Dead End- Part Two, Or How To Deal With A BPD Patient

 

Well, I am here.

I went to sleep, around 05:00 A.M. Gratefully and finally.

Woke up at 06:00 A.M. Ungratefully and feeling like a panda. Yeah,a PANDA.

Took a cab, because I was unwilling to drive by myself, ’cause panda’s don’t drive, do they?

Got to my psych, to find the waiting room crowded as it’s a Black Friday sale.

I just stood in the middle of the room, confused, and thinking what to do.

I consider myself as a really, really impatient person, especially when I feel like a panda, and after along night of horror movie with me as a main actress.

So, I just knocked on the door, pretending not to hear the people from the waiting room saying to me…stuff (censored, because I’m a nice and polite person).

I entered without hesitation. My psych was luckily alone, typing on the computer.

She turned around and looked at me with a looked at me as I am batshit crazy.

Well, I am. Batshit crazy. Or a panda. Choose yourself.

“What the hell happened?!”, she asked. I didn’t look in the mirror this morning, just a quick inspection to be sure that I don’t have messy hair.

That’s important, but the panda look is not.  You know, when your mascara is beautifully melted around your eyes giving you that special panda look.

“Well”, I said, “bottom down, didn’t sleep, wanted to kill someone or something, feeling like a crap, and being on the edge”. Telegraphic voice and telegraph speech.

“You sure look like that”.

“I know”. “So, what now?”.

That deep breath she took while nodding her head in disapproval was so comforting.

I was still standing. “Sit down”, she said.

“Don’t want too”.

“As you wish”, she replied annoyed.

“I can only send you right away to the hospital, for an urgency admittance, you know that?”

“Yep”.

“Do you agree?”

“Nope”.

“If you can, please help me without sending me for another three weeks of vacation in the mental ward”,I pledged.

Her smile was so sweet. I wanted to bang her in the head, although knowing she is completely right.

“Ok now…..have you done something to yourself? Planned to?”

“Sure. I was gambling with a couple of options”.

“Oh, Tina”. That deep breath again. “You have to be admitted. You look like hell”.

“A panda”, I replied.

“What? A panda?”, she asked.

“No, I’m not delusional, just sarcastic”, I whispered. “I thought you knew me by now”.

“Can we delay that admittance for a couple of days?I have things to sort out. It’s not that easy, you know?”, I said.

“It’s not easy to let go home someone who admitted self-harm intentions, I cannot do it just like that”.

Now I took a deep breath.

I knew how I looked. I knew what was happening tonight, I knew, but I just didn’t want to go…there, again

“Please”, I said. “I’ll be alright, I promise”.

The eternal silence with her looking at me,and looking, and looking…..

“Ok. Let’s do it this way. You have my number. You should have called me yesterday”.

“At midnight?!”. I was confused.

“Yes, at midnight, 3 A.M., whatever. We are changing the rules, starting now”. Her voice was full of anger. Oh, what a supporting feeling.

“You will get here tomorrow, for a checkup”.

“But…it’s Saturday tomorrow!”

“And so what? I will be here!”, she replied with growing impatience.

“Ok, ok..no problem, just to avoid that place, I’ll do anything”.

“I will prescribe you another med to the ones you already have. You know you are a complete mess, and we have to start antipsychotic again”.

Oh, joy. Again, a trip to the zombie land.

But I nodded with acceptance. I knew she was totally and completely right about it.

“You’ll start immediately. Go home, take off that panda look, and go to bed. Your cell phone will be by your bed. I will call you in the afternoon, and in the evening”.

Even my mother wouldn’t do something like that. She was never so…compassionate?

“You will?”, I asked perplexed.

“Surely and absolutely. Take a week of the work, take a week for yourself. Don’t answer to the calls, of anyone whom you think will disturb you. Just try to focus on yourself. On yourself!”.

I thought that alien replaced my psych.  This wasn’t her. She was usually cold, distant and totally uninterested.

“What happened to you?”, I asked. “You seem like another person, another psych. I have never met you!”.

She laughed.

“Tina, you are coming here so long, and you haven’t noticed anything? I do care. You problem is that you don’t feel it or see it”.

Yeah right, I thought, but in the same time I asked myself if she was in fact right.

BPD patients are hard to correlate with their doctors, often build a wall around them….I know all of that.

And I started to cry. That was an accomplishment for me. And a relief. I felt that somebody is supporting me. Really supporting me.

“Oh, come on now, it will be alright. The fact you have made it to fight yourself and come here in the morning, that’s a sign of a strength and will. You are strong. You can manage it. I am here. We will get you out of this episode, together. All right?”.

I wanted to hug her, so I did. I never ever did that to any other psych before. I felt like someone took a heavy load of me.

She accepted the hug, I felt it.

Suddenly, the peace and the feeling of hope emerged.

It takes so little to make your patient trust you and cooperate.

It takes so little, my  dear psych docs, for the BPD patient to accept you. It takes just a little of a support and understanding. So little, but so much at the same time.

I felt like floating while exiting her office. I knew someone is watching over me, and will be there. That was a tremendous step forward for me.

So, now I’m peacefull like a baby.

And I didn’t even took my meds yet. I will.

I will follow the rules this time. No rebellion like before, because she gave me what I needed.

This time, she gave me what I needed. Not the meds, but the understanding.

Thank you, my dear doc A.

You saved me from myself, and saved me from the vacation in the happy place of the mental hospital.

So guys, it seems I’ll stick around. Not going on a vacation or a longer trip to the Unknown.

I did it. I managed it, and overcome myself.

I am a strong woman, indeed.

Go to hell, you BPD. I will beat you, I know I will!

Yours truly, Tina.