One teen's experience of 'isolating'

mental health provision

W E D N E S DAY 05 NOVEMBER 2014

As a new report points out serious failings in children's mental health
services, one teenager tells Channel 4 News about being sent to A&E by his
headteacher and told to stop "blackmailing" teachers.

The photo above is posed by a model (Getty)

Sam* was 15 when he was treated for suicidal thoughts and psychotic
hallucinations. Over the course of nine months he was seen by two
psychiatrists and two therapists, having to start from scratch with
treatment each time.

"It was a constant cycle of ups and downs with mood," he told Channel 4
News. "Your therapy gets into the same cycle as your symptoms. It was a
repetitive cycle of not getting anywhere."

Hi school in Birmingham wasn't much better. "When I was suicidal, I would

often break down in school. I would tell my form teacher: 'I'm really
struggling, I feel close to crisis'," he says now. "He referred me to the
headteacher, because he didn't know how to deal with me. The head got
very angry and asked why I was blackmailing my teachers."

Read more on Victoria Macdonald's blog: 'Serious problems' in

children's mental health services
During one particularly bad episode, in which he says he was hallucinating,
talking a lot, and "wasn't really in touch with reality", the school called an
ambulance and he was sent to A&E.

They said he couldn't come back until he was "stable" and he became an
in-patient over Easter - just before his GCSEs. At this mental health hospital,
he didn't come into contact with any health professionals for 12 whole days.
"It was an incredibly emotional time," he said. "It's very isolating, especially
when you don't have the nurses there or the professionals who aren't
supposed to be designated to you."

Sarah Brennan, chief executive of YoungMinds on the health select

committee report on child and adolescent mental health services: "For far
too long we have heard over and over again from young people and their
families about the overwhelming distress caused by lack of access to
mental health services.

"We have been told countless times of the intense frustration of mental
health professionals as they attempt to do their best for children, young
people and their families who are suffering on a daily basis. We hear from
teachers facing a tidal wave of mental health problems, and deep
frustration from professionals and commissioners asking us how can they
plan and deliver services when information on the scale of young people's
mental health problems is ten years out of date and their resources are
devastated.
"The health select committee report proves beyond all doubt that children
and young people's mental health services are facing a major crisis. The
publication of this report must be a pivotal moment in addressing this crisis,
our response has got to change, no longer can we sit back and pretend this
isn't happening."
Now 19, he says his treatment improved significantly once he was on the
right anti-psychotic drugs. He was able to go and take his GCSEs and Alevels.

But he welcomes today's report, particularly the call for more teacher
training and more joined up care, with communication between the various
strands of CAMHS (child and adolescent mental health services) support.

"The people I saw and my teachers, they wanted to help and wanted the
best for me," he said. "But it was a case of not knowing where to turn.
"Training on that and more confidence from teachers to know where to go
would mean the situation could be handled much better."

*Name has been changed

Posted by Thavam