Penndel Mental Health Center

“I hope penndel mental health is proud of themselves. I was coming there for my medicine that I've been getting for more than 20 years. I had to cut back on my medicine to make it last until i can find a doctor. Now I've had multiple seizures which resulted in a serious injury. All because I was all of a sudden no longer allowed to see a doctor without being forced to get therapy. Knowing everytime i start therapy it brings up trauma that I excepted and learned to live with. I tried the therapy again and the results were the same as before. I had a happy life and only had a few incidents involving relationship issues that I sought help for and is no longer a issue. Unlike a lot of people who don't want to admit their fault and except help. I busted my butt getting the help that i needed. They don't seem to realize that what helps treat one person can harm another. Penndel was within bike riding distance and easy to get to. What i need is to be back on my full dose of medicine. I never willing stopped or was forced to lower my medicine to make it last. They have no regard for their patients or their safety. Or the safety of others. Hopefully I can get help fast and not hide myself in my trailer while I'm fighting to get help. Thanks penndel for destroying the life i worked hard for years to achieve. Because us a Mental health patients don't have years of experience to know what is harmful to us. You know everything about our physical and mental health by talking to us for 2 minutes. Instead of looking at our history with mental health treatment from the past. And judging us by our reputation for seeking help and trying different treatments.”

“I was added to the PATH program and basically forgotten, the same things I needed help with from this program I still need help with. I just think it’s extremely sad that people who need help are left to deal with people who don’t want to work or hate their jobs and don’t help you at all until you call management and even management will side with their staff instead of hiring people who actually care about other people it’s okay though hopefully one day when I get myself together I’ll be able to help others because I actually care about others not just myself I think that’s why I’m like this because I care too much but if your serious about yourself and your mental and physical wellness I would consider somewhere else”

“I was with Penndel Mental Health for almost 2 years. I was seeing a therapist called Sophia between 2022 until the back end of 2023, when I was in a horrendous car accident and unable to attend meetings. I'm giving it 2 stars because the front of house staff themselves were decent and there did appear to be more compassionate therapists there. Sophia herself was also a compassionate human being and that was clear. Maybe she wasn't very skilled at that time and has gotten better. I still have some empathy for the difficulty she would have had to face with me coming in every 2 weeks with the same issues whilst she told me over and over that my situation wouldn't get better until the person abusing me chose to get help, but also how trapped I felt as a foreign citizen with a child with my abuser who was in denial as to how badly I was being hurt. But it gets two stars because Sophia actually pushed me further into isolation. I lost count of how many times she indirectly told me she "couldn't help" me without offering to refer me to another therapist, or the times I'd be trying to express what was going on and I'd watch her zone out and pull up a generic questionnaire and ask me "on a scale of 1-5" about something totally irrelevant to what was being discussed that week. On one "mandated assessment" day, she actually tried to tell me that "I must be doing better because my overall score is a bit higher than it was before", which when you have someone constantly gaslighting and abusing you doesn't feel like a win. Or the look of dissociation she would have on her face when I started to vent. Once, my abuser actually came to my therapy session and I ended up being triggered and walked out (she also had PTSD, but was better at showing her triggers and what reaction she had), which following that, my therapist was visibly more distant and less personal with me than she had been before. One session I finally admitted that my abuser had actually assaulted me, denied me transportation to get away from her, made me sleep outside my own home, then had the cops called on me when I got back in the next day whilst trying to get the keys so I could go work (I was the sole breadwinner working two jobs), almost had me arrested for that stunt and was given paperwork by the cops to file against me despite the fact she was the one hitting me. At the end of the session I admitted it scared me because for a moment, I was tempted to hurt her back (but didn't) and Sophia went off the handle and started lecturing me about how I needed to come to her anger management classes and calling me an abuser despite me spending THE ENTIRE SESSION talking about how my abuser had attacked me and I had to restrain her. The look of anger and disdain on her face was wildly palpable and in the end, it only served to further push me away from getting help. I can understand how she came to that conclusion, had I actually chosen to hurt her back I would have been an abuser, too. I can even empathise that maybe she felt helpless and finally saw a way she could act with some agency in my situation and jumped on it, but it was beyond wildly inappropriate to tell the victim of domestic violence (who, as a man, has even more hurdles to get help than a woman does) that they are the problem and needed help. I continued going because my abuser dictated to me that I needed to prove myself by sticking with them. We did not learn any coping strategies or techniques, there was no trust or even a sense that she actually cared what I was saying to her at all for the entirety I was seeing her. They also did an intake for both me and my abuser for psychiatric help. The psychiatrists were attentive, I will say that, but both of us were horrified that they started prescribing meds after a quick conversation, especially for the person abusing me, who was waiting for MONTHS to even see a therapist. I hope Sophia has improved on her trade, so she does not do to others what she made me feel. It wasn't a good experience.”

“I'm so concerned about the people who are entering this line of work! You have nasty, rude, unprofessional people who have worked here for years with that attitude and your job is to help with mental health! Not only do you make it difficult to continue serious medication, but you have psychiatrist who continues messing up your med plan. Penndel Mental health added to my mental health, but if they did do anything good... They taught me more patience and growth, because dealing with them people will have you wanting to slam tables. I'm very upset with everybody who works here. Nobody loves their job any more. I really recommend some where else like Family Service .”