Katie Mitchell

Resident Full Name: Katie Ann Mitchell
Resident Date of Birth:April 4, 1996
Resident Age: 15
Resident Gender: Female
Current Address: 1 Monks Orchard Road
City/Town: London
County/State:Greater London
Country: England

Resident Hair Colour: Red
Resident Eye Colour: Green
Resident Height: 5 Feet 3 Inches
Resident Weight: 105
Distinguishing Marks: Several scars across both elbow joints, forearms, wrists and upper thighs.

Representative: Thank you for meeting with me today. We will now begin the recorded interview. I will ask you a series of standard questions. Please try to answer them to the best of your ability. So, firstly, how are you feeling today?

Resident: I’m fine. How are you?

Patient Obeservation: Ms. Mitchell appears to be somewhat emotionless as she speaks. She picks at a bandage around her wrist.

Representative: And what circumstances have led you to apply for residency at the Highgrove Home for Children?

Resident: I can't stay at home, and the hospital cannot keep me over a month. I need somewhere to go that is far away from here and everything. I don't have any other family that can take me in, and pretty much no where else to go if you don't accept me.

Patient Observation: Ms. Mitchell speaks in something of a monotone, still not looking up, just continually picking at the bandage.

Representative: Do you have any medical conditions we should be aware of? If so, please explain.

Resident: Not that I know of.

Representative: Have you ever been diagnosed with a psychiatric illness? If yes, have you ever been hospitalised or sent to a special care facility for these illnesses?

Resident: They tell me I have PTSD. I'm not dealing with the death of my boyfriend, Tristan well. I tried to kill myself a few times, and landed in the hospital twice, before they sent me here. This was my third attempt. I can't stay at home anymore, it hurts to much. Everything reminds me. I don't sleep unless I have to, and looking at the window and ....

Patient Observation: Ms. Mitchell is oddly detached from what she is saying. She answers everything in a quiet monotone, never looking up. Repeated prompting finally budges her to finish her answer.

Resident: I see it happen again and again. I would rather be anywhere than in that room and that house.

Representative: How does your current state of mind affect your day to day life? Are there any incidences of note which you feel are a direct result of your state of mind, such as suicide attempts, arrests, hospitalisations, et cetera?

Resident: Patient Observation: Ms. Mitchell gives a half-hearted shrug. When pressed for some sort of answer, she finally replies.

Resident: I've tried to kill myself three times since he died. The whole thing caused this. Before Tristan died, I was happy and bubbly. I just sit now. There doesn't seem to be much point in continuing on without him. I'm not ... depressed, I just am grieving the loss of someone important to me.

Patient Observation: Ms. Mitchell continues to evade eye contact, and she seems to be holding something back, but refuses to add anything to her answer.

Representative: have you ever harmed yourself, others, or animals? If yes, please explain.

Resident: I've slit my forearms, elbows and wrists, as well as my thighs. Despite it all, I can't seem to end my guilt, and I realize now that no matter what I do, this is my burden to live with.

Patient Observation: Once again, she breaks off, and when prompted about hurting others or animals, finally answers with a monotone negative.

Representative: We understand you are having trouble at your current place of residence. Could you please describe the problems you are having, and the results or repercussions that have come about because of them?

Resident: I'm to close to home and my family. They come and visit and I just see it all again. The hospital can't keep me more than a month, and they are going to send me home. If I go home, it will be very bad. I can't....

Patient Observation: Ms. Mitchell quits speaking, and despite prompting and repeated attempts to ask her to continue, she remains silent.

Representative: What five words would you use to best describe yourself?

Resident: Lonely, Guilty, Grief-stricken, tired, dead.

Representative: Do you have many friends? Could you describe your relationships and where you met these friends?

Resident: I used to have lots of friends. I was a pretty popular. Tristan was a football player. He wasn’t the star player or anything, but still. We had a pretty big circle of friends, as we were friendly and well-liked. I met most of them at school, or growing up in my neighborhood. We were the normal sort of friends; I’m not sure how to describe the relationship. We just were.

Tristan asked me out on my birthday. We had been going together ever since. At first we had big group dates, but then we started going and doing things on our own. That night, we’d been out celebrating our six month anniversary. Tomorrow would have been 9 months.

Patient Observation: Finally, she looked up at me. The best way to describe her appearance is haunted. She appears to be very tired, with dark circles beneath her eyes and drooping eyes.

Representative: How would you describe your relationship with your biological family? Did you spend much time with them? Do you have any siblings?

Resident: My relationship with my parents is strained right now. They don't understand. They sent me here after my third suicide attempt at home. Prior to....everything was fine. They were normal parents, encouraging me to do well and make the most of the education they were paying for.

Representative: Are you sexually active? If yes, are you aware of any sexual preferences regarding gender or situation?

Resident: Yes.

Patient Observation: Questioning this answer proved to do nothing. Ms. Mitchell simply stared at the ground, picking at the bandage.

Representative: Where did you grow up, and what was it like there? How do you feel about where you grew up?

Resident: I grew up just outside of London in a small row house with my parents. It was normal, I guess. Mom stayed home, dad worked at a bank or something. We weren't rich but we weren't poor. It wasn't an exciting or interesting life, it just was normal. I liked where I grew up.

Representative: How is school? What are your grades like, and do you enjoy it? Do you participate in any after-school activities?

Resident: I'm an average student, and I used to watch football, but I don't like it anymore. I don't have as many friends as I used to. They all remind me ..... and I just don't want to be around them.

Patient Observation: Ms. Mitchell is quiet for a long time and never does speak of what her friends remind her of. I would think that it is Tristan, and she finds the topic to painful to speak of.

Representative: What do you hope to find at the Highgrove Home, and how do you feel about potentially becoming a resident there?

Resident: I hope that I can be left alone. I'm done trying to kill myself, I obviously can't get it right, so there's no point in trying again. I want to be away from all of the places that have to do with life before.

Patient Observation: Ms. Mitchell looks back down and continues to pick at the bandage on her wrist. Although her words are still quiet, there's a tone in them that suggests sincerity to me.

Representative: Lastly, how do you feel about what you have done so far with you life, looking back on it. If you have done unacceptable things, how do you now feel about those?

Resident: The only thing I've ever done wrong was sleep with Tristan. That's why he's dead. It's entirely my fault. If I hadn't had pressed for us to, then he'd still be alive and I wouldn't be here. I hate that I pressed for it, and if I could go back, I would. I feel completely terrible that this whole thing happened because of me.

Patient Observation: Ms. Mitchell shows her first real emotion when answering this question, squirming in her chair, wrapping her arms around her stomach and speaking with a distinct waver in her voice. She pauses, and despite prompting will say nothing more about what exactly happened.


Is there anything your character isn't telling us? Do you have more information to add about your character that they would not tell the representative about? Please explain below:

Katie witnessed Tristan's death while they were out celebrating their six month anniversary. They had climbed up onto the roof of her row house, and were quietly watching the night sky and talking as teenagers in love will do after consummating their relationship. She climbed down first, almost slipping, but managing to slip back into her window without mishap. Tristan wasn't so lucky, Katie had called up to warn him about her almost fall, but it was to late. Tristan's hand slid off the edge of the roof and he didn't catch himself, falling two stories down and landing, face up, on the picket fence edging the yard. Katie screamed and ran downstairs, trying to pull him off of the fence and stop the bleeding. It was far to late, however, and Tristan was taken up to the hospital, and declared dead.

Almost immediately, Katie quit sleeping. All she kept seeing behind her closed eyes was her beloved Tristan falling, and her not catching him. When she did sleep, the whole scene played out again, in detail. Sometimes, she would save him, only to realize upon waking that it was a dream. When her body forces her to sleep, she wakes gasping, screaming and crying. It is rare she has a restful nights sleep.

When pressed, Katie will not speak of what happened. Simply sitting quietly, looking down and fiddling with her fingers. She did tell the police what happened right after it did, but has since refused to speak of it. She attempted suicide after Tristan's funeral, and again a week after that. Both times, she was found by her mother and taken to the hospital, where she was kept for 24 hours to be watched and evaluated. At the time, they diagnosed her with ASD, because her symptoms had only been going on for a few weeks. Her parents admitted her to the hospital she is now at after her third attempt at suicide. Katie admitted that living in the house and staying in the same room was simply to much, and she couldn't handle it anymore.

Character Playby: Haley Ramm
Player Nickname:Kasu
Chatango Username: Kasumic
Preferred Chore Assignment Group: Kitchen Chores

But don't fret! Just follow the steps given to you below and edit your application appropriately. When you're done, please reply to this thread to let us know that the application has been edited, and we will review it again.

• Alright, stick with us for this one, because this app is going to need a serious overhaul before we can get Katie into Highgrove. As it says above, just follow the points and we'll try to keep it simple.
  
• The first and most pressing point is that any mental health facility that kept a patient permanently restrained would most certainly be investigated for malpractice and would be in deep, deep do-do, to put it politely. It simply does not happen. It is considered inhumane treatment reserved for places like Guantanamo Bay. There are far easier, more plausible, and actually accepted ways to handle patients who are a danger to themselves. Long-term restraint is a medical danger to a patient, and a massive, massive legal liability to the facility. Especially in England, where mental health may often be covered under the NHS, it simply would not fly.
  
• Our second pressing point is that, to be honest, this character does not have a single approved issue from our list. I'm actually not even sure what she would be officially diagnosed with in real life. These are the reasons why I say this:
  -Deliberate Self Harm specifies that the harm must not have suicidal intentions to be considered for diagnosis. Since Katie's self harm is all suicidal, this omits her from this diagnosis.
  -She did not acknowledge that Tristan was dead until a week ago, if we consider the OOC information, and yet she started trying to commit suicide to join him in death at least a month ago.
  -She does not display any PTSD symptoms on the in character application (and Highgrove's not going to know about anything that's OOC)
  -She couldn't be considered for major depressive disorder for obvious reasons.
  - She no longer has delusional disorder, and I do not believe she fit the diagnostic criteria for it to begin with, being as she doesn't fit any of the subtypes. I would consider believing a dead person as being still alive to be closer to psychotic behaviour.
  
• Given the way you've described her as a cheerleader and he as a football player, I'm going to go out on a limb and assume you meant American Football, because cheerleaders are not a common thing in the UK, especially not when associated with sports. Obviously, if that's what you were picturing, that's going to need some tweaking. American Football is not played in England. Culture in school in England is very different. The classic archetype of cheerleaders and jocks simply does not fit. Football, in England, is soccer, and it's a different animal all together. It does not have cheerleaders.
  
• Likewise, I think the chances of Tristan falling victim to a gun crime in London may be a little far fetched, considering that handguns are banned in England. The circumstances of his death sound more suited to somewhere like Detroit. Gun homicides are relatively rare in London considering the size of the population vs. the number of gun homicides per year. I really don't feel like I'm reading an application for a character who is not from the US at all. I feel like the address was just changed and an OOC mention added.
  
• I am genuinely loathe and sorry to ever say this to a player, especially a long term player on one of our sites, but I feel like this character is flirting dangerously close to the dreaded M-S words. The implausible and severe institutional restraint and the sheer jolly madness countered with the violent suicidal behaviour and propensity to hysterical fits immediately brings my mind to thoughts of Hollywood, which is not where I would ideally have it go. How could this character even function at Highgrove if the first thing she was going to do when set free was stab herself in the neck or something? She would be unplayable.
  
• Unfortunately, until the points above have been addressed, I really can't add any more pend points. Right now we're looking at a character who will have to be completely overhauled in order to fit. I know this pend will sound harsh, but if you genuinely consider all of my points I hope you'll understand why it may appear so.
  

Edited. I apologize for the crap before.

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• Katie's looking better but there are still some issues that need sorting before she can join the masses. Firstly, everything we need to know about Katie is in the out of character section and it doesn't really belong there. All that information about her boyfriend's death, her symptoms of PTSD, and the hospitalizations are relevant to the interests of Highgrove and therefore need to be in the section that they will be seeing. The OOC section is for the secrets and plot bunnies that the character doesn't need to disclose in order to be accepted.
  
  
• This next point is going to cover quite a bit so bear with me. I'm going to break it up as best I can to make it easier to follow.
  
  - Why hasn't Katie been diagnosed with depression when she can use the diagnostic criteria as a check list? She's lost interest in things she once loved, is strained from family and friends, feels inappropriate guilt, has done a one-eighty in personality, doesn't sleep, spends a lot of time staring off into space, is inactive, and the big one of trying to take her own life. Even if she claims to be not depressed it is very likely that she has long passed the "just grieving" window in the mind of any psychiatrist who didn't get get his diploma from a cracker jack box. If anything, the depression seems to be her main issue rather than the PTSD. This is the all consuming disorder and it is what she's being hospitalized for.
  
  - If Katie is seeing a psychiatrist and has been both put in for observation and committed then she would be on a serious cocktail of medication. There is no way around it. She would have been prescribed anti-depressants since the first suicide attempt and if they didn't help they would continue to cycle through them until the found one that did. Katie's problems are too serious to simply skip the pills.
  
  - If Katie is still a suicide risk she would not be sent home. The sheer amount of do-do that the hospital would be in for letting a suicidal patient walk out is staggering. Unless Katie has shown real signs of improvement they would not be taking her at her word that she's done trying to kill herself. Since she's still showing symptoms of the PTSD and the depression it seems to be that she hasn't gotten better. So she would remain in their care the same way a dangerous paranoid schizophrenic would.
  
  
• If Katie slit her wrists, forearms, and elbow creases deep enough to kill herself she wouldn't have use of her hands. Cutting that deep would slice right through muscles, nerves, everything else that allows us the dexterity we have. Katie would be left with two claw hands and be unable to do anything with them. In addition, cutting those areas would cause severe blood loss. I find it unrealistic that her mother would be conveniently right there at all times to save her before she bled to death. Why wouldn't she wait until she was alone? Why would she try cutting again when it failed the first time? If Katie is desperate to die then nothing would stop her and she'd go to whatever length necessary to end her life.
  
  
• There really isn't any reason for Katie to be attending Highgrove at this point. If she's in need of psychiatric care, because of the issues she has, she'd stay in the hospital. Katie needs to be struggling with her issues but she needs to be able to function without full time supervision and it still feels like she needs it. I feel that if Katie were in a group home or bouncing from foster home to foster home with similar issues she'd fit in much better. Perhaps tone down the suicides and depression and focus more on the PTSD?
  
  
• The circumstances surrounding the boyfriend's death and the fact that Katie is suicidal bare an uncomfortable resemblance to the movie The Virgin Suicides. While not exact, we just want to make sure that the character is your own and not a whim idea based on someone elses work. Given history of a previous character having circumstances directly copied from a motion picture we don't want to see it become a habit. Taking from other works is against our rules and further repeat of the offense will result in disciplinary action.
  

This application has been inactive for three days, and as such it has been marked as dormant. If you wish to continue the application process, you must make the appropriate changes listed in your pending notice, and reply to this thread within the next two days. Failure to do so will result in this application being denied, and you may not apply to play this character again in the future.

We apologise for the inconvenience, but this application has unfortunately been denied. The reasons for this denial are listed below. We encourage you to make another character and try again, but you may not use the same character name and primary issues for your next application.

• This application is marked as dormant.