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Homeless
Posted Tuesday 18 December 2012
Some readers may find Jules' blog triggering, if you need support, please call our Infoline on 0300 123 3393.
It’s your worst nightmare – you are depressed, suicidal and you are in the middle of the biggest mental breakdown of your life. You are in a psychiatric hospital waiting to be discharged into the community and you are homeless.
You have to wait until your discharge day when a charity worker drives you to the housing department with your carrier bags and your belongings. The fear and the feeling of shame and humiliation is overwhelming.
I received excellent care in hospital, they tried to build up my confidence and put me back on track, but every nurse and every doctor knew that on discharge I would have to present myself with my bags at an accommodation office that would have no understanding of mental health issues and no idea about my vulnerable state. They knew it and they could not do anything about it, they could not keep me safe in hospital forever. It was a catch 22 situation.
I had several unsafe discharges from hospital, to filthy properties that were completely inappropriate for my recovery and at times even described by council housing officers as uninhabitable. I felt I was treated worse than a dog, although I did get a meek ‘sorry’ about the place that was uninhabitable until it had had a deep clean that would take at least a week. When I told the homelessness officers I had mental health problems, the response was that they didn’t care. They admitted their emergency accommodation was ‘grotty’ and forced me to stay in places that felt below the standards for the RSPCA. This is not an exaggeration.
My parents, who are both disabled, could not care for me at their home. I also could not live in their town as my childhood abuser lives there and I was afraid of seeing him after having disclosed what he did to me when I was 11 years old to the police last year. So I had no choice but to be ‘in the system’.
To cut a long story short, the discrimination and lack of awareness of my condition by the people supposedly helping me with emergency accommodation drove me to a very bad place.
How did I get here? I used to live in a beautiful home in Australia and manage a business; my life was now very different and I thought about my options - was I to live like a dog in filth or was I to just go to sleep and not wake up? You can guess which option felt better. After a horrific time in and out of hospital and intensive care, I was helped by a kind and amazing police officer who arrested and sectioned me under the Mental Health Act. I had reached a point where I felt harassed and abused by the accommodation team at the council and I could no longer bear to live my life, I had no dignity or pride left. In the end I was forced to save my liver and my life but I was still homeless.
Enter my mental health advocate and Shelter and 48 hours later I am living in Pontins and had 6 weeks to wait for my very own newly renovated council property in the heart of beautiful countryside. What changed? If I had died, the accommodation team at the council would have had to explain to my friends and family why. Why was she treated like an animal? They would ask. Why was she forced to sleep in unsafe places? Why didn’t you understand she was suicidal and unstable, didn’t you read her notes? The answer would have probably been stunned silence.
There is a good ending to this tale and it’s not my new flat or my improving mental and physical health. The head of services for the council stepped in during my ordeal and asked what was going on, he and my father spoke and he realised that vulnerable people discharged from hospital were slipping through the cracks in a seriously dangerous way. He looked at the system in place and he took on the challenge with a full investigation.
We met recently and heard that changes are to be implemented across the county as a result of the trauma I suffered. The promises made brought me to tears, I could never have imagined such amazing results. Every vulnerable patient discharged as homeless from hospital will get a better chance to make a fresh start and be treated with dignity and respect.
Every employee will receive training in mental health awareness and the quality of homeless accommodation across the county will be upped. Huge promises from the head of services but driven by a steering committee of all parties involved to make sure patients get the best care and support in the community. My parents and I have been invited to be a part of the committee along with doctors, nurses, social workers and accommodation officers. Everybody working together to create the best practice and procedures to help others found in my situation.
It was a monumental day for me, proving that one person can make a difference in the world. A huge thank you goes to my mum and dad, Shelter and my advocate for fighting not just for me, but for every person who finds themselves at rock bottom. Now I hope nobody in this county will leave hospital and lose their dignity or their life, nobody will leave hospital to walk the streets rather than stay in unsafe, dirty accommodation.
You can change the system, the discrimination and the complacency. A safe bed in a safe place is a basic right for any vulnerable person in this country. We are not all a waste of space, we are your friends, members of your family, people you know and respect who have fallen on hard times because of illness. We are men and women trying to feel better about ourselves again, trying to get on with life and trying to live with an illness.
I thank God for the changes promised by the head of housing and social services for Denbighshire, he is a champion for other councils, an example of a decision maker who understands the challenges faced by people like myself and a person determined to beat discrimination and put vulnerable people at the heart of his services and policies.
I feel sad today for the men and women I have seen suffer this year like me, walking the streets, returning to abusive relationships, or being housed in dangerous place. I can’t help them, all I can do is hope and pray they are safe. However, I feel an amazing sense of relief for the patients in the future who will have a safe discharge, a safe place to lay their head at night and restoration of their dignity by being treated with respect.
The council and the NHS have a long journey ahead of them working to make these promises become a reality but I will help in any way I can. Nobody in a civilised society should be made to suffer the trauma I went through this year, we owe it to each other to do things better and get it right.
Jules
Jules' story was featured in the Sunday Express earlier this month.
Jules' story shows that you can make a real difference. To join her, become a Mind member today.
6 Comments
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"Some readers may find Jules' blog triggering".
Hopefully into taking action!
You see,its safe sat in front of a computer screen or in the office of a well meaning charity but changes that make peoples' lives better collectively rarely happen without the on the ground struggle. And more often than not the struggle for change comes from those most affected with the least resources. They are not 'do gooders' who go home each evening to a warm safe place. They are people whos lives are affected by their experience and are prepared to make a noise about it even when they feel all their strength is gone. Hope springs eternal in the face of successive oppression.Thank you for your story Jules. Best wishes for the future.
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I have just read your blog and it has brought tears to my eyes. My daughter too has suffered mental illness but luckily we were in a position to help her and she was able to be cared for at home by us. (Please see my blog dated 29th November 2012 My daughter's struggle to access crisis care.)
My main concern has always been for people like you whose family have not been able to support them. It breaks my heart to read your story.
Thank goodness your head of services stepped in. It does not bear thinking about what would have happened if he had not. I feel that so many people have no compassion, understanding or time for people with mental health problems and this is mainly due to a lack of knowledge, discrimination and the stigma that is still attached to mental illness.
I really applaud your dedication to making a change for the future of mental illness and sincerely hope that no-one has to suffer like you did. I too am trying to make a difference. I have spoken and written to Paul Burstow the former Care Minister and our local MP. I have also written to the Head of Surrey NHS making her aware of issues that my daughter went through while she was in crisis.
My daughter is recovering at the moment although she is still on medication and has CBT. I really wish you all the best for the future and your on-going recovery. Together we can all fight to make changes for the better for people with mental health illness.
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Well done.
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Breaks my heart to read accounts such as these because although I'm relieved you're ok now I fear that changes to welfare and housing benefit combined with a critical shortage of affordable decent housing and cuts to mental health services will mean your story will become more commonplace - and without a good ending
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Thank you for your story Jules and having the courage and conviction to share it. I am so sorry to hear about your experiences and I hope that now you are in a better place in every way. It really saddened me to hear this story, I know of someone who went through a very similar situation, being discharged from hospital with minimal support to find safe housing, she was previously homeless and I was shocked at the apparent disregard for her wellbeing and recovery. The whole situation of what happens to people without a home on discharge from hospital needs highlighting and addressing. When people are vulnerable on leaving hospital, they need maximum and proper support to enable them to live somewhere safe and where they feel secure, in clean housing of a proper standard. Otherwise, they could easily get sucked into a downward spiral of poverty, struggle and danger. They need advocates and people with proper training in supporting people with mental health issues. I do not want to see more people 'falling through the cracks'. When we are unable to look out for ourselves and have the mental capacity to fight for what we need from a complex 'system', there needs to be care in place to give us a proper foundation in terms of housing so that we have a chance of getting lives back on track. I believe this could even save lives, it is so important. I am so grateful for you sharing your story and I really hope it is the trigger to prompt social action from the right people who have the power to change things. I wish you well and a strong recovery, your brave story is powerful, thank you.
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Thank you both for sharing. I think it broke my parents hearts to watch what I was going through and to hear me beg to come home. They knew as soon as I would be at their home things would get worse. I was removed from their. house by the police and I could not keep myself or others around me safe., they were dealing with so much themselves including the deaths of close family members who also had mental health problems, they were trying to hold everything together and at one point I was hitting my dad in hospital and pulling wires out of my arms. They were scared and they knew I needed more help than they could give me. But I was very lucky because they fought for me every day, doing things I was not even aware of. I think they put all of their frustration into challenging was going on, they were so scared what would happen to me and they did not know what to do. Thankfully they found support from a charity and my father was able to raise these issues with the council. What horrified them was not just what I was going through but what others were facing too, other patients they got to know. My dad also spoke to our MP and did everything in his power to help. I would freeze and freak out in the street when I had to go into my home town I was petrified of seeing my abuser. It was clear I had to live somewhere safe. The worst part, and probably the biggest trigger for me was that I was abused in a bed and breakfast in Rhyl and the emergency accommodation I was offered was a bed and breakfast in Rhyl! I think that's what triggered so many problems for the council, that's what they had to offer me and I honestly would rather have died my fear was so bad, I was and am suffering from post traumatic stress so it wasn't me being fussy it was me in a severely bad place in my mind which I had no control over at the time. I'm only just gaining control now and its a long process. You are both right, why and how it ends up being people under such terrible stress that have to fight the system is unbelievable. We need politicians and local councils to get the strategy right. It's out of sight out of mind until you find yourself staring at a stained mattress on a wet floor in a dingy filthy room and you are so tired, so unwell, you accept it. It's so wrong. We give prisoners better conditions than that. Im impressed by my local council and their commitment to change, hopefully they will get some good press following those changes and be role models for other councils. With my new home I am able to begin my recovery and feel safe. I'm so grateful for my flat, it might be humble but to me it is everything, its where I can start again.
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