A Calm Day

For the past umpteen days we have been working our tails off and I haven't had a moment to settle down and gather my thoughts. I love writing this blog in particular because of how important the work is that we do here. Crisis stabilization is insane work. We have to nestle up to some people that are literally nuts and try to fix them to the best of our ability. This takes patience, team work, good ethics, and a compassionate heart. I am proud to state that I have these qualities and the years of experience to prove it - and I don't.

Who did I see today? This was an average day. A client that has regular suicidal tendencies, an alcoholic, a person who hears voices to harm themself and has never taken psychiatric meds, who is almost fifty years old and homeless. A person with mulitiple personalities (five) who get's violently paranoid. A spanish speaker who had major depression and psychosis who was off their medication for two months. A young person who wanted to go back into a hospital after just being released because life is too overwhelming. A foreigner who had a scuffle during immigration interviews at the airport. And on and on and on. Each day is another saga, another soap opera, another sitcom.

I have always thought that this job would be perfect for primetime televison. Each day could highlight cases, the crazy staff, and our administration that tries hard and places more responsibility on an already overburdened staff. Sound like good viewing? There is a lot of comedy for sure.

So it is now August and the entire staff can't believe it is coming up on the holidays. I can. Yes it's been a fast year. That is because we are so busy in doing meaningful work. I remember what it was like when I was a kid with nothing to do. My friends might have been away and I was bored and watching the times slowly tick away. Now I blink my eye and it is six o'clock. WOW! HOW DID THAT HAPPEN?

May you all have great mental health.