Story The police dragged me to the ER

[Exact Change]

I called a suicide chat number. She asks if I have a plan. I said no..I am not in danger but I did once buy SN and I had a gun in the home. (It's usa, almost everyone does) I said that I was away from the gun and I'm not in danger. I made another mistake saying I wrote a note. (She didn't give me a chance to explain that it was more therapeutic by putting apologies in paper. I posted it in the creative writing thread). I just wanted to chat, I wasn't in crisis.

Her chats seemed scripted so I told her I didn't want to chat anymore and thanks.

Half hour later (5 am) cops bang my door. They shine a light in my face. Yelling for my hands up and acting like I had a gun and was dangerous. Guns drawn on me. They command me to the ground and cuff me. I'm sure all my neighbors are watching. EMTs take me to the ER, cuffed to the stretcher. I stay for 7 hours until psych clears me.

I am just exhausted.

 

[LittleCupcake]

And thats why you dont call "help lines" Btw It is a joke.....well half joke

thats crazy tho.

 

[KuriGohan&Kamehameha]

I hope you're having some peace and quiet now, it sounds like such a scary and stressful ordeal. Fuck anyone who thinks that this is "help". The other thing it is helping is them not getting fired from their job. It's obvious that these protocols aren't therapeutic in the slightest.

 

[DreamEnd]

Never call those helplines I'm sorry that happened to you

 

[Exact Change]

I tell the police that's it's crazy to pull guns on some who you think is suicidal. I was in my sweats with hands up. And they still made all these commands. Walk to the driveway....turn your back toward me....down on your knees....cross your feet.....stomach on the ground....arms behind head....

So a new method is call a help line.... then ctb by cop

 

[DreamEnd]

I tell the police that's it's crazy to pull guns on some who you think is suicidal. I was in my sweats with hands up. And they still made all these commands. Walk to the driveway....turn your back toward me....down on your knees....cross your feet.....stomach on the ground....arms behind head....

So a new method is call a help line.... then ctb by cop

I think it's because you said you have a gun. Unfortunately if you have a gun and are suicidal to them probably means that you aren't well enough and can go on a killing spree. At least that's probably how they think which is absolutely unreasonable and wrong.

 

[ForgottenAgain]

That is so horrible, how the hell is that helping anyone? I'm so sorry you went through that, that's truly awful.
I hope you'll be able to rest in coming days...how unnecessary of a reaction from them

 

[untothedepths]

Why are they treating you like you are some sort of violent criminal? Like unless you threatened people that's just terrible to do to someone who is in an extremely vulnerable state. Why couldn't they have just knocked on your door, talked to you for a moment with some compassion, and left with some numbers to accessible mental health??? I mean, really, you called to get help, so them acting like this would deter anyone from even trying.

 

[Exact Change]

Forgot to say ..the cops said a few times "currently this is not a criminal matter". It sounded like a threat that I might be arrested for a crime.

 

[FuneralCry]

That is just so horrifying what happened, it truly is beyond hellish how wanting to die is treated like a crime.

 

[divinemistress36]

Getting punished for being mentally ill how disgusting

 

[Cosis]

I tell the police that's it's crazy to pull guns on some who you think is suicidal. I was in my sweats with hands up. And they still made all these commands. Walk to the driveway....turn your back toward me....down on your knees....cross your feet.....stomach on the ground....arms behind head....

So a new method is call a help line.... then ctb by cop

Tried that, didn't work lmao.

I laughed in their fucking faces when they ordered me to do anything. Just stood there smiling at how stupid they were. I shouldn't have said "Shoot me then asshole!" It looked like the guy had a wake up call in his pea-brain and realized he was there for a Suicide Call, not a Homicide. He ordered everyone to put away their guns and pull out the tasers. The rest goes just like the OP.....

 

[Kta1994]

Society is such a joke? How is this helping anybody???

 

[Unsure and alone]

That's absolutely horrible.
Crisis lines aren't supposed to intervene like that unless you're in immediate danger and won't get to a safer space.

But I don't doubt what you say.
Some people who work the lines really don't care and some do.

How are you doing right now ?

If you're okay talking about it how did you get released ?

I'd think having two suicide methods would get you at least a 72 hour psych hold .

 

[biasedregret]

I'm sorry this happened to you. FYI if you ever wanna talk to someone without risking a police intervention, you could call a warmline instead: https://warmline.org/

Much more chill; usually they're staffed by just regular people going through things themselves.

 

[Illegal Preclear]

Sounds par for the course for the US Mental Health system. You're lucky you live in a state that didn't lock you up in a for-profit hospital/behavioral health center for a month or more, or that the cops didn't rough you up. That's a typical experience with the mental health system in my state. NEVER call helplines. NEVER call anyone who has the authority to sick the police on you and/or force you into coercive Psychiatric care. At best, volunteers on those helplines are well meaning but clueless people (or working from scripts like you said) - at worst, they are narcissists who feed off that kind of pain and would love to have power over somebody by letting the mental health hounds loose on them. These are things people don't want to believe, people don't want to believe the systems we're "supposed to" turn to for help are actually evil, but...they are. I can only speak from experience of the United States, but considering it is the United States - our entire healthcare system is for-profit and predatory and the mentally ill/disabled are easy prey.

Never trust anyone with the authority to send the police to your house on nothing but their word.

 

[HereTomorrow]

I always keep hearing suicide prevention hotlines only call police in 3% of calls, but I've barely heard stories of people calling without police arriving. At most like, 2. How can they call themselves safe, secure, and confidential while having enough information to send police to an address?

The last thing that should happen when someone is emotionally vulnerable is traumatize someone via IRL confrontation. Unless the person called directly to be driven to the ER, they called for emotional support, not a nightmare.

Should a hotline be serious about confidentiality and encourage people to call should they want to be saved or heard, they should put in their terms of service they will not be legally held responsible if you CTB (which they mostly have already), police will never be called and the caller must call them by themselves (which can be encouraged but never forced), and make the access point a website or no phone number app to contact so at most an IP is known, but a person has the choice to use a no-logs VPN.

I suspect police are called as a trigger to certain words (aka almost everything that is not "I am happy and ready to live life") and obviously the hotline doesn't want to take responsibility (either legally or through their own trauma) should a person ultimately CTB if the hotline didn't call services. They want to save your physical self, not improve your mental wellbeing.

Because of this, I have no desire to ever call a hotline, or obtain any serious support outside SaSu, and I'm a member of this forum trying my best to recover from suicidial thoughts.
These stories happen too often for me to even bother reaching out even if I know I am going to CTB right that hour. Getting help is currently not a safe option without racking up bills to the ER and ward and/or traumatizing yourself, and ultimately will drive people away who had a small spark of hope that their life would be okay again.

 

[Alexei_Kirillov]

So sorry that happened to you, I also had the police come to my door and bring me to the hospital against my will recently. It's truly a galvanizing experience that makes you never want to trust anyone again when it comes to CTB. You feel harmed by the very people who were supposed to help you.

Ever since then, when asked, I lie about anything CTB-related, even though lying is really not an ability that comes naturally to me, and I'd prefer not having to live in contradiction with my values (honesty is very important to me), but as suicidal people, we have no other choice.

 

[theboy]

it strikes me that they treated you like a criminal when they took you to the hospital. they shouldn't have treated you like that. i'm sorry for what happened. i hope everything turns out well. pm anything.

 

[Cosis]

I always keep hearing suicide prevention hotlines only call police in 3% of calls, but I've barely heard stories of people calling without police arriving. At most like, 2. How can they call themselves safe, secure, and confidential while having enough information to send police to an address?

The last thing that should happen when someone is emotionally vulnerable is traumatize someone via IRL confrontation. Unless the person called directly to be driven to the ER, they called for emotional support, not a nightmare.

Should a hotline be serious about confidentiality and encourage people to call should they want to be saved or heard, they should put in their terms of service they will not be legally held responsible if you CTB (which they mostly have already), police will never be called and the caller must call them by themselves (which can be encouraged but never forced), and make the access point a website or no phone number app to contact so at most an IP is known, but a person has the choice to use a no-logs VPN.

I suspect police are called as a trigger to certain words (aka almost everything that is not "I am happy and ready to live life") and obviously the hotline doesn't want to take responsibility (either legally or through their own trauma) should a person ultimately CTB if the hotline didn't call services. They want to save your physical self, not improve your mental wellbeing.

Because of this, I have no desire to ever call a hotline, or obtain any serious support outside SaSu, and I'm a member of this forum trying my best to recover from suicidial thoughts.
These stories happen too often for me to even bother reaching out even if I know I am going to CTB right that hour. Getting help is currently not a safe option without racking up bills to the ER and ward and/or traumatizing yourself, and ultimately will drive people away who had a small spark of hope that their life would be okay again.

Those statistics are bullshit. It has no reference to what they're even talking about and that's the way they want to keep it. It could easily mean that in 97% of total calls they contact your LOCAL CRISIS first and advise them to call the police. So technically they only "Call" themselves 3% of the time.

It's all political doublespeak so they can put on a front as if they don't sentence desperate people to torture from pieces of shit with a fucking badge just looking to kick someone while they're down.

EDIT: Just to add

The script these hotline people are taught to parrot always contains leading questions that will end up with the depressed person incriminating themselves if they choose to answer. Most people in that situation just want to be heard and are seriously too fucked in the head with all the shit going on in their lives to look out for their "Right to Remain Silent". Someone is there, and willing to listen so they mistakenly tell them everything they ask including questions about CTB.

"Have you thought of hurting yourself today?" = POLICE
"Do you have any open wounds right now?" = POLICE
"What about medication? Have you been taking it?" = you guessed it, POLICE

There are hundreds of other variations too like "Do you have a plan?". Any one of them will trigger the Pig Patrol to come shit all over your life even more.

 

[druggedonsurvival]

That's one of my biggest fears. That's why when I tried a crisis line for the first time, I opted for the online chat through a VPN to stay anonymous. I'm so sorry that happened to you, though, it sounds terrifying.

 

[locked*n*loaded]

Well, it seems you got the help you desired. Not sure how good of help it was, but help nonetheless. I mean why else would you have called a helpline if you truly weren't reaching out for help? And there's nothing wrong with reaching out for help if that's what you want.

 

[Nyotei]

I had a similar, less violent experience... I told a close friend that I might visit an abandoned building I had chosen, but without actually planning to jump (I wanted to just visit it). They betrayed my trust through my phone number, and police were able to stop the bus I was on and take me out. They detained me, wouldn't let me leave, asked a lot of really leading questions then put me in the back of their car.

They didn't even stop to ask how I was doing. They seemed more concerned for my friend than myself, telling me not to hate them for what they did to me. When I was being escorted to the ER, the lady cop annoyingly said "You're not going to run, are you?" before handing me over. Being a schizophrenic, I was having a really tough time with eyes on me the entire time.... my phone being removed from me, all the patients/families/workers gawking at me nearly drove me insane. I barely had enough nerve to withstand it all so I could talk my way out.

They went through all my stuff, my backpack and purse, making really rude and embarassing comments about the stuff I had in there (I had sex toys from a visit with my significant other, the security team really had a field day with that...).

Funnily enough, I was out in just 6 hours. I just had to tell them my friend was exaggerating a false interpretation of something I said, then they took their sweet time preparing discharge papers. I felt so humiliated.

 

[EternalShore]

I called a suicide chat number. She asks if I have a plan. I said no..I am not in danger but I did once buy SN and I had a gun in the home. (It's usa, almost everyone does) I said that I was away from the gun and I'm not in danger. I made another mistake saying I wrote a note. (She didn't give me a chance to explain that it was more therapeutic by putting apologies in paper. I posted it in the creative writing thread). I just wanted to chat, I wasn't in crisis.

Her chats seemed scripted so I told her I didn't want to chat anymore and thanks.

Half hour later (5 am) cops bang my door. They shine a light in my face. Yelling for my hands up and acting like I had a gun and was dangerous. Guns drawn on me. They command me to the ground and cuff me. I'm sure all my neighbors are watching. EMTs take me to the ER, cuffed to the stretcher. I stay for 7 hours until psych clears me.

I am just exhausted.

I'm really sorry they betrayed your trust like that! :( I'm glad they didn't make you pay for it even tho it sounds so awful! :((( You didn't even say you'd do anything! >_< I suppose that's why hiding one's phone number or getting a VPN for the text chat are musts~ >_<

 

[Hollowman]

Society is such a joke? How is this helping anybody???

The government's protecting it's property, we're more valuable/exploitable alive.

 

[escape_from_hell]

This sounds awful I am sorry you went through that. I was once put through ER and smooth talked to some suicide prison while drunk and enraged. Traumatizing shit.

So wear a lot of body armor and make head/face a great target (spotlights on face) and pull out a squirt gun could work? Any spiritual experts know if we would still go to hell or be reincarnated into this shit existence again if it's a cop that kills us?

 

[Hollowman]

This sounds awful I am sorry you went through that. I was once put through ER and smooth talked to some suicide prison while drunk and enraged. Traumatizing shit.

So wear a lot of body armor and make head/face a great target (spotlights on face) and pull out a squirt gun could work? Any spiritual experts know if we would still go to hell or be reincarnated into this shit existence again if it's a cop that kills us?

Bad idea there's better ways

 

[Little_Suzy]

You have to give EMT your permission because you are not being detained or taken against your will. I hope you were able to receive the much-needed help. Perhaps you were having a mini meltdown rather than a crisis, and being in a medically supervised setting allowed you to calm down. Glad you're safe home.

 

[Exact Change]

You have to give EMT your permission because you are not being detained or taken against your will. I hope you were able to receive the much-needed help. Perhaps you were having a mini meltdown rather than a crisis, and being in a medically supervised setting allowed you to calm down. Glad you're safe home.

The police made a "petition(?)"... to have me placed under observation at the hospital. I was forced and in cuffs up until I was in an ER room.

I'm embarrassed to walk in my neighborhood

 

[scientificmethid]

What state are you in? That's crazy.