Items Tagged With psychiatrist

I thought it would be helpful and informative to share good/bad psychiatrist or therapist stories.

We'll start out with my experiences...

My first experience with treatment was at the mental health clinic at the local hospital. I was fairly indifferent toward the first psychiatrist I had there, but I was unpleasantly jarred to find out that he was leaving after six months. Apparently they were on some sort of rotation. When I walked into the new psychiatrist's office, I immediately got a bad feeling. It looked like he felt this was a temporary situation, as the office was completely bare except for the desk and two chairs. The reason for my visit was to ask him to raise my medication, as I was feeling the familiar signs of depression after being fairly stable for a year. He never even looked at me, and only asked me one question to determine whether I was depressed again or not, "Do you have thoughts of harming yourself or others?" I said, "Well, no, but I never have, so that's not really an indication for me." He ignored all the signs of depression I was recounting and refused to raise my medication. I absolutely hated him, and wouldn't go back until he was gone six months later. This time when I walked into the new psychiatrist's office I was very wary, but the difference he had made in that cold office was amazing. I'm a little fuzzy on the specifics, but I immediately noticed that the place smelled great. He had air fresheners in the office that made you want to inhale when you walked in. He had prints on the walls and (I'm pretty sure) healthy plants. I may be just remembering the plants because he was such a nurturing person. He also had a photo of himself with a child on his bulletin board, which I took as a good sign. He was very accessible, listened to me, and ordered a blood test to find out the level of meds in my blood, which indeed was too low. He stayed longer than six months before moving on, and I was very sorry to see him go.