Slipped through the net? Is this really what happens?

Lockdown restrictions have been easing and this has led to an increase in my liberties whilst staying in a care home. I have been here for 3 months and although my meals have been provided and I have had my medication, I have not received any support regarding my mental health or alcohol addiction. After being signposted to a mental health charity I soon became aware that this service is overwhelmed and has a 4 month waiting list – that is not helping me. I’ve tried contacting alcohol support and seemed to be getting nowhere fast.

So restrictions lifted slightly and I was allowed to go out for short visits a couple of times a week. None of my underlying issues have been resolved, no support appeared forthcoming, the freedoms granted me offered no bright future, I feel so overwhelmed, so I pick up a bottle of vodka. Within days I am back to where I was 4 months ago, only now I am homeless because the care home do not know how to respond to my addiction. I am a nuisance, I am naughty, I am making informed decisions and I have capacity – I am so sick of hearing their judgements. I am referred to the homelessness team – I am placed in the most disgusting places imaginable – a shared bathroom that has no locked door and I need to change my stoma bag, drug needles lying around, people knocking on my door all night. I do not feel safe here, so I sleep in a park. I am told this is a choice I am making. How do they work that out? 

In the last 3 weeks, I have been picked up by an ambulance and sent to hospital. My family are asking for a full Psych assessment – I don’t get this. Instead I get a visit from the crisis team and I am told I present with no reasons to suggest a need for a full psych assessment. I am discharged, wander the streets, can’t change my stoma bag safely, self-harm, self-neglect, get drunk and we start the vicious cycle all over again. I return to hospital.   

I now have a new social worker who does not know me – I am notes on a case file and I am assured this time I will not ‘slip through the net… I will get the help I so desperately need’. What do they actually mean by slipping through the net? My family have fought for help and support, they have contacted social workers, they have worked with the GP, they have got me re-housed, they have ensured carers have been put in place and they have continually updated services on every aspect of my life. I still do not however receive mental health support – I am chaotic agreed, but I have waited and waited for return phone calls, sometimes they come but more often they don’t. The voice when it is on the other end of the phone asks me to continually repeat my story and how I am feeling – I feel like shit. I have demons in my head, I am losing the will to live. They will ring me back next week.  Believe me if this is not slipping through the net then what is? This is not dealing with the issues presented. This is being passed from pillar to post with no-one taking the responsibility to help me meet my needs. My life is not a lifestyle choice, I am not making bad decisions – it is like they are telling me that I do not know what is in my best interests. I don’t see the dangers of sleeping in the park. I don’t see the dangers associated with changing my stoma bag in some bushes with no access to clean water, when the alternative in the homelessness shelter is much worse.   

I certainly don’t believe the drink is going to kill me – I’m not dead yet. But I do not see a light at the end of the tunnel, I want to sleep and not wake up. Why does no one listen. I do not want to be a nuisance, I want help. I don’t think this will happen – maybe I will be dead soon.