Boris Johnson has announced plans to put more funding into the NHS to help with mental health. His plans include the Greater Manchester Mental Health NHS Foundation Trust receiving £72.3m to build an adult mental health inpatient unit in Prestwich. For many people, that can be the difference between life and death. In 2017, 5,821 suicides were registered in the UK, and that figure does not take into account the high number of people who attempted it. Here, 22-year-old Carly Beech reveals how she felt spectacularly let down by the underfunded NHS and why more money is needed if more lives are going to be saved.
I was fourteen when started to feel ‘upset’. I was stressed about school, my dad had moved out and I’d suffered a complete loss of self-confidence. Most days, I’d be moody and irritable. I cried more than I’d ever done before, and once I’d started, I couldn’t stop. But ‘upset’ was the only word I could find to describe it.
Eventually, those occasional feelings became a constant state of mind, one I never understood. To numb my feelings, I began to self-harm. It started off every few weeks, but it soon became most days.
At home, if the smallest thing bothered me I’d start again. I felt a release every time, it was like my own little secret. But after a year of doing it, I realised I needed help.
One afternoon when I was around 15, I was picking up my contraception from the doctors when I mentioned my feelings to a nurse. It was the first time I’d ever spoken to a health professional about my situation and I’d hoped she would tell me how to stop – or at least give me some kind of reassurance.
Unfortunately, it didn’t seem to register with her. Her response was one I’d heard far too many times: “Wait until you grow up, that’s when life gets really hard.” I left thinking no one would ever take me seriously.
A year or so later my self-harm cuts were spotted by my teacher, who reported it, and I was called into a meeting. After a long discussion, my head of college referred me to the Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAHMS) and while I waited for an appointment, I was told that if I ever felt low or needed to talk to someone, I could talk to my head of house.
It was a relief to have someone to finally open up to and I feel sorry for anyone who never has this option. It took four months for me to finally get an appointment with an official counsellor and I don’t want to think about what I might have done if I didn’t have that head of house to confide in during that time.
Counselling is supposed to help but it didn’t work for me at all. I was told to draw my family tree, they weighed me, spoke to me in detail about what they thought was wrong when all I wanted to do was talk. I was having problems at school, I was stressed about my exams, my friends, some aspects of my family, there was so much, but drawing a tree wasn’t going to help. After the first session, I didn’t return.
Two years passed and I was still struggling. I continued to talk to my head of house at school, but then she had to leave so I was left without someone to listen.
Eventually, at the age of 17, my pain got worse, I felt deflated and like I’d lost my way. I really didn’t see much point in life, and I didn’t feel like I could talk to anyone.
One night in 2014 I reached breaking point and I overdosed. Realising I’d made a terrible decision, I shouted for my mum after about fifteen minutes, and she called an ambulance in shock. I was rushed to the hospital, baffled at what I’d just done, questioning how I ever thought ending it was better than living.
From the moment I was in that ambulance, the paramedics and the doctors were incredible, I’ve never felt so looked after. They all seemed to genuinely care, they were urging me to go back to counselling and try again.
As I lay in the hospital bed, I reconsidered going back to CAHMS, so I accepted to referral and waited to hear. But in the meantime, I was trying to focus on getting better, and it seemed to be working.
I was still depressed, but I was figuring things out for myself. I started looking into a career, planning my next steps, applying to university – and I felt so much better, I felt like I had a life again. It meant that three months after my overdose when I was offered counselling, I declined.
Could I have avoided my suicide attempt if I had been listened to properly by that nurse or counsellor? Who knows? A large percentage of those who attend counselling are young people and I believe that schools should have a hands-on mental health professional in the building. That would put less strain on the centres like CAHMS, meaning the workload would be evened out and maybe counsellors and nurses would have more time to listen, less time to tick boxes. No one would have to wait four months, like I did.
Today I still struggle at times, I’m not entirely sure how to deal with it when my depression creeps in but I have a better life. I have a good job, I’m engaged to be married, I have a future. But not everyone is as fortunate.
The NHS desperately needs more money to help those struggling with their mental health. Given the number of people who have died as a result of poor treatment, a simple conversation could make all the difference.
If you or someone you know is suffering, seek help. Visit Mind for more information.
