i guess that's pretty hard. I live in germany, and they have this health insurance thing where you can get private insurance, which allows doctors to charge you

i guess that's pretty hard. I live in germany, and they have this health insurance thing where you can get private insurance, which allows doctors to charge you more (crude picture here). But it also gives you a few advantages (for which you have to pay more of course) like being able to go right to the head of department (chefarzt-option), and that's one option i never regretted taking. So basically I called the hospital, and it went like this: me: "i'd like an appointment with the head of psychiatry" secretary: "i'm sorry we don't take any patients" me: "i have private insurance" secretary: "how about tomorrow morning" If there is something similar you can do in england, I would go for it, maybe just try to get an appointment with someone "higher-up". Maybe you have some friends who are or whose parents are in the medical profession, or something similar? The bad experience I had was with someone similar to what you depicted, low-level student counsellor, who the minute I saw her I knew "this is not going to end well at all". I wish you the best, don't give up. On the more prosaic and maybe a bit blindsighted side of advice, regular sleep, healthy food, a bit of exercise is the bottomline that I know I have to execute like a robot, not questioning it, not think about it. I have alarms all over my iphone for that kind of stuff: take out the garbage, clean your flat, do sports, shower. People think I'm crazy, but I know that when things are not going good, that little piece of technology is going to keep me on track.