The mind is your best ally. The right attitude can help you overcome the biggest challenges and achieve the most challenging goals. However, it can also become your main enemy. Worries, obsessions, fears, impulses and ruminative thoughts can drag you downhill.
Psychological disorders are insidious, so it is not always easy to recognize them. Every day you can sink a little deeper into depression, succumb to the impulses of addiction or allow yourself to be convinced by the lies that anxiety tells you. When you finally realize you have a problem, it has likely been brewing for months or even years.
In many cases, conventional therapy is not enough to get out of that hole. If the environment in which you find yourself feeds the disorder in some way, it is necessary to escape its influence. Entering a psychiatric clinic may be the best option since it will not only allow you to get out of that potentially toxic environment, but it will also help you gain perspective and receive anti-crisis treatment to begin to regain control of your life.
The key symptoms that indicate you should enter a psychiatric clinic
“Unlike doctor’s appointments or admission to a hospital, visiting a mental health facility or psychiatric institution can be stressful and frightening. This reluctance is due to multiple reasons, including the stigma associated with former sanatoriums and psychiatric hospitals or the uncertainty about what will happen during the visit.”
“In addition, many people are not clear about when they should ask for help or do not know the signs that indicate that it is necessary to enter these facilities.” Based on their extensive experience, these rehabilitation clinics points out some of the symptoms that you should pay attention to as they usually require psychiatric hospitalization:
1. You have stopped taking care of yourself. Many psychiatric conditions lead to self-abandonment. When your mind is disoriented, it is difficult to pay attention to your basic needs. If you can’t take care of yourself, you have neglected your hygiene and diet, or you don’t go to class or work, you probably need help to get out of that loop.
2. Your sleep and/or appetite patterns have changed drastically. Life changes such as moving, starting a new job, or having a baby often disrupt our sleeping or eating habits. However, when we adapt to the new situation, we recover our usual patterns. If those fluctuations seem to come out of nowhere, they could be a warning sign. Sleeping too much or too little, as well as losing your appetite or having uncontrollable hunger are often symptoms of more serious mental illnesses, such as depression, anxiety or eating disorders that may require psychiatric treatment.
3. You think about harming yourself or others. Suicidal ideations or self-harming behaviors should not be taken lightly and require urgent psychiatric intervention. Therefore, if you are experiencing great emotional distress and feel the urge to harm yourself in some way or think about harming other people, it is better you seek help as soon as possible.
4. You have an overwhelming feeling of hopelessness. Sometimes it is normal to feel sad, unmotivated, and without energy, but if that feeling turns into despair, helplessness, or an inability to envision a positive future, it may be a sign of major depressive disorder and not simply stress. Therefore, it is a clear sign that you need psychological help.
5. You suffer extreme mood swings. It is perfectly natural that some days you feel better than others. However, drastic changes in mood, going from euphoria to sadness or anger, affect your ability to relate to others and cope with your daily activities. If you feel like you can’t control how you feel and it is affecting your well-being, you should search psychiatric care.
6. You can’t fulfill your daily obligations. When mental health problems worsen, they tend to affect your performance. If facing day-to-day life becomes increasingly difficult for you and routine activities such as getting out of bed, cooking, or going to work or school seem like an impossible mission, you should consider entering a psychiatric clinic so that you can rest and rediscover your balance.
7. You have isolated yourself socially. Some people enjoy solitude. In fact, time alone is healthy for resting and recharging your batteries. But spending too much time alone leads to isolation and breaks down social support networks. If the activities you once enjoyed have lost their appeal and you have become disconnected from friends and family, you may be suffering from depression, addiction, or bipolar disorder, therefore you should ask for help.
8. You have suffered a trauma or been subjected to severe stress. Traumatic events leave marks on the brain that are difficult to erase and can lead to post-traumatic stress disorder. If you have been through a highly stressful situation, have trouble concentrating, are easily scared, are always on defense or cannot find peace of mind, you should consider an emergency psychiatric hospitalization to break those connections that are affecting your well-being.
9. You suffer from an addiction. Many people turn to drugs, alcohol, or even gambling as a way to relieve emotional pain, but doing so only exacerbates their problems. If you have tried to quit the addiction, but you can’t and end up succumbing to your impulses, psychiatric confinement could be the only option to get out of that loop once and for all. In fact, consider that some substances can cause a severe withdrawal syndrome that requires medical monitoring.
10. You have hallucinations or delusions. Experiencing hallucinations (seeing, hearing, or feeling things that are not there) or delusions (false beliefs about oneself, others, or other things) are often symptoms of psychotic disorders such as schizophrenia. Since you often lose touch with reality, it is important to trust those around you to help you identify what is real from what is not.
From the rehabilitation clinis they explain that treatment plans in psychiatric units vary according to each patient. However, they generally combine the prescription of medications to emotionally and physically stabilize the person with psychotherapy sessions that provide them with the tools they need to face their difficulties.
Where appropriate, they take a multidisciplinary, holistic and highly personalized approach to provide top-quality care. In fact, a study conducted at the University of Washington confirmed that patient-centered care during inpatient psychiatric treatment, improves long-term outcomes and facilitates therapeutic adherence.
Some clinics are located in natural spaces to promote an environment of maximum privacy that promotes calm and combine psychological treatment with leisure, artistic and gym activities in order to promote deep recovery since there is increasing evidence that the appropriate environment can facilitate emotional recovery.
If you are not clear about the seriousness of your situation, listen to those around you. If your partner, children, family or friends have begun to express concerns about your mental health, it may be a good idea to resort to psychiatric hospitalization. Remember that people with mental disorders can lead full lives. Help from mental health professionals can make a difference.
References:
Shields, M. et. Al. (2023) Patient-centered inpatient psychiatry is associated with outcomes, ownership, and national quality measures. Health Affairs Scholar; 1(1): qxad017.
Weber, C. et. Al. (2021) Patients’ Health & Well-Being in Inpatient Mental Health-Care Facilities: A Systematic Review. Front Psychiatry; 12: 758039.
Nathan, R. et. Al. (2021) Use of Acute Psychiatric Hospitalisation: A Study of the Factors Influencing Decisions to Arrange Acute Admission to Inpatient Mental Health Facilities. Sec. Social Psychiatry and Psychiatric Rehabilitation; 12: 10.3389.
