To my family,
I know that I haven't posted in awhile or responded to any post. I have been studying and listening more then posting. I wanted to let everyone here get some kind of understanding of my job. I work at a state run Psychiatric Hospital. I take care of patients raging in age from 18 to 105. This is a very humbling job and very draining mentally. It can be physical at times, but mostly it is very mental. My patients have a variety of mental illnesses.
You have people who will use everything they can think of to get what they want, and there is some who can't remember when they went to bathroom or how to go to the bathroom. I also have patients who were abandon by there so called loving families and cling to us workers and tug so hard on our hearts that we end getting in trouble for buying things for them or accepting home made gifts from them.
I will try to describe a day of work there but it is hard to put on paper. I start work at 3pm, i walk in the door and has soon has my patients see me they are right there begging me for help. I know the day shift staff has helped them but it still hits my heart hard when they ask for my help. I can't even have a chance to my coat off, I already have patients in the bathroom or in the shower. I then have to do a head count and ask them( if they can remember) if they have had a bowel movement. The ones who need changed I change. I then have to line them up like cattle to get medicine which is suppose to help but I feel like the doctors have no clue. I have a patient who uses the staff like a punching bag and the medicine is like giving her a piece of candy. After medication they can have juice and go outside if it is not too cold or not to hot out. Then about 4:30 pm some of my patients are feed on the unit dining room. Some can feed themselves some can't. Then when they are done I get to take at least 9 patients upstairs in the main dining room to eat. After dinner we do a reading group or discussion group. Which we discuss anything and everything. I mean anything. If you think of it we talk about it. Most of my patients get more medsat 7pm then get a snack. After snacks I change them again but they have been changed like 4 times before that. I assistant the ones who want to go to bed. The rest watch the news or a movie until I wake them and help them to bed.
That is just some things I do. I also listen to how they talk on a hotline to family or the president, the hotline is the heating ducts in the bathroom. I have a patient who thinks this is a punishment from God because of some sin he commited, I do my best to tell him it isn't but it only works for a little while. I also have patients who believe they are pregnant and will leave when the baby is born. She has been in the hospital at least 10 years. I also have another one who has been there 14 years and can manipulate anyone to get what she wants so you have to think 10 steps in each direction to out wit her. I have patients who have Alzheimer's and can't remember what year it is, how to eat, and they are like infants. I also take care of some very intelligent people like a heart surgeon, an architect,an array of different educators. I have to laugh sometimes because they come up with somethings that I would never think of. I have a male patient who has been in and out of hospitals all his life. he needed his pants changed even his underwear but said his underwear was dry when they weren't. I asked him how that was and with a straight face said he only sprayed a little in the front. The lady who uses us has a punching bag one day tried to convince all of us she was a man until we told her to look down and when she did she was shocked to realize she was a women.
This is women who tried to poison her family after they told her their father molested them, and she was trying to prove they were lying. She relives those memories everyday. I have a patient who is religion obsessed so i gather Ray's stuff and give it to him and he calms down some and asks alot of questions but then forgets but it helps him. I have a lady who thinks she is married to Clint Eastwood and he is going to rescue her.
This is just some of the things I see and deal with on daily basis. By the time I get off at a 11pm my brain is so tired of thinking I just shut it off. Samson always says what do you want do on are day off together, I always tell him whatever you want because I do not want to think about it. We only get 2 days a month off together sometimes 3 if we are lucky. He is such an understanding husband and I feel bad sometimes because he has to do all the thinking sometimes. Well, I think my time has come to say thanks for listening.
Ihope this gives you some idea of why I am just reading or listening to Ray. I will try my best to post more but I can't promise. My heart is in it but my brain isn't, I hope that made sense.
Your sister,
Pam
Author
Topic: Working at my Mental Health Job..... (Read 7462 times)