I need to understand this premis (TW)

Hey @Jlol

Thank you so much for being so open and sharing your experience with such clarity. I want to acknowledge right away how exhausting it is to be told to "keep reaching out", only to have those hands pull away the moment that you do reach out 💚

What you have described is not just a personal struggle; you've highlighted the very real structural issue that can be called a 'service carousel' of sorts. It's incredibly isolating to be treated as an "edge case" or told you’re "out of scope" by the very people meant to provide a safety net. It makes sense that your conclusion, that the help promised doesn't exist in practice for you, feels reinforced by every door that closes.

Your point about the system needing to take responsibility for that premise is a powerful one. When the gap between "the promise of help" and "the reality of service" is wide, it’s the individual who ends up carrying the weight of that failure.

To answer your question: yes, many here have expressed feeling "too much" for some services and "not enough" for others, even from my own lived experience accessing services. You aren't alone in that spiral.

Sometimes, when the system feels adversarial, people find a different kind of air to breathe in peer spaces (like here on SANE) or alternative therapies that don't rely on the same rigid clinical boxes, but that doesn't excuse the lack of professional support you truly deserve.

I’m curious to hear from others in the community: Have you felt caught in this "out of scope" loop? How do you navigate the frustration when the system feels like it’s built for someone else?

We're all here to listen, and we’re all glad you felt safe enough to post this here 💚

Thanks @MatchaToad

"Sometimes, when the system feels adversarial, people find a different kind of air to breathe in peer spaces (like here on SANE)"

I'm sorry - and I'll probably get in trouble for this, but I feel almost a duty to say it - but they are even more stricter/locked down. Wont go into details, but I've been kinda hurt many times for telling a story or speaking my truth only to get the post deleted, redacted, or in some cases my account banned. I don't want to turn this post thread into this conversation, but in my view they are very much complicit in maintaining the "ever elusive help" rhetoric because as they've told me, the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, which is fair enough I suppose.

But yes, I would like to know if others have felt this way. And if you did had you have any break throughs?

@Jlol

I really appreciate your honesty here. Please don’t apologise for saying that. I don't believe you should or deserve to get in trouble for sharing how these spaces have impacted you. I truly value transparency, and I think it's so important for people to share these experiences.

It’s a difficult and painful irony that, in an effort to keep a space "safe" for the many, the "truth" of an individual’s experience can sometimes be edited or silenced. When you’ve already been told by hospitals or doctors that you are "out of scope," having a post redacted would 100% feel like one more door being slammed in your face.

It sounds like that has left you feeling even more invisible, and I am so sorry that has been your experience here.

You’ve touched on a massive tension in the peer support realm with the balance between clinical safety and the raw, unfiltered reality of living with long-term distress. When those two things clash, it often feels like the system (even the peer-led parts) chooses its own preservation over the individual’s voice.

I want you to know that I am listening and sitting with you 💚

Thanks @MatchaToad,

That actually means a lot.

"It’s a difficult and painful irony that, in an effort to keep a space "safe" for the many, the "truth" of an individual’s experience can sometimes be edited or silenced. When you’ve already been told by hospitals or doctors that you are "out of scope," having a post redacted would 100% feel like one more door being slammed in your face."

This is spot on. I often feel I have to fight to be heard sometimes, which makes me feel like a jerk. But this comes from a place of being my own advocate.

What you've said touches on the broader problem. The fact is that "garden variety" depression and anxiety are far the most common MH issues. C-PTSD is not common. Therefore it makes sense for services to concentrate on these more "mainstream" illnesses (no offence intended to anyone who is suffering from depression or anxiety).

What I take umbridge with is, well, first off it doesn't really help me. But secondly, there is a constant rhetoric that says these services will help me. That's the thing that drives me up the wall.

So like I said I go to these services, but they can't help me. And I'm left feeling like I'm even more broken or guilty for not trying hard enough.

Sometimes I wish they'd have a sign up saying "This service is for regular depression or anxiety. If you have anything more serious we don't want to know". That at least would make me feel less bad for "failing" at getting help once more.

Then there's the broader implicatons of this attitude in terms of funding. For example, promotes it's self as the a federal initiative for mental health (or something like that, I can't remember exactly sorry). But neither can help with severe trauma or suicidialty. But truama and suicidiality are mental health!

And so, because "mental health" is all lumped together, when a state or federal government health minister looks at the mental health of the country, they're happy to see services are taking care of things, when they're not and can't. And NGOs that do deal with trauma or suicidiality don't get any funding.

Which leads me to being, well, a d*ck sometimes. If services are happy to take the state and federal governments money to fund this nebulous concept of "mental health recovery", but then reject me becuase my mental health issues are out of scope, then you bet I'm going to be a thorn in their side until they do recognise that the term "mental health" is a very broad pair of words that covers a hell of a lot of things, or they concede and give a percentage of funding to an orgnanisation(s) that does deal with the "icky" parts of MH they don't want to touch.

I pay taxes too. I deserve as much respect, recognition, help, and support as someone who has a more "pallatable" MH issue. I didn't choose the illnesses I have.

Sorry, /rant

@Jlol

I don't think you sound like a jerk at all. What you’re describing is a fierce kind of self-advocacy that comes from years of being mismanaged and mistreated by a system that uses a one-size-fits-all label for a thousand complex, different experiences 💚

You’ve hit on a very uncomfortable truth about the mental health industry. When mental health is marketed as a single, nebulous concept, it allows the powers-that-be to tick a box and say, "We’ve funded the solution," while people with C-PTSD, for example, are still left standing outside in the rain.

Your point about "palatable" vs. "icky" mental health is incredibly sharp. There is a huge difference between a system designed for "recovery" (which often implies a linear journey back to "normal") and a system built for long-term management of complex trauma. When the two are lumped together, the people with the most complex needs end up feeling like "failures" for not fitting into a set recovery model that wasn't built for them in the first place.

You are absolutely right, though, you didn't choose the complexity of your illness, and I want you to know that you should never have to apologise for the fact that a "standard" service doesn't have the tools to help you.

I am so grateful and proud of you for sharing this here. It challenges us (and the system) to be more honest about where the gaps are 💚