u/blackrussianterrier2

I'm a participant and just had my plan go in for review. My plan is for a physical condition, but I have psychosocial as secondary. My support coordinator wrote a progress review and a section caught my eye, about "crises avoided". It said that no points of crisis had been identified. Only issue is, there's been two balked and one unsuccessful attempt at suicide during my plan.

I don't see a point in hiding these sorts of details from my NDIS providers, and my OT's report for example covered self harm risk, but even that was worded vaguely and in the past tense. It occurred to me that I usually answer questions as they're put to me, and I've only been asked about the self harm once, last year. I have no clue if she is aware that's an ongoing problem. I've never been asked about suicidality or attempts. And it just hasn't occurred to me to volunteer that information because there's not many circumstances where one does volunteer it, and outside of my psychiatrist's office I don't know how one is meant to flag it.

I hadn't even really considered it part of the NDIS purview until I read the report, I kind of thought everything was about my physical disability and if it wasn't putting me in the wheelchair they didn't really have it in their scope to think about. But it confused me to see a section about averting crisis be listed in the negative given what the last year has looked like for me. So I'm curious now about what the system in that kind of situation actually is, especially given it might come up again in the future.

My main questions really are:

1. Should my OT and support coordinator have had that information in one/both of their reports?
2. If yes, how are they meant to get it? I wouldn't think it's reliable to always expect participants to tell providers outright when that happens, both because participants may feel uncomfortable and providers probably shouldn't rely solely on participant word for incident reporting, right?
3. If no, is there another way these reports define "crisis" that excludes crises not directly related to a participant's primary disability?
4. In the future, is there a way this information is supposed to get to an OT who may not be paying attention to that aspect of health since it isn't related to primary disability?

TLDR: My therapist is in hospital and will be a while. Clinic offered seeing someone else. I'm not sure if I should, but also know my mental health isn't the most stable and managed. What should I do?

I've been seeing the same therapist for 8 years. She is very helpful and has helped me work through a lot of trauma and the complexity of my mental health. I've seen her every two weeks, Christmas excluded, for the whole 8 years. My next appointment was on Thursday.

Unfortunately, I got a call today that she's in the hospital and will be for an uncertain period of time, but minimum a month. The clinic has offered to slot me in with another therapist for that time. My first reaction was that I dislike talking about my mental health to everyone but my therapist and she had to work hard for that exchange, but now I'm wondering if I should take them up on it. There's pros and cons. What should I do? Please help, I'm completely frozen and I have to answer them soon.

Pros:

• Continuing therapy while my therapist is away, keeping care continuous and making sure someone has eyes on my mental health
• My symptoms are not well managed and as much as I tell myself it's just talking, it does seem to help break things down and avoid as much built up despair and stress. So avoiding missing too many appointments might be in my best interests
• Hey, after 8 years maybe a fresh pair of eyes will bring a fresh new perspective to my issues

Cons:

• I do not know where I'd even begin summarising my mental health and relevant background with someone new. I'd have to hope they'd be really good at navigating that.
• I may not actually be comfortable enough to open my mouth, or be honest. Which is a waste of everyone's time and will make me feel worse.
• If my therapist only needs like two months to recover, maybe I can make it two months? It's just talking, right? So seeing the other person would be a waste of time.
• Genuine risk the new therapist would hospitalise me. Self-harm and suicidality are a daily part of my life and not exactly idle. My therapist and I have an agreement to discuss when she thinks it's getting bad enough to trigger concern and/or legal obligations, because before her I saw someone who blocked the exit and threatened to call the cops if I ran after I admitted self harm. I don't want this new person to hear me talk and hospitalise me instantly, and I also don't want to waste everyone's time avoiding it or lying.

I've had a self harm problem for almost a decade now, a few gaps here and there but continuous for several years now. I've generally been fine without medical attention because the SH is fairly shallow. I mostly have a high number of shallow wounds, none particularly deep.

Like a lot of people it seems I struggle with the urge to cut deeper and the invalidity complex that what I do is pathetic and doesn't even count. It doesn't help that in the past I had a medical professional call it attention seeking. That event directly led to me being afraid of being "caught unawares" about it. That if my mental health lands me in hospital again, I can't be caught with shallow wounds in case they call me attention seeking again.

But I'm also aware enough to know that it's a good thing to keep things shallow, not needing medical attention. That deeper is a recipe for multiple types of disaster that I shouldn't court. Despite that, I still feel the urge to do it, and I don't know how to handle it. What can I do to make it go away?

My anorexia used to be way worse and I was underweight, but after being diagnosed with a particular health condition I got put on a lot of medications that have made my weight go haywire. I won't list numbers, but it's common for me to have an "overweight" BMI. I know BMI is hot garbage but I can't get it out of my head. My behaviours are worse than ever, more of them more often more obsessively, but it isn't "working" and just making me sick. I'm tired of feeling sick all the time and just want to eat again. But if it isn't "working" to restrict, how am I meant to want to recover? If I can't lose weight on purpose, and I can't accept that eating freely will make me gain more, what am I supposed to do about it?!