The mental health unit ...

My BIL is a mental health nurse (IMO he is better off in the ward, but another story), they do seperate as to the situation and depends on the wards and who is in the ward at the time.

Hi Kels,

Been there last year with my brother! Its a scary time so if you need to talk to anyone about it then pm me!

If your family member is at Middlemore then there is a highrisk wing which if you go visit then you walk into one door get that locked behind you empty pockets etc of anything dangerous, nail files, lighters etc and then you can go into the ward. When visiting you are taken into a room and they generally only allow two visitors at a time (how my brother got past that I don't know). My brother was having visions of grandeur, a little bit of psychosis, was quite hyper, his thoughts were racy his own words he didn't stop talking for a good 24hrs. Mum and dad rung me to tell me and put him on the phone to me as he wanted to apologise to me about all the "bad" things him and my other brothers did to me as a kid. (Like I care now!)

I'm not going to lie there are some scary people in there, he had his id bracelet taken from him by another patient and she tried to contact him when he came home, it was treated as very serious by the staff as well. He was scared himself, there was an incident involving another patient in there and he ended up calling home in tears to talk to mum it set him off so bad. Luckily the staff recognised he was better a little bit and transferred him into the other wing which was less secure. You still had seperate rooms to visit in but much less relaxed and lower risk in this wing, mostly young guys they had freedom to roam and watch tv, and bro used to play the piano etc.

Like I said pm me Kells, as we're still dealing with this now, he hasn't been back since the initial visit but he has had lapses and we have had to be very careful what we say around him and to him. He thought that if we spoke in a low voice we were talking about him and he hated this! This is a year after the initial event. My brother too would be very heightened and then would snap back and be very logical it really just depended. His friends found it very hard to see him in there as well and didn't know what to expect.

(on a complete side note, we have a mutual friend irl who doesn't know this stuff as yet as we didn't think to tell her, although we don't keep it a secret)

Susie and Kells its hard, just be there for him, and as hard as it is just listen and be there. That's all we could do with my brother. He started telling us how we were all heroes to him and all this sort of stuff its hard to see the ups and downs. My poor parents have been struggling with this my dad being sick me being pregnant and my older brother due with his first in 6weeks. Plus more.

DP and I are believers that it was the chemical drugs that helped bring this on for him. We found out when he was admitted that he had been doing magic mushrooms two days before he had his first episode. The staff really do care, and if he is lucky enough to get the Dr my brother had he seemed to click with this man then things will be ok. It is a long hard road we are still travelling it and it is far from easy but you never know what will happen. It may only take a week for him to come out of the high security ward as this is how long it took my brother and he was hardwork. High strung and emotional etc.