darkness

I'm starting nights again. It's a wee bit daunting in psychiatry. There's the main hospital, then several outlying wards so I tend to hop in the car if I'm called down to them at night. Of course the radio comes on and I'm privy to the weird and wonderful night time anthems on the waves. But there's something almost soothing about those beats, well thuds, when the night is at it's darkest. Somehow it's like I'm in limbo waiting for the morning sun. At that time, the problems of the day seem small, a million miles away. And you know sometimes I quite like it.

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Listening to: Chase & Status & Delilah - Time
via FoxyTunes

mondays

Now that I'm working closer to 9-5, I seem to get that oh god it's monday feeling on a nice lazy sunday evening. Gah. Horrible. But nonetheless I grumble my way round monday mornings and drag my self into work. I spend the morning thinking of the one hundred and one other jobs I'd rather do then by midday or so I've kinda realised I'm stuck with my lot and what the hell am I thinking, just get on with it for christ's sake woman. Then the afternoon goes by and I get so happy at the prospect of home time, anyone would think I was back at school. And here we are. Wishing my life away, one chunk at a time. I'll do that, AFTER my exams, after my results,after 1 st year after 5 th year and so we go; wishing life away slowly; but, surely there's more to enjoy than exams, study, assessments, work. Ha! Wishful thinking. But then I was actually thinking for once and you know perhaps this is just the season of work, of passing exams, of jumping through hoops. Maybe I should just try and enjoy it, rather than fighting it all the time. Just Maybe. I'm game to give the new theory a go. For one thing it has to be more fun!
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Listening to: Martin Solveig & Dragonette - Hello
via FoxyTunes

finding my groove

I think I used to think five years and bam, you're a doctor. You learn the knowledge and put it into practice, right? I'm sure you'll agree it's not quite like that. I'm working under a consultant just now who will retire just as I finish the job. He's worked, in various capacities as a doctor for, I'm guessing, 40 years at least. Experience is priceless. Learning how to tackle the concotion of issues patients, relatives, fellow staff, establishments throw up each day is invaluable. As time creeps on, in the space of a year or two, the art of observing, of patience and of calm in the face of chaos, become covetted skills. The art of being able to say, "We can watch, we can wait" even for a moment longer, can bring clarity to a situation looking dire moments before. From cardiac arrest calls to irritatinf relatives to the angry patient that moment, I'm learning is vital. Just as finals are complete at medical school, it's easy to think that's it, but the more I work, the more I realise that was just the very beginning of a long road, a long road of continual learning, adjusting, reviewing, reading, interacting and hopefully, enjoying. Though it times it seems impossible, I'm doing my best to learn from the older folk, they've seen a lot and that counts for a lot.

troubled

His mother strode along the corridor, "oh quieten will you, nobody's after you," something she's said for 30 years or so. Thirty years caring for her son. And now we're at a loss. He's been to many facilities; turned away from many, not coped in many. And here we are again, rejections and options running thin. He shouts, shouts louder, paces, hands failing. The uncertainty is too much. These voices have troubled him from youth, from those early teen years. When the shouting settles, a shell of a man remains, apologising profusely, unable to control these outbursts. A personality somehow evades this chap, destroyed even before it had a chance to blossom. The voices, the thoughts too much for a child to handle. And now a grown man, lost, fumbling, child like in the midst of the harsh adult world. But his mother is still with me, his father hobbles along propped up by a stick. The father is quiet and full of thanks but with a look of defeat, of regret, of a hard life. His mother is tearful, wanting the best for her boy. A boy who is long since a man, yet troubled with the affliction of illness. Illness that has halted a personality, distroyed hopes of a life expected as the norm at birth. Illness that society all too quickly rejects or ignores, frightened of what lies beneath, frightened of the possibility. Even the highest does of the best medicines do not seem to help, the illness runs too deep, too entrenched. This is medicine.

In the mind

I'm trying to read some psychiatry stuff and I'm thinking what would a mental state exam on me say. What would someone think of my beahviour and appearance, my mood, my thoughts.... and what would I think of their assessment. Psychiatry is so personal, so invasive but this is what makes it so fascinating. What happens in the chemistry of the brain to trigger persecutory delusions, flights of ideas, pressure of speech, florid halucinations and psychosis? It mind boggling and intriguing. It's daunting. I think I'm almost looking forward to getting stuck in. But first a lot of reading, I feel quite out of my depth.
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Listening to: The Wallflowers - Into The Mystic
via FoxyTunes