Honoring the Fear

I'm not sure I'm going to make much sense here.  Sometimes I think on paper, or rather, on my laptop.  It's the equivalent of thinking out loud.  It's difficult to put some thoughts into words, especially in such a way that other people can follow them.  You know, people that don't live in my head.

A thought occurred to me today, as I was driving down I-71.  I find long drives to be the ideal time for thinking.  I mean, what else is there to do?  Sometimes I talk on my cell phone (yes, I do know you aren't supposed to do that) but when your friends all have jobs, sometimes there is no one to call.  So I am left to think.

Plus, the sound of the tires on the pavement is sort of meditative, I think, and today the sky and the land were both greyish-white and it was like being surrounded by white noise, both audible and visible.  Like I said, ideal for thinking.

Those who know me well know I've been highly anxious lately.  For those that weren't aware of that, well, you are now.  A lot of my recent anxiety stems from a very traumatic experience back in November in which I was treated at my local emergency room for self-inflicted lacerations of both forearms.

Note: My local emergency room, if you're wondering, is MedCentral Hospital in Mansfield, Ohio.  I highly advise not going there, especially if you need care for anything at all related to a psychiatric condition.  The care is worse than bad.  Do yourself a favor and go to one of many other nearby hospitals where you can expect compassionate, quality care.  For instance, go to Samaritan Hospital in Ashland, or Galion Community Hospital, or Bucyrus Community Hospital, or Morrow County Hospital in Mt. Gilead, or Fisher-Titus Medical Center in Norwalk.  Of course, the Cleveland Clinic, University Hospitals in Cleveland, and Ohio State University Hospital are all nearby and you can expect to receive state-of-the-art care there.  If you think you need inpatient psychiatric care, Windsor Laurelwood in  Willoughby, Ohio is an excellent hospital.  All of these are far better choices than MedCentral.

All right.  I feel better now.  Maybe I'll tell you more about my experience at MedCentral another time, but that's not really what I wanted to write about right now.

I wanted to tell you about fear.

Well, when I was treated at the emergency room at MedCentral, the care I received was appalling.  To make a long, painful story as short and simple as possible, I'll just say that I was treated with a lack of compassion, dignity, or respect, and that the emergency room physician closed wounds in my arms with surgical staples without giving me any local anesthesia to numb the area first and then refused to give me any pain medication for almost five hours after that.  As you might have guessed from my note about other area hospitals that provide better care than MedCentral, I'm a bit angry about how I was treated.  But I'm also afraid.

Since that experience, I've been afraid of seeking medical care.  It simply doesn't feel safe to me.  A couple days ago, I finally went to see my primary care provider, a nurse practitioner that I really like, because I'm had an upper respiratory thing going on for about six weeks now.  I didn't go sooner because I was afraid.  I realize it seems illogical to be afraid of her.  I knew she was not going to perform any painful procedures at all, with or without anesthesia.  I knew she was not going to attempt to admit me to a psychiatric ward against my will.  But I was still afraid.  Medical professionals no longer seem safe to me.

It's a post-traumatic stress reaction to the traumatic experience I had at MedCentral.  I recognize that.  And I'm pissed that I went to that emergency room without that fear and left with it.  Recognizing it doesn't make it go away, though.

My friends keep telling me I don't need to be afraid.  My therapist keeps telling me I don't need to be afraid.  I keep telling them that they just don't understand.  I start getting angry at them, for not believing how afraid I am, for not understanding, for not respecting my fear, for not acknowledging the danger I now see when I think of going to a doctor for something.  I start doubting myself, wondering if I am just crazy.  I start thinking they must believe I'm nuts, or I'm stupid, or both.

While I was driving today, I remembered an experience I had about ten years ago.  I was in the hospital, at Forest View in Grand Rapids, Michigan (an excellent hospital with a fantastic treatment program for people with trauma-related disorders, such as PTSD).   It was nighttime, the nurses were passing out bedtime medications, and I was afraid of going to bed.  People with PTSD will probably understand this.  I knew I was safe, knew there was nothing to be afraid of, but just the thought of going to bed in that dark, quiet room terrified me.  I didn't want to take my medication because I knew it would make me sleepy, and I didn't want to get sleepy, because I didn't want to go to bed because I was so scared.

I didn't know what to do.  Finally, I went to one of the mental health technicians, and told her I was afraid.  I expected her to tell me there was no reason to be afraid and to take my meds and go to bed.  But she didn't.  She took my fear seriously.  I think that may have been the first time in my life that anyone ever did that.  She started suggesting options to me.  Did I want to skip my meds?  I could, if I wanted to.  Would it help to sleep in the quiet room behind the nursing station?  Would I like to sleep in the patient lounge, across the hall from the nursing station?

I was so surprised.  She didn't think I was stupid for being afraid.  She wasn't telling me to just do something anyway, even though I was terrified of it.  She was giving me choices.  I ended up choosing to sleep in the lounge, where the light and soft voices and quiet laughter from the nursing station filtered in all night, making me feel safer.  But really, I think a big part of why I felt safer was because this mental health tech didn't dismiss my feelings.

She honored my fear.

What if I did that myself?  Because I don't.  I haven't been.  I've been trying to make myself go to appointments, even though I'm terrified.  Not surprisingly, I haven't been real successful.  I've just ended up disappointed in myself, feeling like a failure, feeling embarrassed when I had to tell friends that no, I did not keep the appointment with my psychiatrist, I was too scared to go.

But what if I quit doing that?  What if I just honored that fear?