Social Pariah's, A Review Of 5050 NE Hoyt

In light of Mental Health awareness month:
Bravo.. Clap clap clap. They just built an emergency clinic for mental health care in Portland. I wish they had built this in my 20's.. 5050 NE Hoyt crushed me, as an addict with mental health issues.
In 2006 I was suffering the end of a 'run'. I was without sleep or my medications. I felt super depressed and beaten up.
 My Dad threatened to call my bench probation judge so I promised him I would go to the ER. I didn't want my insobriety being exposed after getting my second DUII in ten years. It had stiffer penalties and was painful to endure. There was too much to sacrifice. I needed my freedom and comfort and would like to be "off paper".
My angle to go into the ER seemed to appease my Dad, and after I had choked out my suicidal intention to the front desk, I was left in a room with my family for hours, before actually being seen.
Mentally compromised, my mind was bleak from using, and my soul felt overshadowed. It was a terrible place to be and after the first hour of waiting, I threw a fit. I was angry they hadn't been in to see me, feeling righteous indignation, smugly justified in my displeasure.
I mean REALLY??
Where was I?
Why is this happening??
I am in a emergency room, waiting to see a doctor and suffering through an unreasonable amount of time. My tantrum didn't help me see a doctor which had stretched my limits. Still, no one came and nothing happened besides my Dad putting my ranting in check. Soon my family had left and I was alone with my discord.
Mentally grappling my choice to be there, I was flooded with fear and powerlessness due to the immediate danger of withdrawals. My self-righteous fervor dissolved as my detox began, making me feel more desperate for immediate medical attention. Eventually, the doctor came in, prescribing the medicines I had been missing. (antidepressant etc) Nothing for the withdrawal and without enthusiasm. He then left me for the rest of my stay, something I didn't know. This was one of the many truths I would swallow that night.
My nurse was supposed to be my personal attendee, giving me relief with her bright candor and healing ways RIGHT!? Actually, she was indifferent, detached, impersonal, short AND unmoved by my suffering, turning a deaf ear to my pleas for support. It was like being spat at! After a while of not seeing her at all, upon returning, I childishly broke down and begged her to let me see the doctor again. It felt terrifying, with my heart flopping and a migraine like a knife through my eye...my detox symptoms became incredibly intolerable. Still, I never saw the doctor again and I never felt relieved of my withdrawal symptoms.

Inside an institution for healing and imprisoned because of their "suicide protocol", but without any real support!! It felt like a living nightmare!! Anxious, and dry heaving, kept me awake. I was up throughout the night and into the next shift change. But before that shift change, being stressed, then agitated by medical care I DID NOT RECEIVE, the game became more morbid and unsavory.

These were Health Care Workers. They're supposed to be caring and attentive, I believed. Baffled, I kept waiting for some beautiful soul to save me from my misery. No relief whatsoever. In fact, I wish it had only been about poor attitudes and pathetic service. However, after all of this, the staff made a move that felt boldly wrong.

You see when I checked in, and told them I was suicidal, I was put in an opened curtain, windowed room. All the hospital ER staff saw me in my room through those windows. They all knew why I was there and had to of made choices to purposefully ignore me. It was humiliating as I could not wrap my mind around their cold detached behavior. Me as the crux of a private joke I knew nothing about. All I knew was pain and the lack of medical aid.
As I was being tossed around emotionally, experiencing heartbreaking solitude, on the verge of extinction, the hospital personnel watched on. Again my credulousness was spurred as I was lying in my hospital bed watching a group of medical personnel huddle up outside my door. It was odd to see them in close proximity, smiling and laughing one with another. I saw that they were snidely judging me. Wait, really? WHO DOES THIS?

Right outside my suicide watch door, they were there, in earshot and making snide comments about my CIRCUMSTANCE. Chuckling to themselves, probably feeling wry about how hilarious my situation was!! Right?? NOOOOO!!
Lying powerless in my now cell, I weakly listened to them gossip about me. I thought I was literally in a twilight zone, it was so adverse to my reasoning and ways of life. I believe my young naivete mind was too trusting and unaware of this sad plausibility. I innocently revealed my addictive tendencies and personal powerlessness around self-harming, because I was in a Hospital! Really, I was completely ignorant about this painful backlash. At the mercy of these ER professionals, it felt like the end of the world.

The metaphysical strain of being the object for those that were meant to care for me triggered a fall into morbid reflection. Already defeated when I arrived, I was now sailing the seas of despair and hopelessness. I think it broke me a little, feeling the need to use survival techniques only. There was not going to be any private regrouping as I had been overthrown by this madness!!
Outside my opened door was at least three bullies. They were throwing around their dismissive sophistry and miscalculating judgment about me, becoming professionally and personally careless. I knew they must have behaved like this before I came along, seeing as people don't suddenly group up to disparage others. It's learned and carried on and is socially OK. Grouping up like mini-mobs at the workplace is fine in the world.
As a healthcare provider myself I think its understandable and OK to be frustrated or stressed. What's common in the healthcare industry, but not OK, is using your power-over-position, as a vehicle to levy control. Being cruel, controlling, and indifferent towards clients or staff is common in some clinics, where people have learned to use their provider card menacingly. Power over posturing and professional abuse were occurring when it was my turn for being cared for. AS I LIVED AND BREATHED, I had been taken completely off guard. Totally and C O M P L E T E L Y!
How dare they run a secret protocol on me! How dare they treat me like a thief that had somehow personally victimized each of them. I was hurt and wounded by how deep the injustice was, disgusted by bullying. Weak minds grouping together for such proclivity is cowardly to me. I've always been one for standing in your own beliefs and not hiding in someone else's shadow. It makes me scoff even now.
Unfortunately, because I was honest about my drug use and instability, I was targeted.
I had even made it to the Psych Ward of that hospital because of another similar injustice of being in jail for 5 days and not being given any of my medicines. My sister saw how crazy I was and suggested I go in there. So, when I arrived at the psych ward, I looked around to see what kind of reception I would get. True to form I witnessed again Medical professionals mini-mobbing. I could only stare them down before I went upstairs and got better. It took a few more trips to that ER before I finally accepted it for what it was and learned to keep myself out of that terror, later entering medical detox to get and stay clean. I never went back to 5050 NE Hoyt or the psych ward after that, as those events scarred me emotionally. Looking back I'm kinda grateful I learned to be self-reliant through aversion by poor behavior, under the care of merciless mob mentality behavior. At least I know I'm not that way.  NLM

/http://portlandobserver.com/news/2017/jan/04/mental-health-center-open/