Even more psych fun...

Consults are a blast. Seriously. Although quite disturbing at times. Below are a few select quotes from ONE of my patients (I met him in the private hospital ER, believe it or not; he came into the medicine ER voluntarily to report an assault):

"I solved Tupac Shakur's murder. And now Aaliyah's family's hired me to figure out what happened to her."

"I'm a prophet. I saw Hurricane Katrina in my mind before it happened."

"They're following me. And physically and sexually assaulting me. It's happened in Plano and Richardson and Dallas. They're outside in the parking lot right now." (Note: no evidence of physical harm of any kind...or of weird men in the parking lot. He also provided us with a list of license plate numbers of "them." He would not tell us who "they" were.)

"You've got to help me find my daughter. They've taken her. She's not my biological child but I've given off so much of my DNA in searching for her that now she's my biological daughter."

"That woman (a woman he is very preoccupied with and talked about throughout the interview) is a false prophetess. Do you know what that is? An evil lesbian prophetess. She steals men's male energy and has orgies and makes the little children watch. She killed all those little children. And now I'm going to leave here and hunt her down and kill her. Kill her legally. 'Cause that just ain't right."

For that last comment, he earned himself an involuntary stay at the psych hospital. So sad...but a great learning experience.

Another fabulous clip from Britain's Got Talent!

I LOVE this show....I wish it came on in the US! Made me cry...again. And it kind of made me want to have babies.

I know I post too many YouTube videos...

...but this one is awesome! It made me cry a little.

More psych fun....

Last Friday, I interviewed a psychotic patient, whose hallucination was a "whoremonger" who lived inside her with his "he-wife" (a hermaphrodite). It's actually pretty sad; apparently she heard the beings talk to each other, and she experienced them raping her and making her body do really weird things. She also believed that her COPD was the hallucinations taking her breath away and that the beings sexually assaulted her neighbors and family members. So sad. She's a really sweet lady, too.

After my attending and I left, the intern spoke with the patient briefly. It turns out that the whole time my attending and I were speaking with her, the patient believed that the whoremonger and his wife were "touching (OUR) private parts." Oh my goodness. I asked the intern, "Did she see them doing that?"

My intern replied, "No. She said she could just tell by the way y'all were shifting in your seats." Ha. I can't help thinking that's funny. How many people can say that they have been sexually assaulted by a patient's hallucination? Though in truth the lady's condition is tragically disabling and not really that funny.

On a different note, I finished up on the eating disorders unit last week. I had a really amazing time, and I learned so much. I'm excited about consults (my next three weeks) and seeing different illnesses, but I'm sure going to miss the eating disordered patients and my awesome attending.

I think the hardest part of this whole experience is seeing physicians and therapists try to treat illnesses of the mind and heart independently of God, specifically independently of who I believe is the true God, the Father, Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit. To other Christians, this will make sense; to those of you who are not, this probably sounds like nonsense. Which I can totally understand. It's just that I believe that the God of the universe has enormous power in healing the ills of His creation. Not being allowed to discuss Him (it was one of the big no-nos at my site; we were only allowed to talk about "spirituality" in the most generic sense, even with patients who shared our faith) made me feel really impotent. But that topic is a "whole 'nother" discussion.

Wisdom from my psych patients...

Yes, my patients on the eating disorder unit like to give me career advice. Which they are really not supposed to do, as it crosses professional/patient boundaries. It's pretty challenging to maintain those boundaries, actually, as the women are of similar age to me and have had many similar experiences. Anyway...my favorite advice was:

"Skip the crazies, go with the babies. I should know."

I just might take that advice...I'm really leaning toward pediatrics right now. I love helping patients with mood disorders, anxiety disorders, and eating disorders, but the rest of psych just isn't that interesting to me. However, the idea of someday getting a degree in Christian counseling after my pediatrics certification is quite appealing. Something to think about. My attending, who is absolutely wonderful, has given me quite a bit of autonomy on my rotation--I'm actually sort of giving therapy! A student version of it, of course. My attending also wants me to still consider psychiatry and told me that I have a rare ability to understand people's motivations and also that I have a natural rapport with patients. Which is very kind...I'm not sure if that's true or not.

Oh, another great story. Every week, the patients have a spirituality class. Today they talked about how their eating disorders become their gods and starve their souls, preventing them from relating to their higher power. (This is a secular program.) Then, one of my patients, the same one who gave me the wise career advice, said, "I wanna binge on Jesus!" Brilliant.

I love this rotation. But I'm still going to be a pediatrician. I think. If I could only make up my mind for sure.

Hopefully, teenage girls do not watch Fox News.

Seriously, Jordin has probably a BMI of 26, which as an African American woman, actually doesn't put her at increased risk for diabetes or hypertension. Silly. Her health risks are much lower than those of, say, Nicole Richie.