@Cristine Karapetyan here’s one I did.

Messing with AI.

I’ve been to quite a large number of psychiatric hospitals in my life. I had my first experience of psychiatric incarceration at just 15 years old, that was 20 years ago. At one point, my insurance disclosed to me that I had had over 70 hospitalizations in my record. That was 2 years ago, I believe I have 80 or so now. Reflecting a lot on all these experiences—not just being a frequent flyer, but being held captive in these supposed safe havens where I was supposed to get "care"—I do feel that psychiatric hospitals are a cell. It tells their patients, all these people who are diagnosed with mental illnesses, that they are wrong for having human experiences and the human emotions that go along with it, and that they need to be less emotional, less unique, less them because being who they are is disruptive and problematic and makes people uncomfortable. We are not robots. We are allowed to have complex feelings, grief, shame, anger, resentment, we are allowed to cry and numb our pain if that is what we need in the moment to survive the experience. Here is what that reality actually looks like: The Myth of Care: It is a medical facility, not a therapeutic one. It only does that one side of complex care, focusing purely on medication management rather than true therapeutic value. Punishment as Treatment: It uses medication as a punishment and a threat. If you are perceived as too sick, noncompliant, aggressive, or even just loud, they will chemically restrain you. That is deeply traumatic: having multiple people hold you down as they come at you with a needle, pull down your pants of all things, and inject you there, taking away your ability to be present and aware as they disregard your autonomy. Ignoring External Realities: None of our coping mechanisms are "good" or "bad"—they just are. We are surviving the best ways we know how. It’s not just a matter of willpower or being put into a locked ward for a week and being reprogrammed with toxic positivity while being talked down to. We need to look at the external sense of safety, not just the internal. Poverty, food insecurity, job insecurity, family stress, overwhelm with children, relationships, grief, peer pressure, and addiction are what cripple us.

Hey everyone, just wanted to remind you that there's a meeting today at 3pm Pacific. Hope to see some of you there if you can make it. It's on Skool this week. 🙂 Let's Unlock the Psych Ward Doors!

I met Cristine through her HeyPeers group, Unlock the Psych Ward Doors — Peer Support for Psychiatric Harm, Psychiatric Incarceration, Societal Constructs, and Oppressive Mental Health Systems. I had a singular experience as a voluntary psychiatric hospital patient. My experience there was a bad one due to another patient who was very intimidating. I was fearful the entire time I was there, and my anxiety ended up being worse than it was before I went there. I came to Cristine’s group to hear the experiences of others and was quite startled by the horrific treatment that many people have received in psychiatric hospitals. Cristine is a most compassionate person and truly understands the trauma that people have experienced. She listens, gives excellent feedback, and is a true advocate for people with mental illness. I have learned a great deal from her about things I never imagined were going on. Cristine gives of herself in a remarkable way by sharing her life experiences and providing us with a safe place to discuss these things. I feel that anyone can benefit from this group, even those who have not experienced mental illness or psychiatric incarceration. There is much to be learned and understood in this area by the general public. There are things going on that people simply do not know about. There are also people working in the mental healthcare field who should not be there. I am grateful that I found this group. Otherwise, I would not know how awful involuntary psychiatric incarceration can be. This has given me a burden for such people, and I pray daily for them to be set free—free from sin and condemnation through Jesus Christ, free and healed from mental illness, and free from mental incarceration so that they may live a free life in the world.