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In 1984, I disliked the psychiatrist I saw at Kaiser in Hayward. I had been noncompliant with medication and, as a result, had been put on injections of Prolixin administered by a nurse--so that persons who were treating me could be certain that I was medicated.  

The psychiatrist was blunt in his explanation that something was wrong with my brain. He showed me a picture of a cross-section of a brain and pointed to the area that he said was creating the problem. I wasn't yet prepared to wrap my consciousness around that one.  

I experienced medication side effects that caused me a lot of suffering--I had a lot of body stiffness, along with medication-induced depression.  

Yet the psychiatrist was probably correct. Something hadn't worked right, or I wouldn't be in that situation. He hadn't tried to soften anything in his explanation of what was wrong with me. He hadn't denied the fact that I was getting medication side effects. In fact, he had lowered my dosage when he observed that my upper body was very stiff. I still didn't like him.  

The psychiatrist who I later saw at Kaiser Martinez was nicer. He still believed I needed medication and said I would need it "for quite a number of years." I didn't like hearing that. However this psychiatrist referred me to a therapy venue that was helpful, and referred me to Department of Rehabilitation, where I would later get job training. He also said that being schizophrenic didn't mean I wasn't intelligent; he said it affected "harnessing of intelligence." Thus, the pills from this doctor were easier to swallow.  

Later in life, psychiatrists were usually more likeable. Yet, there is no rule that you have to like your psychiatrist. She or he is there for the purpose of treating you for a disorder, and this is sort of a business transaction--or at least, you could see it that way. A doctor's bedside manner is a somewhat separate issue to whether or not they are any good at what they do.  

Your psychiatrist is not your friend. She or he may tell you things that you don't want to hear. If they can convince you to remain medicated, and can prescribe the right meds and the right dosages, and/or, prescribe other treatment, they have done their job.  

You don't have to like your psychiatrist--just be civil, and try to work with him or her. The treatment and your cooperation with it will benefit you. It is important to realize that the many of the medication side effects ease up after the first year to two. If you are unlucky enough to get Tardive Dyskinesia, it is possible that the psychiatrist will try to find a solution to that.  

(For the uninitiated; Tardive Dyskinesia is a reaction to antipsychotic medication causing involuntary movements of the mouth, face and upper body. It is disfiguring, it can be crippling, and it is often irreversible, including when antipsychotic medication is discontinued. It happens to a small percentage of those who take antipsychotics.)  

Mental illness isn't fair, Tardive Dyskinesia isn't fair, and the medications are far from perfect. But trying to go noncompliant, because you believe your psychiatrist is an ass, is not a solution. These illnesses do not go away without treatment, in fact they get worse. The best way of keeping most of your civil liberties intact, keeping your brain from deteriorating, and making a better life for yourself, is to cooperate with treatment, and in fact, to be proactive about it.  

It took me a number of years to come to terms with the fact of being mentally ill. I held on for a very long time to the notion that, at some point, I would be able to cure my problem with meditative techniques. 

As it turned out, the meditation wasn't in vain. It gave me the ability to like myself despite all of my imperfections. It is a help with internal challenges of facing life as a disabled person. It helps me in general, because I don't have to be controlled by baser impulses, and instead I can choose my actions consciously much more of the time. In addition, meditation helps with getting along with whomever my psychiatrist is at the time, even though he or she may tell me things I don't want to hear.