It was no walk in the park
Taking time out to reflect is a huge part of my recovery and since I have finished my therapy in CAMHS I have had a lot of time to reflect on things which I have experienced in the past. I often think that I have had too much time to reflect but nevertheless it is important I do that so I can more on.
One thing which I never really reflected on or thought about was my three and a half years which I spent attending weekly appointments with my CAMHS team. The only time I wasn't attending weekly appointments was the time when I was in hospital yet I was still very much linked in with the staff there. Now this post is not meant to be about praising CAMHS in Celbridge but I do have to say they were amazing. The support and care I received was top notch and I could not find any faults in it. They were dedicated to providing me with the best care possible and they did just that. They worked hard to get me a place in hospital when I was on the verge of attempting suicide, they worked hard with myself and my family to help build our relationships and most importantly they worked hard to ensure I was always included in decision, I was always aware of what was going on with my treatment and most importantly they always made sure I was comfortable in anything we did and to top it all of they tried to ensure I was safe at all times. They were amazing and I could not have asked for better treatment during the hardest years of my life and for that I would like to say a huge thanks to all the people at Linn Dara CAMHS.
My time spent having treatment with CAMHS was not easy despite every effort being made to help me through the treatment. I went to weekly sessions where I engaged in talking therapy or CBT- cognitive behavioural therapy and while these sessions only lasted an hour each week I would go home thinking about what was discussed or bring home some exercise I could do which were related to my CBT work. It was hard enough being introduced to all of this and trying to get my head around things but with the added pressure of missing school to make appointments made things a lot harder. In transition year it wasn't so bad leaving school early once or twice a week to keep appointments as it was transition year and there was less work to catch up on but things changed drastically when I went into fifth year. The stress of the homework, study, exams and class work all began to pile up and made even harder to deal with when I was missing time from school each week to keep appointments. i couldn't miss the appointments because of school though as at the end of the day my mental health was and is more important that school or college work. Missing time each week from school caused people to ask questions, caused people to begin to judge me and think that I was just trying to get time off school when I reality that was not the case, it certainly was no walk in the park like some people thought and my four months in hospital wasn't just an act to get time off school like some people also though.
What I am getting at here in this post is that because I was missing school for an hour or two a week people thought it was great because I was missing school or missing tests or missing the work but the reality of it was it only made things harder. I had extra work to catch up on in my own time, I had to deal with some teachers being annoyed over missing their classes and I had to try and keep looking after my mental health at the same time. The main point of this post is to say if there are people in your school missing time for appointments don't think they have it any easier than you do, if they miss time it is most likely because they need to miss time. I struggled through the final three years of school in terms of the amount of time I missed and the amount of work I had to catch up on so it is no walk in the park ad before judging people you school think about how you would feel in their situation.