The Purple Biscornu

So there’s something I always remember about dealing with people.

When I was an intern in my last year of med school, I did my voluntary assignment, naturally, in psychiatry. I was placed on an open unit dealing with patients with affective disorders.

There was a resident there, a woman called A – maybe in her mid-thirties or early fourties. She was specialising in Childrens’ psychiatry, and as such had to work a year in adult psychiatry.

I disliked her from the start. She was distanced and gave me the feeling I was stupid when I asked questions. At that point I was still seeing a therapist (who is also a psychiatrist) weekly while recovering from a severe depression I got about a year before.

I had two patients of my own. I still remember them, even though I can’t remember their names. (I’m bad with names. It’s annoying.) One was a depressive patient who was scared of being at home and later on of riding the bus. The other woman had what we thought might be bipolar disease and came in with a depressive episode.

Since she was bipolar and I always had the feeling I had to know things instead of asking on rounds with the chief attending, I I thought I’d try to find out what to do when someone had a manic eopisode, in case one of the other doctors would ask. Doc A was sitting in the conference room, and I asked her.

Lil Doc Fae: I was wondering, how would you treat a manic patient?

Doc A: Why do you want to know?

Lil Doc Fae: I have this patient with bipolar disease and thought they might ask during rounds. I know what to do about depression, but I’ve never seen a manic patient before.

Doc A *points*: There’s a bookshelf over there. Read it up.

I was mortally embarrassed. I read it up.

I told my therapist the week after and she chuckled and said, “Honestly – she’s a childrens’ psychiatrist and won’t have seen much of bipolar disease or mania. Have you not had the thought yet that maybe she doesn’t know either?”

And I boggled. Honestly. The idea that someone could know as little or less than me had never crossed my mind. That’s how confident I was at that point, haha! And somehow, instinctively, I knew she had to be right.

I never talked to Doc A about it. I didn’t even think about it myself, at that point I just thought, oh! and that was about it.

What I will never forget though is how things changed from that point on. Because suddenly it was easy to work with her. We got along very well. We played to each other’s strengths, and at the end she was my favourite doc there.

And all of this because I thought differently. Because that was the only thing that had changed, the way I perceived her. My behaviour to her must have changed, and that made her change hers. I have no idea that I did anything differently, but I believe knowledge of any kind makes you behave differently automatically.

It taught me to a degree to question others’ motives, especially when I assign them negative ones. I think it also meant that I was born to love cognitive therapy

But, anyway. Another thing. I’ve always seen my mother as an incredibly disciplined and tidy person. She used to have everything tidied, and cleaned and whatnot. And I could never do it. Cue tons of teenager-mother-conflicts. I’ve always had problems keeping order, I’ve always had waaaay too much stuff, never been able to keep sensible routines. At the same time it’s always been a big thing for me. While I’ll never be a neatfreak, I don’t like it when it’s too cluttered. I somehow always cross the line between comfortable and cluttered without noticing. Honestly, it just happens!

I remember very well the only day I’ve been truly suicidal, about nine years ago now. I woke with the thought, “I will clean now. At least they won’t be able to say that the apartment was a mess.”

And I wondered what the hell was wrong with me when obviously my mother had it all down, and how could I not have learnt this from her?

When I was visiting last week I got my answer – she isn’t too good at it, either. She really hates it as much as I do. She could force herself when she was home with me and my brother, but now that she’s working part time again, stuff doesn’t get done the way it did before. She told me how she didn’t clean the bathroom because my brother was staying and would shower that day, so it wouldn’t pay off to clean the shower just before that – sheesh, I so recognise that line of reasoning.

It was good, to see that she isn’t perfect, so I’m not too imperfect either.

Popularity: 47% [?]

My first time! <3 This fun meme is found here: Click

1. Why do we have to sleep?

2. Stupid things I used to do occasionally are now habits.

3. I have been staying up for too long.

4. I had never heard the phrase “Tc-99m-sestamibi” and it’s pretty strange.

5. I’m daydreaming the way I always do.

6. How was I to know that there was so much backstitching in my new embroidery project?

7. And as for the weekend, tonight I’m looking forward to sleeping, tomorrow my plans include watching SGA season 5 and stitching and Sunday, I want to have a nice trip to Stockholm!

Popularity: 52% [?]

She’s well-dressed, her white hair a sporty short style, her make up well done. I’ve met her only once, almost two months ago during her stay on the psych ICU. She had just tried to kill herself the second time. We did rounds and called her in to talk to her, the attending, two interns and myself. I didn’t say a word.

She still remembers me, tells me where I sat during that conversation. I didn’t think she would, she seemed so closed off at the time, wrapped up in unhappiness, wishing she would have succeeded with taking her life.

She seems different now. Talkative, enthusiastic, open. We talk about a lot of things. She’s glad I’ll be able to see my grandmother on her birthday. She talks about her own grandchildren, and her eyes sparkle.

I ask her about what happened when she tried to take her life. “Oh, when I went to take a bath?” she giggles. She took pills and went to drown herself in the lake, in the middle of winter. Luckily, because otherwise her family wouldn’t have been able to find her. There wouldn’t have been any tracks, no snow.

I’m taken aback and I tell her. She becomes serious and tells me, I still sometimes wish it had worked. Being like this, it doesn’t mean I’m well. It doesn’t mean I want to live.

She has nightmares about promising her doctor not to hurt herself, the day before.

Popularity: 59% [?]

My grandmother is going down the same path. She has never been the same after my grandfather passed away. She’s depressed and extremely anxious, and I’m more than convinced that if her faith didn’t forbid it so adamantly, she would have taken her life long ago.

She’s grown to be forgetful, and while that is to be expected when one reaches 85, it has happened very quickly and the contrast to her very good somatic health is striking.

The family has a hard time with her because of her constant negativity. It’s the thing where she does everything in her power to stay miserable, and I really think she believes that she’s supposed to be miserable without my grandfather, forever.

So many people have offered help and advice, which she constantly throws back into everyone’s faces. My grandparents and parents have always been involved in Church and other voluntary work, and there is quite a lot going on which she could fill her days with. She doesn’t want to. She got flowers for her birthday, they’re too much work. She gets offers to go on trips, she doesn’t want to because it reminds her of my grandfather. She was gifted nice chocolates, she doesn’t want them because they could make her fat. (Honestly, grandma?! 85!!)

She doesn’t have any hobbies. She has stopped knitting and watching tv. She doesn’t read. She doesn’t listen to music. All she does at home is either solve crossword puzzles or stare at the wall. Honestly, she sits in her livingroom and does nothing. She says she goes to bed at 8 pm sometimes because she’s bored.

It makes me incredibly sad. It can also be a tad annoying, because she has this ideal in her head that she isn’t supposed to be alone, and at the same time she shouldn’t have to have to do anything to be in contact with people. “If I didn’t go for a walk today, no one would come here to see me all day.” Her ideal is the way my greatgrandmother lived out her days, in my grandparents’ apartment on a chair next to the heater in the kitchen. “She was never alone, you know.” she says very often, because she forgets she’s already said it a hundred times. “Me and your grandfather, we did our duty.”

Which of course is a backstab at my mother especially, and I hate when she does that. My mom and dad live only two houses down the street, and they have an incredible difficult time dealing with her constant negative attitude.

There’s also my grandmother’s unhealthy behaviour towards alcohol. She just doesn’t seem to get that she doesnt tolerate the same amounts she did twenty years ago. She drinks, and it has happened that she falls and vomits, and can’t remember a thing the next morning. My parents basically had to prime the entire family not to give her any hard liqueur.

It makes me so sad. I love her incredible much, and I feel so sorry for her, and at the same time I sometimes want to hit her over the head for being so stubborn and not giving things a chance to get better. It’s such a horrible waste. I’m thinking about writing a letter to her doctor, but I didn’t ask her if that was okay, so I’m in two minds about it. She’s a horribly good actress, she has dominated the yearly sketch show of the town’s Catholic Women’s Association for years. She’s made for comedy, brilliant at it. Many people thought my mom was an evil witch for having problems with her, until they saw the way she is when she’s drunk and went “Wow, I didn’t know she was that mean to you.”

Sad. Even I feel a good amount of dread when I go to see her. It’s hard to bear when she’s telling me over and over again, because she forgot she already did, how she doesn’t want to live anymore. I wish there was something I could do to make her get back the spark she once had, but I feel like all of us lost that fight from the start, when my grandfather died. It honestly makes me wonder if I ever want to find that special person, if it isn’t better to live alone and not that attached, and be self sufficient. Which is kind of sad all on its own.

Popularity: 47% [?]

I’ve always been close to my grandmother. I think I was closer to my grandfather when I was very small, but as soon as I came into my teens, I grew closer to her.

This is difficult, because I had to write a post like this about my grandfather once, and I remember what happened afterwards.

My grandpa was a proud man. He fought in WWII, not because he agreed with the government, but because he wanted to protect his country. When his regiment was taken to a new assignment by plane, he talked to one of the commanding officers or a pilot, I don’t quite remember – they recognised each other’s dialects and talked about home. He was offered to fly with that man on the plane that was going to fly in the middle, escorted by a number of other planes. The weapons and other materials were in the centre plane, surrounded by planes carrying soldiers. The soldiers were more expendable. The centre plane was the only one that got through.

He was taken prisoner in Africa, where he and his comrades were kept under barbed wire in the blazing sun. It was fastened so low they couldn’t sit up. There are pictures of him plucking cotton in the USA, where he spent five years as a PoW.

He married my grandmother and took care of her mother until she died at 97. He was a weaver, and was so involved in the union that he became the president of the country’s textil union in the end. My mom describes him as very conservative and correct, but also generous.

He was a great grandfather anyway. My favourite thing to remember is Saturday mornings during elementary school. Mine was about the last grade that had school every other Saturday. On the Saturdays I was free, often my grandfather would come over during breakfast. He’d sit on the corner of the bench, where he’s always been sitting when he was at our place. After breakfast, he would take me somewhere cool, on the back of his bicycle or in the car. The small airport was only used privately then, and the main attraction was a big (or so it seemed at six years old ) playground. There was a carousel, I remember, and swings, and a little wooden house one climbed up to, to sit on a plastic seat that was connected to a horizontal rope, so one could glide over the entire playground.

That’s how I choose to remember him. He wasn’t doing well when he was around 70 years old, but he blazed through bypass-surgery – the surgeons said they hadn’t seen anyone his age recover this quickly before – and had some very good years after that. He and my grandmother travelled a lot. They hadn’t been able to go away for many years since my great grandmother couldn’t be left alone, and now they finally did. We used to joke that it’d be less work to note in the calendar when they were actually home.

When he was around 80 years old, he started to dwindle away. There was less of him every time I spoke to him or saw him. He died of pneumonia caused by his dementia. The worst for me was when I Talked to my godmother a few months afterwards, and she told me how abysmal the care he received towards the end was, how she was laughed at when she asked for painkillers for him, how this man, whose pain threshold was so high it was non-existant (he didn’t need any anesthetic for root canals, he said he didn’t have any pain after the bypass surgery – not to act the hero, but because he honestly didn’t) – he was screaming to the Virgin Mary and begging to die. For months afterwards, I wasn’t able to talk about this to anyone, it is just too awful to think about.

Popularity: 48% [?]

I kind of lost track of this whole blogging business when I started my rotation at Childrens’ psychiatry last summer. It’s in BiggerTown, meaning I’m looking at a one hour commute from TinyTown each way. Which, as it turns out, is killing me rather effectively – apparently I’m a commute-wuss.

The rotation was awesome, however. I wish I could have stayed there longer. After that I started at the psychiatric clinic in BiggerTown, which is, believe it or not, bigger than the one here in TinyTown. (I know. Be still my heart.) I was worried about that rotation, since the colleagues in both clinics tend to think the worst of each other,  but I found I actually like it there.

Many patients are sicker than the ones in TinyTown (since the two psychiatries are basically one clinic, so the more difficult cases are sent to BiggerTown) and many of them have been waiting for an appointment for a long time. TinyTown’s clinic works more smoothly, is more tightly knit, and after severe reorganisations and a lot less funding, BiggerTown is still building its outpatient clinic. Which is where I want to work. It’s challenging, but as long as I can work with patients, I’m fine.

It’s been pretty exhausting, seeing at least four patients a day I’ve never met before. Now I start having patients come back for follow ups, so it will get a bit easier. The nightshifts are actually fun (no, you’re not allowed to quote me on that).

So, it’s a lot of work, but at the same time I learn loads, and it’s so great to feel that I’ve chosen the right specialty.

Right now I’ve spent a week in Germany with my family because of my grandmother’s 85th birthday. It’s hard, she’s not doing well, and I don’t know how many more times I’ll be able to see her. I want to save up more money after the summer when I get my Fancy Specialist Salary, so I can travel to Germany more often, but what with increased loan payments I don’t think I can make it there more than twice a year.

It’s my last evening here today – I will have to leave early tomorrow and fly back home. Looking forward to it in a way; I do love my family and miss them, but I also miss my apartment and being able to do what I like. I haven’t been able to keep up with my lent fasting here because, routines – meet the window, window – please let the routines through. I hope I can back into it on Tuesday latest.

Popularity: 94% [?]

This week’s SBQ over at Stitched with Love and Cat Hair is the following:

If you had to choose, would you rather spend money on overdyed floss or hand-dyed fabric?

I am a member of the Limited Edition Fabric Club and the Dragonfloss club at Polstitches. I find that I mostly stitch after charts in solid colours, so the the biggest part of it is done with DMC. I have however done a few pieces with overdyed thread, and I love it.

Right now I have a nice range of overdyed flosses – not too many, but then I don’t use them too often, I mostly get them because they’re so pretty, haha!

I’m absolutely in love with Polstitches fabrics and plan almost all my projects around them. So for me, the answer would be fabric.

 

Popularity: 10% [?]

Tags: SBQ, Stitching

Seeing how bloody slow somewhat moderately fast my stitching is at times, I’ve ordered Christmas stuff today. Last year I started in October and everything just went veeery stressful in the end.

So I bought these things, thought it would be nice to make something other than cards:

 I bought five to give to All Those Relations Who Have Everything. I like that it’s not only a card you’ll throw away, but something you can use every year. Okay, so I bought four for the family and one for myself, hehe!

I have had a pattern I’ve wanted to do for my grandmother for some time now. She owns a few real Hummel figurines so I figured she’d like it. And I think it’s cute, so shoot me. I’m going to start it when I have finished half of my mermaid.

 

 

Popularity: 7% [?]

Tags: christmas, Stitching

Since cats make me happy (I’m weird like that), there shall be the occasional deranged lolcat. Mostly on Saturdays. Wouldn’t you know, that’s today!

 

Popularity: 6% [?]

Tags: lolcat

I’m still here. No, really.

I’ve started working at Childrens’ and Adolescents’ psych, and the commute is killing me. Gah. Everyone’s nice though, so I hope I’ll get used to the additional two or three hours a day.

I will be off in a few minutes to see Bouncy Haired Girl and go to Louisiana (the museum, not the state) to see a fabulous Cézanne-exhibit. Yay! I hope my stomach behaves, it has been keeping me awake lately with incessant cramping. No fun.

I shall be back with you soonly, and there shall be funny cat pictures Promise

Popularity: 69% [?]

Tags: Pesky Real Life