH". Reassuring huh?

I doubt Keri will sleep much tonight but here's hoping! She's just had her evening medication and is likely to go and sit in the communal area for a while. She's taken off her shock machine now so hopefully she can cope otherwise she's going to end up in another medication induced coma...