I was ready to end it all. I felt as if there was no help left. The belt was wrapped around my neck. While tears poured down my face, it hit me that I needed help. Soon after, I admitted myself to The Pinnacle Pointe Behavioral Hospital. I went there for help to make it through, but I left with a forever nightmare.
Sometimes we make the wrong choices, and need the appropriate discipline to get us back on track. I was there due to depression and anxiety, but being there increased my symptoms. I expected well-trained professionals and people who cared and wanted to make a difference. My expectations and what I got were no where similar to each other.
I arrived there scared to death. They took my mom into another room for questioning. After the talk with a councilor, my mom came out. Red eyed and sniffling, it was quite obvious she had been crying. They told me to tell her my goodbyes. With strongly grasped hugs and repeated I love youÓs, we went our separate ways. I was sent with a tall black gentleman. He had previously taken me to a room, while my mom was in with the councilor. There he had went through all my belongings, weighed me, and had taken away my shoe strings, bra, and make-up. He took me to an elevator that only worked by key. We went to the second floor...Third...Then we exited on the fourth. From there he once again opened another door with a key. There we stood in a quite long hall, similar to a regular hospital. The reek of 409, urine, and latex filled the air. I felt more alone then ever.
I was once again taken to another room. This time I was strip searched and my vital signs were checked. After all the long and harsh sessions, I got sent to my room. It was small, with lightly shaded blue padded walls. Two beds were placed along opposite walls. The floor was brown from dirt and god knows what. The bed was terribly small and stained with blood and urine from past visitors. It was hells front door steps. I was suppose to have a roommate. Instead the staff got a kick out of making a joke out of my age, claiming that it would be statutory rape to give me a roommate. I was constantly criticized and bullied. Whats worse was it was always the staff. They told me it was stupid to be as upset as I was. They laughed at my Christian beliefs and judged everything about me.
My schedule consisted of hating myself more, crying, and praying to God to help me escape. Finally, by chance, I got a roommate. She was slightly shorter than me, blond short hair, and she was wearing boy clothes. She spoke. Her voice was deep without fear showing. It was the first time I had talked to anyone else. She had been there for ten days and had only seen a therapist twice. My worse fear was that I'd be there forever. When I was finally allowed to see the doctor, he didn't even look at me. He asked five questions, prescribed antidepressants and walked out. From my whole experience there i just got medication.
I finally got taken out because my mom couldn't afford it anymore. The funding to that hospital was very limited. Staff was cruel and very uneducated, the food tasted of cardboard and paper, and the facility was poorly taken care of. Everyday kids who are taking life for the worse, live suffering through the life there. It is suppose to be a place of peace and healing, not more pain and hatred. It should become an awareness of what is going on there and help should be established.