My first draft of this particular post started with ‘the partial disclosure of my medical records, first by Southern Health on the 15th June, 2022 and then by the Sussex Partnership on the 22nd June, 2022 had caught me completely off-guard.’ I re-read the start of that first draft many times and found ‘caught me completely off-guard’ to be a serious understatement, the idiom grossly inadequate. Is there a suitable idiom? The revelations detailed in the partial disclosure of my medical records was actually seismic.

The consequence of dealing with mental health services in Basingstoke, especially with CAMHS and the wider Sussex Partnership NHS Foundation Trust, had made me fearful of a possible decent into paranoia. For almost six months I had barely contained a festering suspicion of conspiracy. As it turned out, all my fears were realised in the revelations detailed in my medical records along with new ones unreckoned. I never could have anticipated the breaking of a presumed contract between  professional therapist and an exposed vulnerable patient. Here was evidence of a violation of trust, the defilement of an ethical agreement between clinician and client. This fundamental undermining of confidence in the therapeutic relationship would precipitate a catastrophic psychological response like a medieval fortress wall being undermined by a subterranean sapper. My psychological response was characterised by a subset of extreme reactions and emotions. Some of these reactions were immediate. Others were weeds being germinated.

There was mostly fear.

The ground shifted under my feet and my perspective of the world was altered. Everyone became untrustworthy, even dangerous.

I was, indeed, caught ‘off guard’. I was shaken out of myself, dislocated and dissociated.

I was subsumed by anxiety, grief, sadness, hopelessness and shame.

I absorbed all of the negative emotions, turning them in on myself in self-deprecation, belittlement and accusation.

I became restless, irritable, neurotic and full of doubt, socially self-isolating even with close friends.

All hope and ambition were erased, replaced by pervasive suicidal ideation.

But it was mostly fear that petrified me. I couldn’t fight and I couldn’t flee.

I just froze as though embraced by the cataleptic attention of a gorgon.

I so I was pulled, inexorably, into the only recourse available, that being CAMHS General Manager, Wanda Reynolds.

I thought, at the time, that I could trust her. I had met her once on the 20th May 2022 and had taken her at her word. She had seemed genuinely supportive and understanding, telling me twice in that meeting that ‘We have damaged you’. She had reached out and offered her time to talk through my disclosed medical records and I had taken up the invitation readily. I had spoken to her briefly on the 15th June, 2022 immediately after the partial disclosure by Southern Health but have no recollection or record of speaking with her again. What I did do was write to Wanda Reynolds extensively over the course of several weeks

I still have all of the emails that were sent to Wanda Reynolds. They are truly distressing, poignant testaments to the abject pain that I felt at the time. The following are extracts of the first batch of emails sent to and received from Wanda Reynolds between the 15th and 22nd June, 2022. My words are published here without edit or grammatical correction, providing an accurate representation of just how psychologically damaged and cognitively impaired I was at the time.

‘Mon 20/06/2022 09:33

Good morning Wanda,

I am due to visit ****** *****, Meg’s social worker,  at her office this afternoon, ostensibly to undertake a carer’s assessment. Unfortunately, I will be informing ****** that I am expecting to surrender all my caring responsibilities as I recognise my fragile mental state and feel the onset of an imminent crisis. Meg’s mother is prepared to intervene sooner rather than later and take Meg back into the family home should a crisis escalate… I don’t know how I’m going to react today’s Camhs disclosure. I think I’ve alerted every relevant health professional to my current state. I had half expected to meet with you after the initial stage of the investigation was completed. I had visualised begging you to allow me to have that meeting with Sally. Now I am confused and completely heartbroken. The revelations contained within those disclosed Bridge Centre health records took me by complete surprise. I was expecting to find evidence that I had been lied to, deceived and manipulated but it was so much worse…’

Mark

From: REYNOLDS, Wanda (SPFT) **************************Sent: 20 June 2022 08:11To: Mark StockSubject: RE: medical records

Hi Mark,

Thank you for your emails and I am so sorry that you are so distressed.  One thing I have been thinking about a lot is that professionals that don't know a person will make judgements on information that gives one perspective and there is always more perspectives.   

Do you think it would be helpful for us to have a conversation after you have seen the records today?  Unfortunately I have quite a few meetings in but I have a gap for 30 mins between 4.40-5pm - do you think that could be useful?

Wanda

Tue 21/06/2022 17:28

‘Hello wanda been reading the disclosure released by Katie Not good. Im Very depressed. Im disappointed absoloutely nothing recorded in the ‘the extensive discussion with our leadership team. Where are the notes Wanda? Where are the minutes for the extensive discussions about me and my 12 page letter. I wanted to understand the thought process that led to reneging on my meeting of the 3rd. I needed to know what sallys thoughts were. She mentions something about a veiled ultimatum i don’t understand wanda there’s no ultimatum veiled or otherwise in my letter. I wanted to ask her to dinner. ITS absolutely crystal clear in my letter. An honestly simple romantic invitation to dinner which I fully expected Sally to decline. Said so in my letter. How did something so explicit get so so misconstrued? I don’t understand wanda

I feel so awful I feel sick Ive never felt such depression…

…But i never expected her to join my family or be a surrogate mum to Meg. And where does the ‘veiled ultimatum’ idea come from who suggested that idea? I was expecting to be rejected by her. I expected to move on after being rejected… Ask her to dinner. Thats all Romantic hopes were obviously there hope that she would find me interesting want to get to know me poss be a friend poss more. My intentions were honouranbel; She had nothing to fear. I wrote that i would take rejection on the chin.

How did everyone in that leadership team meeting get me so wrong?

To read all of this and to realise that it was all happening behind my back is appalling. To think i believed the lies all the while thinking sally was poss having personal problems at home. I was checking her facebook profile daily thinking she was in trouble. WANTING to help offer love and support. Seeing if there was a clue as to her welfare. And then her profile went ‘private ‘ and i couldn’t see anywore i thought she wanted privacy from everyone while sghe was goinf through a difficult time. But that wasn’t why her page went ‘private’ is it? It was because of me I was the perceived danger and . Her online presence vanished phots of her vanished from the internet. Because of me. Its dawning on me now. Its awful. I need to die. No wonder she didn’t want to meet me . I would nt want to meet me either under those circumstances. She thought I was a monster after all.

I don’t know what good talking with you would do maybe ia should talk to you sometime I don’t know.’

Mark

From: REYNOLDS, Wanda (SPFT) ************************************Sent: 20 June 2022 18:05To: Mark StockSubject: RE: medical records

Hi Mark,

I just wanted to check in on you at the end of the day.  I am aware that today may have been difficult.  I hope the meeting went well with Meg's social worker.  I will assure Sally of those points that you have raised.

If you would like to discuss your records from CAMHS with me please let me know.

Take Care

Wanda

I need to understand what happened during that meeting of the Camhs leadership team, the part referred to as ‘...the extensive discussion with our leadership team...’ Where are the notes Wanda? Where are the minutes for the extensive discussions about me and my 12 page letter. I wanted to understand the thought process that led to reneging on my meeting of the 3rd. I needed to know what sallys thoughts were.

I literally live by living honestly. Maybe its an autistic trait. I take things literally. I also have justice written into my dna. I can’t process injustice. I intervene even if I see injustice being metered out to defenceless strangers. It’s like a badly hung painting that needs straightening or that untied shoelace.

I trusted Sally. I need to know the truth.

From: Mark Stock ********************Sent: 21 June 2022 18:39To: 'REYNOLDS, Wanda (SPFT)'Subject: FW: medical records

‘…I’ve just re read my 12 page letter again and again. It’s the original, digital version of the letter that I wrote to Sally. I hand copied it, virtually word for word ( I remember that some small parts of this original were omitted from my hand written one ie the rambling about my book characters and a small re-wording towards the ending but nothing substantially different ) It was explicit. Where is the ‘ultimatum’? There is none. It was a simple no strings invitation to dinner. Does Camhs have access to that hand-written letter? Did Sally keep it or was it destroyed? Can you tell me? I sent the digital version to you a few days ago. You can check the substance of the hand written letter against the digital one. Both are explicit. It was a romantic invitation to dinner… Sally has or had a private practice outside of Cahms and I did hint at continuing some of the more intergenerational  therapy work and I allude to a couple of areas that we skirted around … Sally had said, during our latter sessions that she wanted to delve even deeper and more intensely into those parts of my past. I was desperate to tell my ‘story’ and relieved at the opportunity to finally have a trusted confidente. My therapy drawings had already illuminated those terrible dark traumas ( and so now maybe you can understand why it was so important for me to pick up those drawings from Sally as she was my trusted therapist. Eventually picking up the A3 envelope containing those drawings, from Dora, a complete stranger to me, and then opening them up half way home and finding no correspondence from Sally, no summary, no insight offered into the drawings and nothing to accompany to incomplete intergenerational family tree, also enclosed caused such a violent emotional reaction that I literally threw up on the pavement. Now you understand ?).’

Wed 22/06/2022 02:02

Dear Wanda,

‘Sorry I can’t sleep. I don’t think I’ll be able to sleep for a long time.

I’ve been going over the medical records disclosed earlier today over and over and over again. As with the Bridge Centre disclosure there are aspects that need commenting on and rebuttals that need to be made. I’ll do that later.

The really distressing thing is reading both Camhs AND Bridge Centre disclosures in chronological alignment with my own correspondence over the last six months or so, following my own sincere and heartfelt attempts to reach out to Sally while all the time unaware of the subterfuge playing out behind my back. While I imagined Sally was seriously troubled by personal upheaval and offered my unyielding patience and politeness, everyone else at Camhs and The Bridge Centre was conspiring, framing me as a threat and informing the authorities. I was being monitored, surveilled, risk-assessed, pathologised and criminally accused before being disregarded by Camhs for almost six weeks while I fretted and worried about Sally’s welfare…

‘Has Sally seen ALL my emails over the last six months or so, Wanda or have some been intercepted? I find it hard to believe she could have read my words and not felt my anguish, did she just talk it through with her supervisor last December and compartmentalise me. What was her reaction to my email of the 14th? Did she panic. Did it come as a shock to her to learn that I was still out here, six weeks later, waiting like odorous garbage that hasn’t been collected by the dustmen?

I’m finding this impossible to process Wanda’

Time and hindsight proves that I was naïve. Over the course on the following seven weeks Wanda Reynolds would reveal herself to be dishonest, duplicitous and motivated, apparently, out of self-interest. Over the following seven weeks I was to learn that Wanda Reynolds had been at the centre of the very real conspiracy to misrepresent me.

By the afternoon of the 22nd June, 2022 I was feeling beset and very much alone, the burned out single dad and main carer to a severely mentally ill adolescent. Clinicians at CAMHS, Bramblys Drive, Basingstoke had grossly failed in their responsibilities towards my daughter. I had been psychologically damaged and abandoned by CAMHS art therapist, Sally Mungall and now deliberately and cynically misrepresented by her and her clinical cohorts and leadership staff in the wider Trust. The community mental health team at the Bridge Centre, New Road, Basingstoke were still refusing to accept me into their service, playing hot potato with iTalk over clinical responsibility of me. That same community mental health team under Southern Health NHS Foundation Trust hadn’t even appointed a care coordinator to my daughter and wouldn’t allocate talking therapy for her until 2023. I was already one step over the precipice, staring down into the void without hope or relief.

I don’t think I would have survived had it not been for an extraordinarily timely intervention.

Later in the afternoon of the same day that I received the partial disclosure of medical records from the Sussex Partnership I received the following email

From: Isobel ************************************Sent: 22 June 2022 16:31To: ********************Subject: Counselling sessions

Dear Mark

Following on from your recent contact with Basingstoke Counselling Service, I would like to offer you weekly counselling sessions at 8am on Thursday mornings. These will be face to face at our offices in Basingstoke (I enclose a map of how to find us).

If this time suits you, we could start our sessions on Thursday 30th June.

I look forward to hearing from you.

Isobel

BCS Counsellor

Basingstoke Counselling Service