Creatively Written (part I)

For the most part, unless the instructor is out for some rare reason, we have a creative writing group each and every Tuesday. Shes pretty reliable, only out a few times, and I definitely miss this set aside time when we don’t have it. Its not exactly what you would think of when you think “creative writing group”. Its not about how to write better, more descriptively, or grammar corrections. The instructor really knows her stuff and what she does is gives urging through prompts and then, after a few minutes of wordplay, we read aloud and analyze what we have written. Its almost like art therapy but with writing instead. We work on trying to find out what our writing says about us. Often when we each read aloud the others around the table hear hidden messages and meanings in the words that we never realized were present.

This week she gave us a list of simple questions and we were told to reply to each one with whatever came to our minds when we read the question. What we came up with didn’t necessarily have to be a direct response to the question itself but, at least preferably, a semi-complete thought or part of a sentence that had to do with what we thought about it. After we had written down our answers she then told us to find a blank sheet of paper and write down only what we had written as reply to each question but we were supposed to turn it into a paragraph that had some flow to it. It didn’t have to make complete sense but it couldn’t be totally disjointed. When we read our paragraphs out loud it was supposed to invoke a view into the various ways we looked at life. It was a lot of intrinsic translation that could only be seen through the eyes of a bystander.

The questions:

Why do bunnies have pink noses?

How do birds fly?

What makes the pictures in my TV?

Where does the color ——- come from?

Why do we have two ears?

Where does our thinking go when we sleep?

Why are our teeth white?

What do wild monkeys eat?

Why is the sky blue?

What makes the subway cars go?

Why do we have fingerprints?

How do fish not drown?

How do lightbulbs work?

Why is dirt brown?

How do planes stay in the air?

Why do we have fingernails?

What are dreams?

Why is today Tuesday?

Why is water wet?

What do worms do all day?

How does ice get to be ice?

How does the refrigerator stay cold inside?

How (or why) do trees grow leaves?

…the answers tomorrow.

The Griz

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!

Fiends and fears

It was coffee time and Benji and I watched the clock tick away our allotted minutes until someone came to deem us ready to leave for the small upstairs cafe.

“I’m going to give them until 8:47 to get their act together before I start pestering them about leaving.” Benji was speaking of whichever one of the 3 staff members would be escorting us upstairs as his knee jumped in antsy anticipation. “We are running out of time!”

“I know, I know,” I said as I shuffled cards around in my computer solitaire game, “I don’t know why they put groups back to back with fresh air time when we are always running late in the mornings.”

“And its only the mornings!” Benji exclaimed, as he peered around the corner at the front desk for the umpteenth time. “All i ask for is my coffee in the mornings. Is that too much? It would be good to have more than 10 minutes to drink it in too. This standing around chatting like they are doing right now – this is crap!”

Just then Cora walked into the tiny day room. Cora was a larger woman, one of the nursing staff, who had a fluctuating attitude that she didn’t attempt to hide.  “What was going on with Elle at breakfast? What was the problem there?” She eyeballed the unkempt stack of magazines on the coffee table for a moment before looking from Benji to me and back again.

“Oh, she was just having some problems with the peanut butter. Its one of her fear foods.” Benji glanced past Cora at the front desk once more.

“She did a good job though. She ate it all in the end. It had just been causing some anxiety.” I added.

“I don’t understand. i just don’t get how someone could be scared of something like peanut butter.” Cora said with a gesture of her hands that displayed her giving up of comprehension. “In my house peanut butter is normal. The kids all eat it, everyone eats it no problem. Why would someone be scared of it…its just peanuts and sugar!”

Benji and I tripped over each others words as we both jumped in at once to try and explain the thought process behind “fear foods”. By the time we had sorted out who was going to say what though Cora had already turned and walked away. Benji looked at me.

“Well shes not known for her niceties.”

“I know,” I said, “but what I don’t understand is how someone who works on an eating disorder unit hasn’t had training in basic ED habits. Not only that but her walking away like she did just shows that shes not even going to try…”

“Coffee!” The call echoed around the room cutting our conversation short, that one word trumping all else.

Ready, set, settle in!

Early Monday morning and its one week down. The lazily comfortable weekend will be counteracted in a few hours with the return of all the docs, resident students, and various weekday groups. I’m looking forward to it though. It’s a good balance. The last 2 days were just enough down time and now I’m ready to get back into the swing of things. Rumor has it that we will be getting a new patient today as well but we wont know for sure until it actually happens. With the entering of someone new though there is and underlying sadness because it means a bed is opening up and someone else is leaving. This time its Sofie.

I don’t know how else to describe Sofie other than that she is a true free spirit is many many ways. Virtually the opposite of me in social aspects she is a boisterous, enigmatic, outgoingly hilarious actress who lives here in New York. I couldn’t be more happy that this, although short, amount of time here overlapped for us. I have the feeling, and her words to back it up, that we wont be seeing the last of each other once she steps through those doors on her way home today. Especially, if nothing else, she has promised that she’ll be around if I want company on one of my many upcoming passes to go out into the city. She’ll be one of the only people I know that lives around here when my time to explore rolls around so I’m definitely looking forward to accepting that olive branch.