Annie, my therapist, has moved on. The med student changeover occurred last week as their month-long stint on our unit drew to a close. I knew from the time I started seeing her that we would be having limited visits. I don’t think the knowledge of her imminent departure hindered our conversations in any way, and I tried to get as much out of our frequent meetings as I could.

What it comes down to is that, with this being a teaching hospital, there are a number of medical students making the rounds as they work in one area one month and another the next. I still have my residential therapist,                     Dr. VanHalen, who oversaw Annie’s work, sat in on a few sessions, and meets with me for a short one-on-one at least once a week. VanHalen is a very animated woman as far as her facial expressions and hand gestures go. Her short thinning hair, wide open eyes, and boisterous personality almost make it hard to take her seriously but “almost” is definitely the key word in that statement. Its not easy to forget just how much sway she holds over the unit and over our individual treatment teams. VanHalen is assuredly a key player and shes not going anywhere any time soon.

All in all though I think I lucked out when Annie left as far as adjusting to her replacement goes. Paul isn’t a medical student with a short month-long shelf life, he is a psych intern. He will be on the unit until December and actually specializes in the psychiatry field which means I wont have to readjust again to someone new at all during the rest of my stay.

Paul is of an indeterminable age. If I was forced to guess I would have to wager between 28 and 34. His longish but slicked back dark blonde hair reveals and only minor hairline recession and the neatly trimmed but full beard he sports only has a light amount of white just in the very front where it comes to a point. To me he sort of resembles a reformed hippie mountain man who decided to try it in the real world for a while. His big teeth and expressive nature-boy eyes don’t fail to reinforce the idea that he would be perfectly at ease camping or planting an herb garden. Before I knew his name I started referring to him as Grizzly Adams, meaning the term in the nicest of ways, and eventually shortened his nickname to “The Griz”.

Judging from the 3 half-hour sessions I have had with Paul so far I can definitely say that I really enjoy working with him. Our sessions are productive, enlightening, and I actually lose track of time talking with him. Hes easy-going with his laid-back stance during discussions and doesn’t inhibit his colorful vocabulary. The passion he has for his job truly shows almost like his acute interest in what I am saying is so real its leaking out his pores. He just loves what he does and is not at all afraid to show it. It makes it easy for me to be open with him.

In any case it feels good to look forward to the one-on-one time. Its comforting to know that I really will get something out of it. Headway – here I come!