Psychiatric patients: the ideal training partners?

[wujidude]

I've noticed how a number of regular contributors to this forum say that they've used their martial arts in connection with psychiatric patients: GLW, Kevin Wikse (I think), scarletmantis . . . and now Braden(watch out Riverview Psychiatric). Am I missing something? Do you guys train with loonies (I'm not talking about the Candadian $1 coin)on a regular basis? Tell us some of your stories!

[GLW]

It is not that I trained with loonies...although there would be those who would say I MIGHT fit that category myself....

It just happened that I trained Chinese Martial Arts, was getting a degree in Psychology - (I do engineering now...computers don't expect you to give a **** how they feel.... ) And I took a job working as the man in the white coat who comes to carry you away....

This included working with patients, dealing with them if they wanted to run away from the hospital, and subduing them if they were out of control (read that as VIOLENT).

In the state I live in, it is ILLEGAL for a person working in a psychiatric hospital to hit a patient. In some states, they have a reflex grace period. That is to say, if a patient hits you and you reflexively hit back, you are not held accountable.

In this state, you don't usually get sued or have a legal problem...you just get fired if you hit them.

So, in dealing with VERY violent individuals in a hospital, you have to realize that they WILL hurt you, the will NOT be held accountable for it, they CAN sue your butt if you hurt them, and they are capable of hurting others. They also do not always respond to pain, they are strong as hell, and they will do things a sane person would never consider.

All of this for about 1.5 times minimum wage...was I hungry or what.

[TheBigToad]

Well, for as much as a post back to loonies it seems like a should be training with them... :)

I used to work part time in a mental hospital and a halfway house for kids.

In my state (and the sate I worked in) it is illegal to purposely hit patients or residents of the halfway house.

Their was a state hired man that taught "safe" take downs and restraining techniques, however I feel he him self was an idiot and was able to make them work because he seriously must have tipped the scales at 500 pounds and not because he knew what he was doing.

I never once ever had to get physical with an of the kids at the halfway house, they respected me as I did them, I only one time I had to step in front of a punch throw and catch it in the chest to prevent another from child getting hit.

Working in the hospital however was something of a different story, these aren't sane or reasonable people for the most part, many where there for very violent offenses against their in-home care takers.

There was one individual I was told flat out (and I'm thankful I was told) he would grab you and knock you to the ground and then do what ever it takes to injure your spine, he was big and inhumanly strong, talked to him self, heard voices and would even tear off hunks of his own body and others with his own teeth. He was erotically stimulated by the idea of surgery and being cut open and would swallow pens and keys and whatever else he could to get operated on.
This is truly dangerously insane for any of you who have ever thought you might have even once knew what dangerously insane was.

For these reasons alone he was at all times in solitary away from the other residents. I was unfortunately responsible for watching him while he was in room examined by doctors and feeding him and other very undesirable tasks.

3 times I can think of I really had to fight him near tooth and nail and various multiple times just to get him off me. He did not feel pain like most people do so restraining holds and locks did nothing.
I feel he was a non-responder to the real effective pressure points that will usually pretty much drop a person, they did nothing but make him more ****ed off. So I in the most real sense of the words; had to project and throw him into walls and dominate him physically into his submission before anyone could with remote safety approach to inject him with tranquilizers.

I could not belive that such a person could be alowed to continue his exsistence, and I even offered to pay for the bullet when they decide to put him down for good in my resignation letter.

As much as have a very jaded feeling towards working in this field and the fact that the twisted whisperings and incoherent sentences uttered by this individual are still enough to keep me awake at night, I wouldn't trade the experience for anything in the world, solely because now dealing with the so called loonies and "bad asses" in the outside world are nothing, compared to this one man's madness and greater majority of the population simply does not intimidate me like he did.

GLW is right on the money its horrible pay for the most part, these people will hurt you and yes they will do things and attempt actions that "normal" people would never consider.

I would not call this training, but real life experience that greatly dictates my practice now.

[old jong]

Hey guys. I have been working in a psychiatric hospital for 23 years!I'm direcly taking care of a dozen patients and I had my share of grappling with out of control individuals in all those years!...Are they good "training partners"?...If you like to be :bitten,scratched,spitten in your face,hair pulled and the likes,they are without comparaisons!....Of course,they punch and kick too!...And,I am allowed only to maintain them using only non abusive moves!
I had a formation about control techniques but it is mostly stupid and innefective in any situations.So,I have to relie on my M.A. skills to defend myself and not harm a patient.Wing chun defensive moves and my physical strengh have permitted me to survive in that environnement without damage to others or myself.
Tell me about the UFC :D

C'est la vie!

[GLW]

Strange as it sounds, I actually preferred working in the Acute Care (locked) ward. You KNEW going in that it was dangerous and you could NOT make a mistake.

On the open wards, the patients could be normal and then do something totally unexpected. Mistakes happened there by assuming that because 5 patients were close to discharge and almost well, the remaining 6 on the ward portion you were responsible for were also (not necessarily true). Then you also had the adolescents who were in the hospital not because of mental illness but because they were young criminals and their parents had enough insurance or enough money (or both) to get them put in the hospital instead of juvenile detention...or prison. They were dangerous to the point that they were quite capable of plotting to ambush you with numbers...I carry a 16 stitches scar as a reminder of those types...I gave them the benefit of the doubt and did NOT hurt the patients. That one never happened again...I don't give anyone that much trust.

[wujidude]

Wow . . . and I thought working in a nursing home was dangerous . . . ;- )

In all seriousness, thanks for posting your stories. To have to deal with varying degrees of Hannibal Lecter on a regular basis is not something I'd look forward to. It was particularly interesting hearing about the legal standard applied when assaulted by psychiatric patients . . . hell, you have more of a legal right to self-defense on the street than when working at one of these psychiatric facilities.

Glad you guys were able to deal with it.

[Student]

I was working as an alcohol and drug counselor with adolescents in 1995. It was a day treatment, outpatient program. One day I had a male client just go off because this girl told him to stop shooting her his middle finger ( a bird). He threatened to beat her ass etc... I got in between them, but his left arm came around and he nailed her in the chest with a palm hill strike. SHe fell backwards over the arm of a couch, landing on her back, hitting her head on the door while falling. THe program manager tried to talk the girl out of pressing charges, which is unethical. If stories go public like that, some local people and politicians try to get your funding removed and close your program. THe program manager tried to blame the boy's behavior on me. BUt, I didn't make the client's decision for him. I tried to talk him down. I wound up calling the police because another employee had gotten fired because he took a kid down, and the kids arm was broken during the take down. I have had no training in take downs. I didn't know what else to do. Calling the police can get you fired too. Some programs like to keep everything quite just like a dysfunctinal family in denial. He pushed me acouple of times. i thought about hitting him, but I knew I couldn't. In the end I just realized that this stuff is really hard work. I am training to be a school psychologist now. Swollowing ego can be a hard but benefitial thing. Good luck all.

[wujidude]

Depending on the school you work in, your xingyi training may still come in handy.

[Qiman]

That is the training format. Sounds great hey? I am a Psych Nurse. I worked accute locked units for about 7 years. Now I am out patient services. My guys do some weird stuff but if they get assaultive they go to jail. I learned a long time ago not to put up with that **** and I will press charges.

My worst experience was being chased in the parking lot by a psych patient with a large Rambo knife. The door locks failed and he got to his truck. A group of us had followed him to the parking lot to restrain him. The worst thing was that when we tried to get back in the building the doormat rolled up and jamed the door. We were trapped for about 45 seconds with this guy threatening us with this big arsed knife. He didn't attack thank God. I still have some flashbacks at times.

[GLW]

The training available when I was doing that line of work was limited.

What you mention, Qiman, really emphasizes the different laws from place to place. I was assaulted in an adolescent unit...multiple opponet time - and I followed the rules. did not hit the patient. It thought about pressing charges and suing..but the hospital would not back me and I could not get a lawyer who would take the case. the reasoning was that the hospital did not want the publicity and the lawyers figured that since they were already patients, the only place they could go for money was the hospital...it was a mess.

Then I had an instance with a special team where I had a patient try to punch me out. I blocked him at every turn but slipped on vegetable medley he had flung when he tried to hit me with a dinner tray. Then I did a leg sweep on him but by that time, another staff member had grabbed his arm...Guess what happens when you sweep a leg and the other staff gets in the way of where yu are going to have to put your sweeping leg...you get a 210 pound patient landing on your leg...

That was bad enough but then one of the shrinks came up and gave me hell...I almost took him out...