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.