Borderline Personality Disorder,  Suicide

Mother who attempted suicide writes open letter to A&E staff saying “Stop judging me”

“When I attend your department I can guarantee it’s as a last resort. I’ll have spent up to an hour tending to my cuts, trying to dress them and have been mentally running through the pros and cons of presenting at A&E to seek help. (There are always more cons) I have never took that decision to attend lightly.”

Mother who attempted suicide writes open letter to A&E staff saying “Stop judging me”

James Connell

A MUM from Worcester who has attempted suicide several times has written an open letter to the city’s A&E department asking staff to show more compassion for people like her.

Mother-of-three Sasha Bailey-Dean who lives in Worcester city centre first tried to commit suicide when she was only eight years old and wants doctors and nurses in Worcester’s A&E to show more compassion and understanding for people who end up there because they have self-harmed.

During her life she has made five attempts on her life, sometimes using an overdose of prescription drugs, and at other times by self-inflicted injuries using blades.

She suffers from borderline personality disorder but says she is rarely treated with compassion at Worcestershire Royal Hospital in Worcester because her injuries may be self-inflicted.

However, she wanted to stress that she had received excellent care from the community mental health team and at Holt ward at the Elgar Unit in Worcester, managed by the Worcestershire Health and Care NHS Trust.

The 36-year-old, who runs a support site on Facebook called ‘Glitter & Hope’ for people with borderline personality disorder, said she wanted to provide a voice for other people who had self-harmed in the past.

Miss Bailey-Dean, who is receiving Dialectical Behaviour Therapy for her condition, said her letter was based on around nine or 10 visits to Worcester’s A&E when she had been treated by staff in an “unfortunate manner” because she has either self-harmed or attempted suicide.

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