Embarrassment with the police while being sectioned

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NB: to those that don't know, "sectioning" is being involuntarily committed to a psych ward

About four weeks ago I was sectioned on a section 136 of the Mental Health Act 1983 (I am on a section 2 (of the MHA 1983) now, having Christmas leave though). I was taken in a police van to the section 136 suite etc etc but when the police brought me into the seclusion room there, they started removing things off me. Headband, shoes, belt, ok, but then they said I had to take my bra off! I was freaking out completely because of the Voices and paranoia. Then suddenly a policewoman unhooked my bra underneath my t-shirt. She took it off, and I wouldn't have minded so much if there weren't male police officers there. I felt humiliated having my bra removed in front of male police officers, even if it was all done under my t-shirt. And all that time a male police officer was restraining me

Do you think this was right?

Because they were even suggesting to take my trousers off me because of the cord! Luckily I got to keep them otherwise I'd have been half naked

I kept yelling to them that I felt humiliated but they ignored me

Also, they completely disregarded my sensory hypersensitivities. And they put me in handcuffs really tight. When the psych assessed me in the seclusion room, he thought I had been self-harming, but that was in fact the marks left from the handcuffs

What were the circumstances that lead for the police to detain you under those powers?

Did they have reasonable suspicion that you may attempt to harm yourself while detained?

At the end of the day they can potentially justify their actions in that they were preventing you having access to materials you could use to harm/kill yourself and that while some violation of your person was involved and restraint was used it was carried out in the best interests of your safety. At the end of the day the police would rather not have to deal with your dead body in the morning they would rather you were alive.

I'm not saying that as my opinion. I'm giving you the perspective of what the police would probably say to justify their actions. I'm not saying its right or moral. But clearly there are three sides to every story and depending on your experiance of being sectioned before. (i.e. if this was your first time, I imagine it was pretty damn scary to say the least) and the circumstances in which you were sectioned theres only so much that people can go on to advice you on your situation.

Do you have access to anyone who can advocate for you or represent you that you have trust in?

The handcuffs I can understand. Theve put them on too tight and done you damage as a consequence. It's not ideal but when the adrenalin is pumping and the shite has hit the fan its not always easy to get everything 100% right or do the correct procedure. I've been on the police officers end of dealing with similair incidents were a person with AS and BPD tried to stab me with a broken wine bottle as he was between me and the door of the secure unit I was working in at the time.

Its no justification, because that can cause damage to the circulation in your hands and wrists. But it is an explaination of why such a circumstance occurred during the whole incident.

As for the circumstances of your section all I can say is You were definatly several lettace short of an allotment that night (no offence)

In some countries they'd of just pulled out a firearm and shot you if you came at them with a weapon like that mentally ill or not.

Well sorry to read about your crisis with paranoia/psychosis its not cool to go through. Hopefully things will pick up for you in 2011.

Good to see you've got a friend who's able to articulate a letter of concern/complaint on your behalf. The worst thing is to be alone and have nobody in the "system"

Yes, sadly its not a good prognosis old Paranoia Schitzophrenia. The odds are stacked against you in terms of controlling and managing the condition and being able to get on with your life.

However, if you have the tenacity to have made it this far in 7 years then clearly you haven't quite wained in your will yet. It's as much an internal determination to battle the conflict and turbulance that goes through your mind as much as it is the drugs or therapy/treatment that give you the tools to get to an even playing field.

Theres no need to apologise for ranting. It's a pretty shite stack of cards you've been dealt.

Well in order to suffer an illness of the mind, you have to have a mind usually

The nature of the condition is that you usually always will have cycles of being in and out of mental health services. Even people who manage with careers etc still struggle with the condition, but the fact such people exist in the first place should give you an indication that it is possible to come to some kind of half way in your mind were you can go from there. Though I guess ultimately its only yourself who can really come to any kind of inner peace or mutual agreement with whatever demons or thoughts exist in your mind.

Oh I know all too well about the strength of adrenalin, having been involved in having to restrain people in the past (not something I envied or enjoyed in the slightest) So not suprised the police had to use such strength in order to gain control of the situation.

I can't imagine its much fun suffering from such a condition. As I can see my relatives have spent most of their life combating their own issues although theve all managed to find a niche for themselves. Its difficult to relate to something that I've not directly experianced but ive seen in others so im not sure what insight i can offer you in that respect.

I didn't work in a ward as such I worked in a low secure unit which was ran by a private sector company. They were awful employers, awful management, the staff under me were great people but we were lead by incompetant half wits and some just down right dangerously incompetant people.

The people I worked with had personality disorders and autism though so its not neccesarily that I can compare their circumstances to you. A lot of the crisis that we dealt with I could point to a trigger point being something so simple and stupid that someone had done. I used to point out all the time the way the support workers would behave (And some of the other nurses too) like walking into a young autistic girls bedroom without knocking on the door or seeing if she would actually like them to come in. No just walk on in turn the lights on or whatever. There was no consideration of the human emotions this non verbal autistic girl might be feeling. Away from her parents for the first time in her life, in a strange environment with strange people and we couldn't even make simple considerations like not knocking on the door and respecting her personal space.

Then the staff wondered why she would get upset try to ripp peoples hair out and coming screaming down the hall way like a wailing banshee and wrestle five grown adults to the floor.

So you know the fault lay more with us not understanding these people. Whereas with your situation its an internal conflict and the solution doesnt neccesarily lay in solutions of what others can do to help you but rather its something that you wrestle with internally.

My background isn't in mental health so I'm not really confident on advicing you how to deal with these thoughts and drives within you. It sounds like something most people would be terrified of dealing with. Perhaps if it is effecting your life so badly you should consider anything on offer such as CBT or even the old ECT? Though I doubt that really has any effect other then to cause brain damage and trauma (ECT that is not CBT)

Don't mean to put a damp squid on this conversation. But I think in conclusion I couldn't really help you. In so much as I don't really know what internally helps a person with your issues come to terms with themselves or find a way of coming to terms with these forces that operate inside your mind.

I'm a person on the outside looking in not a person on the inside looking out so to speak. If I had personal experiance of schitzophrenia i'd be more then happy to openly share my thoughts. But seeing as i don't and my background is more in autism and learning disability then it is mental health i'm not so sure i have any knowledge that can be of use to you?

By all means I can listen, I can discuss with you your issues. But beyond that I'm not sure what use I am to you really. But i'd rather be honest and openly say that rather then give you a false hope of some kind of clarity you are looking for.

But all the best. Being that I'm from the same melting pot city as yourself i'm sure at some point I may come across you, hopefully you'l make it through your course and be a pharmacist that would be pretty cool and more clever then what I do (pays good as well)

You haven't put any pressure on me. I'd just rather be upfront and not mislead you on in any way that I don't have any magical powers to render the dark forces in your mind inert.

What I can offer you, as I said before, is if you want someone whos anonymous to your situation to listen to the issues you face I don't mind hearing them. You know where I am on this site if you need an objective view on a situation your in or just someone to listen.

Same goes for anyone else who's reading this thread too.

I'd rather people talk to someone about whats going on then internalise their struggles. So I'm offering to be that person if they feel a need to do so.

Without reading the control and restraint policies of the metropolitan police I can't really answer that question directly. Thats for the police to answer.

Given the context of the situation that lead to you being restrained i.e. trying to stab them with a knife. They may well have felt you still presented a danger and were still in a volitile state. If however they had control of the situation and they were simply twisting your arm to silence you or any other trivial reason then they engaged in act of abuse/brutality that is a cause for concern.

I wasn't a witness to the incident your describing so its difficult to judge either way

Its interesting how you can look back on such an incident and identify the psychosis you were experiancing at the time. It must leave you in quite a vulnerable state as you recall such incidents it must be difficult to discern what was the actual reality of what took place and what was part of your mind at work. And I guess in some respects your looking for some kind of reassurance of what you feel was distressing treatment. I don't think anyone actually enjoys the act of being restrained...well no thats a lie. There are people I've worked with who sought out restraint as it was the only human contact they had ever known with one or two it was even sexual gratification to be quite blunt.

In some respects its no suprise that people such as yourself are at such high risks of abuse or mistreatment in mental health services or out in the public. If your memory of events can be called into question then your word does not carry equal weight to someone else.

Thats quite a scary prospect actually

It may very well be that the police mistreated you inappropriately. However it may also be the case that you perhaps percieved you were treated badly due to the state of mind you were in at the time. Its difficult to reach a conclusion one way or the other.

I'd like to think the police did the best they could under difficult circumstances. But i've never been particularly impressed with the police i've come across in the past who dealt with people out in the public who had learning disability and mental health problems were they were more then happy to say it was someone elses job or responsibility. Or to leave a vulnerable adult with more then enough medication to overdose himself outside the local court house who was in a seriously depressed state.