So I've been known as a bitch before and that's ok. Usually it's because I've called someone on their bs and they get mad and butt hurt about it. One reason I think you can call me a bitch is because yes I admit it, sometimes I laugh at other people's pain (especially if it came about in an unusual or funny way) or in their craziness. Now I know that most people cannot control the fact that there are imbalances in the chemical make up of their minds and they cannot control what psychiatric problems they have. I also acknowledge the fact that some people have had traumatic things happen in their lives or that they were mistreated in some way that caused them to act the way they are. These people are actually legit and I do not laugh at them or about them, I hope these people truly get the help they need. I'm not that heartless people. Then there's the people that aren't crazy or anything and are nothing more than attention seeking jerks. These jerks I have issues with, they give the others a bad name.
When it comes to the "crazy" people or our behavioral calls there's the normal calls we get and then every once in awhile we'll get one that's just amazing. Whenever we get psychiatric calls they usually come out on the radio as "behavioral" or if the person has suicidal thoughts then obviously it will come out as suicidal or suicidal attempt.
Let me explain something real quick. Now in our state if a person says five magical words then by law they are going to the hospital. These words being "I want to hurt myself" or "I want to hurt *insert name of person". Once these words are mentioned a person can no longer refuse care and has to be taken in. They get to choose their ride of course. They can choose between the back of the nice police car in handcuffs that doesn't cost them anything, or they can go in the back of the nice ambulance that either they will pay for or the tax payers will pay for. It's always an amazing feeling taking someone in knowing that I'm paying for their ride with my taxes. Believe it or not once these words are mention no matter how much you promise that you don't mean it or you won't actually kill yourself or someone else we cannot leave you wherever we picked you up. This concept seems to boggle people's minds. Look people I don't know you (it's rare that I know someone I pick up) and there's no way I'm going to take the word of some stranger that they won't hurt themselves after making statements or trying to cut themselves so just man up and take the ride.
Now lately there's been an increase of people with suicidal ideations (SI). These are usually people who just have thoughts of suicide with no attempt or plan of killing themselves. These people can be broken up into four subcategories.
The first category would be the "I want to die because my *insert significant other* doesn't love me any more" These lovely and smart people (even I can't help the seething sarcasm) believe that if they say they are going to kill themselves, or take pills or cut themselves, then their significant other will come runing back to them because they will magically see the error of their ways. Of course this usually doesn't work and instead they get a nice little ambulance ride to the hospital.
The second category is the "My parents don't love me, won't let me do whatever activity, are making me do chores or something else so I want to kill myself to make them feel sorry" Yes these are actually somewhat popular at least around here. We get various aged teenagers that decide their parents are "so unfair" because they won't let them go to parties, or stay out past their curfews, or make them do their chores so they decide to take pills or drink nail polish remover (not making that up). Or these kids think that their parents don't care enough for them so what better way to show them they care than to pop pills or cut themselves.
The third category would be the people that are suicidal because they are in jail or are in police custody and believe that saying so will get them out of said jail. These people suffer from what we like to call incarceritis (the allergic reaction of being in police custody) The funny thing is they don't release that all it does is gets them a bed in a hospital for a few hours with their own personal guard and handcuffs. They will still go back to jail and still have to deal with the cops.
And the fourth lovely type of suicidal person is the attention seeking jerkoff. These are people that decide they want attention from someone and so they decide to take pills, scratch themselves, or just call 911. These people are not really suicidal they just want someone to give them attention and would never actually kill themselves. They are usually whiney and can't understand why we are annoyed at them. They even tell us that they really aren't suicidal really, they just want someone to listen to them.I have taken in many of these kinds of people my favorite's response when asked why he was suicidal was "Why not?" as he proceeded to laugh at me.
I guess a fifth subcategory for suicidal people would be the famous drunk suicidal. These are people that when sober have no need or want to kill themselves, but as soon as they are drunk decide the world is too horrible to live in and want to die.
When this happens the hospitals can't do an evaluation for possible admittance to a psych hospital until they are sober. By then they usually are released because they are no longer depressed. It's all the alcohol, go figure.
For some reason people think that if they overdose, and by overdose I mean actually taking a lot of a pill not taking one or two more than the directions say to, on over the counter medications such as tylenol (or tylenol pm is very popular) or ibuprofen or benedryl that they aren't doing any harm and they will get the desired response out of their target. Let me set the record straight. If you take enough tylenol you can actually die. If you take enough tylenol or ibuprofen that you actually kill yourself in the attempt then you will die in the most unpleasent and long lasting death you could ever dream of. There is an antidote for tylenol overdose but if not given in time the person is screwed, there is no antidote for ibuprofen. Tylenol deaths are long and painful, you start breathing very quickly because your body now has way too much acid in it's blood stream. Your liver and kidneys star to shut down and usually in three to four days you are dead. That is after they place a tube down your throat to help you breath, you're stuck with so many needles, and various other things, and the last thing you will remember before you die is pain. The same goes for ibuprofen overdoses, so yeah let's all go pop pills.
There's so much more I want to say about behavorial calls, some are actually very interesting, but I think I'll save it for part two.
*Side note: Ok so it came to my attention I may have sounded cold and heartless with this post. Let me try and explain. I am not a cold heartless person. I truly got into this profession in order to help people. I do realise that my veiw points seem harsh. Unfortunately in this job we are over run with bullshit calls. We are abused by people who believe we are nothing more than a glorified taxi here to do everything they say. I truly believe that there are people out there that both need and want help. That they call us for this reason. For the people that want help and are not able to find it any where else but to call us I have sympathy. For the people that really are depressed and feel they are at the end of their rope and the only way they can get help is to call us, I have compassion. For the people that act in any of the above ways mentioned in this post I have issues with. I have lost friends to suicide, I have people that I care about who are actually depressed and have mental issues. I have problems with people who want attention and want sympathy from people and believe that they deserve to have others bow down to them and give them everything they want. It is not a crutch, it is not a bargaining chip. It is a disease.
I do realise that what I say and how exactly it is meant may not be the same thing. Through out this blog I will do my best to make the reader understand truly how I feel but there will always be some loss in translation, and there will always be some loss if the reader has never been in this profession. I can't fix that. So there, I tried.
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