William - Interview 10

Age at interview: 47

Age at diagnosis: 45

Brief Outline:

William was badly bullied as a child and developed various obsessions and compulsions. He had trouble concentrating and finds working challenging. He now takes Lustral and Quetiapine which he finds helpful but still struggles with feelings of depression.

Background:

William took medical retirement but does volunteer work for Rethink, is single and has no children. Ethnic Background' White British.

More about me...

William was bullied extensively as a child and describes his life as ‘worse’ before contact with mental health services. He thinks he had very severe social anxiety and obsessive compulsive disorder that was undiagnosed. He couldn’t really socialise and missed a lot of school. William thinks that he got his contamination fears in his late teens, but felt compelled towards other kinds of organising and reciting before this. He felt he may also have been bullied by his mother, and says that his mother and father had a very bad relationship.

 

After school he had a few jobs and had problems concentrating. He was fed up and decided he needed to see a doctor. His Mum asked him ‘Do you want to be viewed as mad?’ and he found all the comments were very negative. William’s GP ‘gave him some pills to take’ and said that psychiatrists were for ‘people that are mentally ill’. William couldn’t properly discuss the constant need to wash, and couldn’t talk about someone on the television that he was obsessed with, for whom he had unrequited feelings. He couldn’t concentrate and found all these things ‘together’ were very difficult.

 

When he was about 20 he went to a day hospital. He used to hide his washing rituals from view and perform them at home so they said he didn’t have OCD. He said it was invisible and you could cover it up. He was embarrassed about it and thought it was ‘too mad’. For a while he had visual/aural hallucinations which he thought were a reaction to a particular anti-psychotic drug, and he now very occasionally experiences these on waking. Although he doesn’t have experiences that a friend of his (who has psychosis) has, he does believe there is a connection as he feels he lives in a ‘fantasy world’. He was asked about his sexual behaviour by psychiatrists and found this very embarrassing. He fell in love with a trainee psychiatrist at the day hospital and thought about her for about five years, after going to the place for only about four months. William wanted to discharge himself from the day hospital and wanted to have psychotherapy in order to talk about some of these difficult and embarrassing issues, but he wasn’t offered it. He was very depressed. A work rehabilitation centre was suggested to him but he didn’t want to go there. He was given an IQ test by a psychologist and was told he would make a good filing clerk. William felt he couldn’t discuss the development of his sexualised obsessions with any professionals or relatives apart from his cousin, who was of a similar age. He says that he was given anti-psychotics for violent and aggressive thoughts.

 

William started to realise he might be getting a ‘bad deal’ from services as he believed someone could help him to talk. He complained about his psychiatrist and the psychiatrist wouldn’t see him any more. A psychologist he has since seen thought he had intermittent psychosis and gave him a tentative diagnosis of schizo-affective disorder. William has done assertiveness and personal development courses which have helped. He is now able to talk more about his feelings. He felt that reading self-help books helped a lot. Cognitive behavioural therapy might have had a small effect on his shyness. However cognitive analytical therapy made a dramatic difference' talking about his feelings and talking to women. He now takes Lustral which helps his anxiety considerably, although he says he can’t ‘beat’ the depression he experiences. He takes anti-psychotics but finds that they make him very drowsy. He would like to have more support. 

William talks about his confusion when he received a diagnosis of intermittent psychosis when he had normally experienced anxiety, depression and obsessive compulsive disorder.

You were saying that the report said you’d had intermittent psychosis?

 

Yes, that was the one two years ago. Yeah. Yeah.

 

And what do you think about that?

 

Well... I think it might have been how I presented my feelings on the day when I went to see this psychologist. And I was, I think it’s because I presented something about not really understanding about feeling violent, [2 sec pause] at times. And... having less insight than I should have into it, I think. And it was my feeling that may be that’s what he thought.

 

But that’s all, you know, really I thought, no I can’t be that, I can’t, because I always that, you know, that [2 sec pause] when I was roughly the same, why would it be considered all the sudden I’m psychotic, you know, when I’ve had all the other labelling. So, I...there is a side to me that thought, no, and there’s a side to me that thought, well may be, you know, it’s... it’s what I said on the day. And, it could be something that is more newly developed. And, definitely not in my... you know, history. I think, yes 

William talks about reaching 'crisis point' and becoming so angry that he felt he had to see a doctor, who advised him against seeing a psychiatrist and gave him 'various pills'.

So I think I was about 18 or something it was really, reached crisis point. And I actually remember what I did. I mean one day I was literally throwing things around in my living room, when my parents weren’t there. Where I used to live before. And it was like, I was so angry that I had to do it, that I had to go to the doctor [laughs]. And it comes so easy nowadays, what a change, you know. And I don’t, I went to the doctor, and then I got my Mum involved, and she said, “Oh he wants to see a psychiatrist.” And, and, you know, I was told all these things. “Do you want to be viewed as mad?” And all that. “Do you want to go to the mental hospital?” And you know, it was all like real negative. And the GP really, he just gave me some pills to take, and said, “You know, you don’t want to see psychiatrist. It’s meant for people that are mentally ill.” And he didn’t. And you know, I kept seeing him, and taking different pills and it all started from there. And then eventually I did see, you know, various people, eventually, within a year or two. But it, it sort of was difficult in the early stages of trying to get help, because I couldn’t really say what I felt like. And that’s why I probably needed my mother to speak to him sometimes really. But you know, it was still better than before I got into the system. 

William was severely bullied as a child and used to miss a lot of school; his parents didn't help much and always seemed to be fighting.

I was bullied constantly. I think I only escaped about one year. But in every school I went to, I was bullied, except for, I think there was just one time when I was in north London that I didn’t get bullied. And I, a lot of it was like more like torture than being bullied, I suppose. And then also I think, you know, having my parents really not being very good psychiatrists in that they weren’t that type of thinking people, you know. And they weren’t clever in that sort of way that I’m just the opposite, and they weren’t able to... they’re only, you know, I mean they never really talked to me, encouraged me to have any kind of friendship or anything with them really. I think my mother thought that children [laughter in voice] should be seen and not heard really. She thought, you know, very primitive thing, and they did tend to be like that, yes, and also... I think also another thing about that they hated one another. And I used to have watch them fighting always. You know, fighting constantly all my life really that I can remember. Sometimes daily, you know. They might skip a day or two. And... and then, oh yes, then there was this thing about that I hated the school so much, in a way my Mum helped me to survive, because or my Dad even sometimes, because what I would do is, you know, I would ask them for days off, and they’d give me a letter saying I was sick literally. But really, they should have really, you know, done more than that. They should have tried to figure out what to do, which is better then, you know, me pretending to be sick, and then I had asthma. Once you had asthma, you know how to pretend to have an attack [cough]. And I used to do that as well. So I used to sort of do the three day working week [laughs]. Yes, I was just thinking about something in politics about the three day working week. That once existed I used to do this three day school week or something. So I think I must have missed, huge, masses amounts at school. But that helped me to survive, because I just wonder really I might have… I remember at times, actually sometimes just crying about the bullying, when it was getting really too much.