YOU ARE NOT ALONE - A companion online community discussion board for The Mental Illness Happy Hour podcast with Paul Gilmartin

I've been suffering from depression and anxiety since 2008. I get easily distressed around people and new situations. A week ago I was in the hospital cause of appendix surgery. Two days ago I noticed some marks of infection around my wound and I also had high fever. They took me back into the hospital and they started this iv-antibiotic Unasyn 375 mg https://www.rxstars.net/unasyn-reviews- ... t-quality/ . Do you have any experience and advises how to manage in the hospital with this kind of situation? All this has made me more distressed than before and am afraid that I'll start to avoid more social situations. Have you any experience about this antibiotic and your own mental medication? How they work together?

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Hi Andrea, I've never thought about this before, but having social anxiety myself, wow the hospital would be a super challenging place to have to go. I feel for you! Are you still in or are you out yet?

Are you talking to a therapist about your social anxiety? When you finally are out and able to get around a bit, you might give that a try. One of the users here, BlackHole just posted a list of low-cost and no-cost psychiatric resources that are available, I can find the link if you like, it's here someplace. In the meantime, you've found a safe and healthy place, here. Check out some of the other threads and the thoughts and stories that people have shared, and keep us updated on how you're doing.

Hi! Thank you for your support I am still in the hospital, and it's been quite hard even talked about this many time with my therapist. Although physically I start to be much better. It reliefs me to see that I am not alone with this problem. The link for the BlackHole's post would be nice. I need to dig in more this forum later when I feel better, but I am so happy that I found this site.

Hi, Andrea, here is that link to those resources:

viewtopic.php?f=10&t=10100&p=25362#p25362

What's the latest, are you out of the hospital yet? I'm so glad to hear that you have a therapist! How are you coping/did you cope with getting through the hospital situation?

Oops, I'm sorry, here's a better posting of that link -

mentalpod.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=10&t=10100&p=25362#p25362

Hopefully you are home by now! When I was in the hospital for an extended stay, I told them about the anxiety. I said I needed to sleep with the curtains closed, the bed couldn't be flat. I couldn't sit up on my own, so if I woke up, I had to called the nurse and wait for her to come, and a feeling of being trapped would overwhelm me and trigger me. If they needed to check on me, wake me up first. That was quite the experience, waking up to find someone checking my vitals and going into a full on panic attack the first week! The head nurse made a little sign with what I needed and put it on the wall by my bed. Only one nurse ignored it. Awful little so-and-so. I had also had them have someone from the mental health department come see me so I could talk to them and have a contact in case I needed it.

Anyway, hope that helps for anyone else who might be wondering.

In case you're wondering about the anxiety level I was dealing with, it was so bad that I avoided the hospital a few times, instead choosing to pass out from pain. All that stuff I did there was when I was on morphine after surgery, which apparently made me a great advocate for myself. I wouldn't recommend anyone try that at home though.

That's a great thought, SpookyGhost, I'd never thought of that before, ask to talk to someone from the mental health department about social anxiety & being in the hospital. I'm gonna remember that!! Did they come to your room to see you? Was the person helpful?

Yeah, they came to my room and asked if it was ok to talk there, since there were 2 other patients in my room. We ended up going to an office to talk. They were very helpful, they actually set me up with group therapy and even with the stuff I needed when I got home for getting around. It ended up being a really good thing.