Medical help doesn’t come quickly to me

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Congratulations! (far off, but happening) How are you doing in the meantime?

FYI - I am waiting for a provider to call back, but in my case it's not urgent (although it feels urgent, but I know it's not).

I have found very slow response in many social services due to underfunding, and, too often, over-management. I found a worthwhile counsellor available two blocks away that my doctor had not known of. I got the referral through victim [of crime] services, and had a long wait. After that, she bent the rules to keep me in care, and also gave me her personal phone number for emergencies. That was quite unofficial, but she said that nobody had ever abused the privilege. It was like having a security blanket for me. When she finally quit because of the administration, she was quite touched when I noted that she had only been paid to prevent embarrassing suicides, and that getting from there to reasonably happy had been her volunteer work.

Only waiting a month or so for TMS ain't bad. Time crawls when it comes to getting access to mental health care unless you are rich. I hope it works for you.

I have been on a colossal number of different drugs and the only one that ever improved my social skills was Adderall XR. It cleared out the fog in my mind, made it easy to find the words to say, and they just flowed right out of me. I would say it fixed a lot of my social deficits. I watched many hours of sitcoms to assimilate speech/jokes etc from. I practiced my social skills mostly online where I'd meet someone online first, establish a connection before meeting them in person. I had several relationships while I was on that med. Unfortunately I couldn't tolerate the side effects of loss of appetite and altered taste so I quit it. I was on it for ADHD though not specifically for social skills, it just so happened to help in that area that is all though Adderall is used occasionally to treat depression in refractory cases like yours. None of the effects were permanent and my head has returned to a garbled mess, I'm back to being socially awkward, though maybe not quite as bad as where I started.

Maybe consider learning CBT exposure therapy, find some groups or meetups with shared interests that you can attend and practice your social skills there. Unless you are online on dating websites or meeting new people on forums or Facebook, you aren't going to meet anyone sitting at home. You have to be out and about in order to run into people that might potentially be a match. I found if you start from a group of people with shared mental illnesses, they tend to be less judgmental about that seeing as they have one themselves, and you might get along better than with a normal person without any issues.

I feel like I have the mental equivalent of a serious injury but the treatment for it is being denied to me.

I take this to mean there are no Urgent Care facilities for moderate mental health issues. My medical doctor has appts available for urgent care. Plus I could easily stop by a Urgent Care facility to get a splinter out, or help with dehydration, or a hernia that needs a push back in ---- but if someone has the mental equivalents? Not so easy. Sure, there are facilities for severe (heart attack like) mental health issues, but what about for mild to moderate issues?

I did a search and find only college and university Urgent Care clinics have counselors on staff. I guess the demand is concentrated there. I would venture to say it's also in the general public, but the culture doesn't encourage one to get help. Marknis, your case in point: it's discouraging.