Ask Men

Overall, great. I have needed a lot of help, and got it. Almost always with compassion, empathy, and amazing skill. Even when one or more of those wasn't in place, the others were, and I still received appropriate care.

That being said, you gotta be careful sometimes. You start talking about philosophy surrounding death, particularly your own, and they get all het up. Outright stating that you reserve the right to choose your time and manner of death is not always received with the kind of open mined listening that should be the default and standard for such subjects.

There's some that will outright argue with you if that's your relationship with death. Which has always eventually been resolved, but it's a pain in the ass.

But that's why I stopped eventually. If I can't rely on a professional to tell the difference between suicidal ideation and a frank exploration of death as an aspect of life, then every time it's necessary to see a different provider, it's more added stress to deal with than is worth it to me.

At this point in my life, the amount of physical pain caused by going somewhere, sitting in uncomfortable chairs, and then trying to ignore that pain to deal with internal mental processes is so high that nothing I could gain would be worth starting back. I already have to deal with that bullshit at regular doctors, I'm not layering more of it on.

But! That work I did was important. I wouldn't be here without it, and If I had managed to make it through, I doubt I would be as functional. Shit got bad for a while there.