That is what she yelled at me from her bed.
I asked her why she called me that.
“Because you are a bitch”
Harder than they should have
Was it because a middle school boy called me that over two decades ago?
Was it because deep down I believed she was right?
Was it because I thought of myself that way?
Normally this doesn’t hurt.
Patients call me things all the time
Why does this one matter so much?
Is it because I am the one that actually called the reinforcements and called a code white?
Brought in the calvary that dragged this patient out of her room and into the treatment room where she received Haldol 5 and Lorazepam 2? Kicking and screaming along the way
She was yelling racial slurs to the team, screaming her head off and disturbing others on the unit. She threw the door off the door frame. It didn’t hurt anyone or herself but it could have happened.
She had already tried to elope twice. Thankfully it she didn’t get too far because there are multiple doors with locked keys.
Yes I was the bitch that prevented you from getting out.
But I didn’t bring you in, that was some other “bitch”
I also am not keeping you here and doing fitness tests, that was the other one you called “bitch,” the PHD psychologist
I guess the only person that is preventing you from being here is yourself.
You get to choose whether or not you take your daily meds
You get to choose whether you cheek them and spit them out for your room mate to find
You get to choose what you scream and where you do it
Yes I get it, I wouldn’t want to be cooped up in here for weeks with out a breath of fresh air
You lost that privilege when you tried to climb the fence
You lost more privileges and the right to choose meds when you smacked down chairs and screamed at the top of your lungs
You are right when you told the 911 operator that we gave you meds against your will and were holding you hostage.
I don’t have the legal authority to let you go. Nor do I want to.
Thankfully you aren’t one of the people that were murders. But you did your own illegal things to get in here
Now it is our job to keep you and others safe both on and off the unit.
It is my job to keep you from hurting yourself and hurting others.
I didn’t fully appreciate that responsibility until I had to make that judgement call yesterday
Now I look at you through your bedroom window with a blanket over your head wondering if I made the right decision?
I could have put it off for another hour or another day.
I could have left the unit and just have gone home.
I could have let whichever attending on call order the meds when they received a phone call from the staff in distress.
But they wouldn’t have known you
And I guess you wouldn’t have known them either
There would never have been a face of whom did this too you.
Even if I didn’t draw up the medication and stick the needle in your right butt cheek.
I am the one that called the code and made the final decision
I never knew it would feel like this
Just being called a bitch
Maybe that is the title of what I am, just with an extra MD at the end