My patient today was depressed and delusional. He refuses to eat or drink because he believes he has no digestive organs, like an esophagus or stomach. He refuses to let people touch and assess him. He refuses his medications, which are vital to his mental wellbeing. He's been in the hospital for around a month, and he is finally getting some inprovement through ECT (electroconvulsive therapy). Basically, they shock you into being happy! It's interesting to see how it works though, because he will be interative and eating right after shock therapy, and in the afternoon his interaction dwindles down so much that he doesn't make eye contact or answer yes/no questions. He hides his face under the blankets and refuses to keep on his hosptial gown.
I have a heart for these kind of patients, maybe because I can relate to them. Sometimes you just need someone to treat you normal and not treat you like you're crazy; like they don't know what the hell is wrong in your brain that makes you feel so sad you can't get out of bed.
So, instead of shrinking the poor man, I opened up his blinds and let the beautiful blue sky and gorgeous colors of the changing leaves shine in his room, and talked to him like a normal person about irrelavant things, even if he didn't talk back. And his response?
He smiled and looked out the window for a long time. And he let me touch him. And took all of his medications.
Sometimes I think I might just make a good nurse afterall.
Nice! Well done. Such an undervalued job when you hear the true stories of how much you can touch a person's life.
ReplyDelete