I –
Am light.
Luminous, blazing, bright as the full moon at Mid-Summer.
Warm as a hearth fire on a winters night.
Radiant, complete and whole.
You –
Are Shadow.
Empty, hollow, made from the leftovers of another’s glow.
Without substance of your own,
Incomplete and weightless.
You knocked at the door of my life
Wanting the warmth of my hearth fire,
Begging for the radiance I carry within me.
You thought that bathing in my light
would hide your lack of substance.
That standing in my radiance
would give you weight and form.
But that is not the nature of my light.
My fire laid bare all that was lacking in you.
Exposed you for the half formed thing you are,
and drove away the shadow you use to hide your emptiness.
The brighter I shone
The more you were exposed.
The more brilliant I became
The more you were diminished.
So you tried to dim my light.
With betrayal, with hurt
With disloyalty and with lies
But you cannot dim the sun.
You may have made clouds,
But they are as insubstantial as you are.
I will blaze forth again, and burn you aside
And you will retreat back to the shadow.
Where you belong.
Friday, December 2, 2011
Tuesday, September 13, 2011
My Mom/Nurse nose trumps your MD license.
Those of you on Facebook (and really, aren't we all on Facebook?) already know that I've had an...shall we say...interesting afternoon.
Wyatt had a doctors appointment for a check up and his varicella and pertussis boosters today. Nothing out of the ordinary, no big deal, take him in, get it done and move on, right?
Yeah, not so much...
I picked Wy up at school, made the schlep into Kernersville to the pediatricians office and got Wy checked in. We went into the exam room, and Wyatt charmed the nurse and the adorable pint sized PA who examined him. Her name was Sabrina, and she would have fit in my purse, really, she was just cute as a button. She checked him head to toe - eyes, ears, throat, nose, reflexes, had him bend and touch his toes and checked his spine, did the "turn your head and cough", she was VERY thorough. Wyatt is now 4'9" tall and 97lb. At this rate he'll be taller than me by the time he hits 8th grade.
So after tapping his bumpers and kicking his tires, she said he was fine, and that the nurse would be back with his shots in just a minute. We'd been there for a little while and Wy needed to pee, so I sent him across the hall to the bathroom while we waited for the nurse.
Then I heard the words no mother wants to hear from her child as he's coming out of the bathroom.
"Mom, I think you need to take a look at this"
I'm thinking - Oh shit. Do I have to?
But I'm a mom, so of course, I looked.
His pee was the color of cranberry juice.
Now, I've been a nurse for a LOOOOOOONG time, so normally my reaction to things like that is "Hmm. That's interesting. Let me call the doctor." But that's when it's a patient, not my kid.
Now, to my credit, I didn't flip out, I kept my cool, sent Wy back into the exam room, went up to the desk and asked the other PA sitting there for a specimen cup and told him why I needed it.
"Hi, could I have a specimen cup and a cup of water for my son? He just passed blood in his urine and I want to get a sample."
It took a minute to register with him, he did the: oh...Oh..OH! thing and got me the cup and came into the exam room. As we were walking back to the room I started think about the last time this happened, which was when Wy had a strep infection (the same day his father and I went to custody mediation after the piece of garbage and his lovely attorney alleged I had a revolving door on my bedroom and was an unfit mother who didn't feed my kid. But that's a whole other blog.).
OK so last time it was a strep infection, but that couldn't be the case this time, right? I mean, the PA JUST examined him, she'd looked down his throat with her shiny little light, and was inches away from his face. If his throat was irritated she'd have seen it right? She'd at least have smelled it, right?
Just to ease my own mind I took a whiff of Wyatts breath.
Oh.
My.
God.
There was some SERIOUS punky going on there. I know that smell, that was Strep, no doubt about it. The PA from the desk did a culture, we waited, and of course, it was positive.
By then Sabrina had come back in to the exam room. She was very apologetic, which was very sweet, and since I'm all about the advancement of education, I had her take a whiff of Wy's breath, so she'd remember the smell.
So now Wy's home from school tomorrow. The Appendix actually acted like a decent human being and offered to watch Wyatt tomorrow since he's off work and I'm not. ( I know there's something in it for him, he never does anything unless there's something in it for him, but I need to work, so I'm just going to accept the offer and deal with the fallout later).
The one bit of good news from today is that I got a callback for Annie, the play I auditioned for last night. There's a rotten, mean little part of me that's actually thinking that maybe Wyatt breathed on the other women trying out for Miss Hannigan and eliminated my competition. I know, I'm a terrible person.
Wyatt had a doctors appointment for a check up and his varicella and pertussis boosters today. Nothing out of the ordinary, no big deal, take him in, get it done and move on, right?
Yeah, not so much...
I picked Wy up at school, made the schlep into Kernersville to the pediatricians office and got Wy checked in. We went into the exam room, and Wyatt charmed the nurse and the adorable pint sized PA who examined him. Her name was Sabrina, and she would have fit in my purse, really, she was just cute as a button. She checked him head to toe - eyes, ears, throat, nose, reflexes, had him bend and touch his toes and checked his spine, did the "turn your head and cough", she was VERY thorough. Wyatt is now 4'9" tall and 97lb. At this rate he'll be taller than me by the time he hits 8th grade.
So after tapping his bumpers and kicking his tires, she said he was fine, and that the nurse would be back with his shots in just a minute. We'd been there for a little while and Wy needed to pee, so I sent him across the hall to the bathroom while we waited for the nurse.
Then I heard the words no mother wants to hear from her child as he's coming out of the bathroom.
"Mom, I think you need to take a look at this"
I'm thinking - Oh shit. Do I have to?
But I'm a mom, so of course, I looked.
His pee was the color of cranberry juice.
Now, I've been a nurse for a LOOOOOOONG time, so normally my reaction to things like that is "Hmm. That's interesting. Let me call the doctor." But that's when it's a patient, not my kid.
Now, to my credit, I didn't flip out, I kept my cool, sent Wy back into the exam room, went up to the desk and asked the other PA sitting there for a specimen cup and told him why I needed it.
"Hi, could I have a specimen cup and a cup of water for my son? He just passed blood in his urine and I want to get a sample."
It took a minute to register with him, he did the: oh...Oh..OH! thing and got me the cup and came into the exam room. As we were walking back to the room I started think about the last time this happened, which was when Wy had a strep infection (the same day his father and I went to custody mediation after the piece of garbage and his lovely attorney alleged I had a revolving door on my bedroom and was an unfit mother who didn't feed my kid. But that's a whole other blog.).
OK so last time it was a strep infection, but that couldn't be the case this time, right? I mean, the PA JUST examined him, she'd looked down his throat with her shiny little light, and was inches away from his face. If his throat was irritated she'd have seen it right? She'd at least have smelled it, right?
Just to ease my own mind I took a whiff of Wyatts breath.
Oh.
My.
God.
There was some SERIOUS punky going on there. I know that smell, that was Strep, no doubt about it. The PA from the desk did a culture, we waited, and of course, it was positive.
By then Sabrina had come back in to the exam room. She was very apologetic, which was very sweet, and since I'm all about the advancement of education, I had her take a whiff of Wy's breath, so she'd remember the smell.
So now Wy's home from school tomorrow. The Appendix actually acted like a decent human being and offered to watch Wyatt tomorrow since he's off work and I'm not. ( I know there's something in it for him, he never does anything unless there's something in it for him, but I need to work, so I'm just going to accept the offer and deal with the fallout later).
The one bit of good news from today is that I got a callback for Annie, the play I auditioned for last night. There's a rotten, mean little part of me that's actually thinking that maybe Wyatt breathed on the other women trying out for Miss Hannigan and eliminated my competition. I know, I'm a terrible person.
Wednesday, August 17, 2011
I'm trying to wrap my head around this, but my sanity won't bend that far.
My wonderful friend Kimberly has a knack for finding really interesting and sometimes mind boggling things online and very generously sharing them. She posted a link yesterday that has me still dumbfounded - so much so that I felt the need to actually dust off my blog and write something about it.
Apparently in the state of Maryland, there is a group called B4U-ACT - that wants to remove pedophelia from the upcoming new edition of the DSM 5, meaning that it would no longer be classified as a mental illness. The rationale behind this is to remove the stigma of criminal behavior from "law abiding, minor attracted persons" and encourage tolerence.
Tolerence? Of WHAT? Of a sexual attraction to children? Of the presence of sexual predators in areas where children are accessible? Of the behavior itself?
This group states on their website that their goal is to provide mental health services for individuals who are sexually attracted to children. I can understand the necessity for this, and I'm actually not opposed to that. I think that these people need access to mental health services just like anyone else does, even more so than most because the impulses and behaviors they have are potentially harmful to others if they act on them.
The problem I have with this group has more to do with some of their other attitudes. In the words of their conference keynote speaker, Dr Fredrick Berlin of Johns Hopkins University -
B4U-ACT’s own website puts Berlin’s views front and center. “Just as has been the case historically with homosexuality,” he writes, “society is currently addressing the matter of pedophilia with a balance that is far more heavily weighted on the side of criminal justice solutions than on the side of mental health solutions.”
To me this is sickening and so VERY wrong. Homosexuality is not a criminal act, it takes place between 2 consenting adults. Sexual contact in the case of pedophelia DOES NOT. It is the assault of a child or adolescent by an adult, and causes sufficient enough emotional and physical damage to merit its own special classification of PTSD in pre-school aged children. There's also the issue of the level of repeat offense by pedophiles - in a 2001 study conducted by the Center for Sex Offender Management, the recidivism rate for: "Child molesters with female victims ranged between 10 and 29 percent. Child molesters with male victims ranged between 13 and 40 percent. Exhibitionists ranged between 41 and 71 percent."
On top of this is the fact that Dr Berlin has flat out refused to comply with Maryland state reporting laws regarding sex offenders. He actually came under scrutiny from the Maryland State DA for refusing to report sex offendors when he knew that they were molesting children in the 1990's.
So basically, the goal here is to remove stigma from pedophelia, change the name from child molestor to "minor attracted person" and make it OK for them to be around children, as long as they haven't been caught breaking any sex offense laws.
I understand the desire to show compassion, to treat the mentally ill with dignity and humanity, and 99.999% of the time I agree with it, but let's face it here folks: some people are just bad. Some people are not poor victims of circumstance, they're not helpless, they don't need pity or compassion. Just as it is in the animal world there are scavengers and bottom feeders who will prey on the defenseless and weak. Some people have been damaged beyond repair, and are beyond rehabilitation. They are a danger to others around them, and regardless of how terrible the circumstances may have been to make them that way, the point is that they ARE that way, and there's no fixing it. The only option with someone like that is to protect others from them, and to prevent them from inflicting the kind of damage that was done to them on to others.
I know that sounds really harsh, but it's reality. I work with the mentally ill on a daily basis and the vast majority of the clients we treat are harmless, and no more a danger to a child than you or I are. Many of them are actually loving parents who are getting help so that they can be there for their children.
But I've also worked with clients over the years who are a danger, people who would harm a child, who have harmed children in the past. I go out of my way to treat these individuals with the same level of care and dignity that I would treat any other client with, but if one of them tells me that they're actively molesting you can bet your ass I'm going to notify law enforcement. At that point I don't give two farts about "stigma" or criminal vs behavioral treatment, all I care about is that this person has harmed someones baby and they need to be in a cage.
To think that there are mental health professionals who get so wrapped up in the lofty moralistic debate that they can't see the potential threat that people with pedophelic desires pose to others is just astonishing to me.
It makes my brain hurt.
Apparently in the state of Maryland, there is a group called B4U-ACT - that wants to remove pedophelia from the upcoming new edition of the DSM 5, meaning that it would no longer be classified as a mental illness. The rationale behind this is to remove the stigma of criminal behavior from "law abiding, minor attracted persons" and encourage tolerence.
Tolerence? Of WHAT? Of a sexual attraction to children? Of the presence of sexual predators in areas where children are accessible? Of the behavior itself?
This group states on their website that their goal is to provide mental health services for individuals who are sexually attracted to children. I can understand the necessity for this, and I'm actually not opposed to that. I think that these people need access to mental health services just like anyone else does, even more so than most because the impulses and behaviors they have are potentially harmful to others if they act on them.
The problem I have with this group has more to do with some of their other attitudes. In the words of their conference keynote speaker, Dr Fredrick Berlin of Johns Hopkins University -
B4U-ACT’s own website puts Berlin’s views front and center. “Just as has been the case historically with homosexuality,” he writes, “society is currently addressing the matter of pedophilia with a balance that is far more heavily weighted on the side of criminal justice solutions than on the side of mental health solutions.”
To me this is sickening and so VERY wrong. Homosexuality is not a criminal act, it takes place between 2 consenting adults. Sexual contact in the case of pedophelia DOES NOT. It is the assault of a child or adolescent by an adult, and causes sufficient enough emotional and physical damage to merit its own special classification of PTSD in pre-school aged children. There's also the issue of the level of repeat offense by pedophiles - in a 2001 study conducted by the Center for Sex Offender Management, the recidivism rate for: "Child molesters with female victims ranged between 10 and 29 percent. Child molesters with male victims ranged between 13 and 40 percent. Exhibitionists ranged between 41 and 71 percent."
On top of this is the fact that Dr Berlin has flat out refused to comply with Maryland state reporting laws regarding sex offenders. He actually came under scrutiny from the Maryland State DA for refusing to report sex offendors when he knew that they were molesting children in the 1990's.
So basically, the goal here is to remove stigma from pedophelia, change the name from child molestor to "minor attracted person" and make it OK for them to be around children, as long as they haven't been caught breaking any sex offense laws.
I understand the desire to show compassion, to treat the mentally ill with dignity and humanity, and 99.999% of the time I agree with it, but let's face it here folks: some people are just bad. Some people are not poor victims of circumstance, they're not helpless, they don't need pity or compassion. Just as it is in the animal world there are scavengers and bottom feeders who will prey on the defenseless and weak. Some people have been damaged beyond repair, and are beyond rehabilitation. They are a danger to others around them, and regardless of how terrible the circumstances may have been to make them that way, the point is that they ARE that way, and there's no fixing it. The only option with someone like that is to protect others from them, and to prevent them from inflicting the kind of damage that was done to them on to others.
I know that sounds really harsh, but it's reality. I work with the mentally ill on a daily basis and the vast majority of the clients we treat are harmless, and no more a danger to a child than you or I are. Many of them are actually loving parents who are getting help so that they can be there for their children.
But I've also worked with clients over the years who are a danger, people who would harm a child, who have harmed children in the past. I go out of my way to treat these individuals with the same level of care and dignity that I would treat any other client with, but if one of them tells me that they're actively molesting you can bet your ass I'm going to notify law enforcement. At that point I don't give two farts about "stigma" or criminal vs behavioral treatment, all I care about is that this person has harmed someones baby and they need to be in a cage.
To think that there are mental health professionals who get so wrapped up in the lofty moralistic debate that they can't see the potential threat that people with pedophelic desires pose to others is just astonishing to me.
It makes my brain hurt.
Tuesday, July 26, 2011
How to Change a Toddlers Diaper
(This is a piece I wrote for my Freshman Comp class back in 2004. My instructor submitted it for the Freshman Writing Contest that year and it won in the Expository Writing category. I just found it sitting in a drawer and realized I've never posted this, and the paper copy is the only one I have, so I'm putting it up here. Because we all know whatever you post on the interwebs stays there forever.)
How to Change a Toddlers Diaper
1) Assemble the necessary changing supplies: Diaper, wipes, DVD episode of Blues Clues, a sippy cup of juice, toy cars, stuffed animal and a change of clothes (for you)
2) Locate the toddler. If unable to locate the toddler try looking in the following places: the laundry pile, under the bed or inside the refrigerator.
3) Once the toddler is located, transfer him to the designated changing area, preferably someplace with a television. This may take several attempts.
4)Turn on the television, and place the DVD in the player.
5) Remove the DVD as the toddler screams "WANT A DIFFERENT BLUES CLUES!!!"
6) Locate the desired DVD and place it in the DVD player.
7)Remove the DVD as the toddler screams "NO BLUES CLUES, WANT ELMO!!!"
8) Locate the Elmo DVD, scrape the crusted up Gummy Bear off it and place it in the DVD player.
9) Place the toddler on his back and remove the old diaper.
10) Get up, chase the half naked toddler, pick him up and return him to the designated changing area.
11) Repeat step 10
12) Repeat step 10
13) Repeat step 10
14)Hand the toddler a bag of Gummi Bears and the juice cup.
15) Wipe the toddlers bottom from front to back with the baby wipes and begin to apply the clean diaper placing the tabs in the back so that the toddler cannot remove the diaper without assistance.
16) Remove the Gummi Bears from your hair that the toddler placed there during step 15.
17) Now that the Gummi Bears are gone, hand the toddler the toy car.
18) Remind yourself to apply ice to the toy car induced lump on your head.
19) Repeat step 10
20) Finish applying the clean diaper to the toddler. (Reminder - be sure to place the tabs facing the toddlers back to prevent the toddler from removing the diaper without assistance)
21) Allow the toddler to return to playing.
22) Look down at your clothing - note the juice stains and Gummi Bear smudges. Silently pray that the smear on your blouse is chocolate.
23) Realize that the smear is not chocolate.
24) Change your clothing
25) Attempt to locate the toddler again.
26) While attempting to locate the toddler, pick up the clean diaper that the toddler has removed without assistance.
27) Repeat steps 1-26.
How to Change a Toddlers Diaper
1) Assemble the necessary changing supplies: Diaper, wipes, DVD episode of Blues Clues, a sippy cup of juice, toy cars, stuffed animal and a change of clothes (for you)
2) Locate the toddler. If unable to locate the toddler try looking in the following places: the laundry pile, under the bed or inside the refrigerator.
3) Once the toddler is located, transfer him to the designated changing area, preferably someplace with a television. This may take several attempts.
4)Turn on the television, and place the DVD in the player.
5) Remove the DVD as the toddler screams "WANT A DIFFERENT BLUES CLUES!!!"
6) Locate the desired DVD and place it in the DVD player.
7)Remove the DVD as the toddler screams "NO BLUES CLUES, WANT ELMO!!!"
8) Locate the Elmo DVD, scrape the crusted up Gummy Bear off it and place it in the DVD player.
9) Place the toddler on his back and remove the old diaper.
10) Get up, chase the half naked toddler, pick him up and return him to the designated changing area.
11) Repeat step 10
12) Repeat step 10
13) Repeat step 10
14)Hand the toddler a bag of Gummi Bears and the juice cup.
15) Wipe the toddlers bottom from front to back with the baby wipes and begin to apply the clean diaper placing the tabs in the back so that the toddler cannot remove the diaper without assistance.
16) Remove the Gummi Bears from your hair that the toddler placed there during step 15.
17) Now that the Gummi Bears are gone, hand the toddler the toy car.
18) Remind yourself to apply ice to the toy car induced lump on your head.
19) Repeat step 10
20) Finish applying the clean diaper to the toddler. (Reminder - be sure to place the tabs facing the toddlers back to prevent the toddler from removing the diaper without assistance)
21) Allow the toddler to return to playing.
22) Look down at your clothing - note the juice stains and Gummi Bear smudges. Silently pray that the smear on your blouse is chocolate.
23) Realize that the smear is not chocolate.
24) Change your clothing
25) Attempt to locate the toddler again.
26) While attempting to locate the toddler, pick up the clean diaper that the toddler has removed without assistance.
27) Repeat steps 1-26.
Sunday, July 17, 2011
Music, dancing drive 'Pump Boys and Dinettes'
Music, dancing drive 'Pump Boys and Dinettes'This article appeared in todays Winston Salem Journal!
Wednesday, July 13, 2011
Whose rights come first?
A while back I had blogged about the Arizona shooting. Because I work in behavioral health nursing I've got a pretty keen interest in how the story unfolds, and so I've been following the case pretty closely. I'm excited for Senator Gifford, her progress in her recovery is nothing short of amazing, as is the recovery of all of the people wounded that day.
I've been very curious to see how the legal system would handle the case against Jared Loughner. He's been declared mentally incompetent, and is now being held in federal custody, in a secure psychiatric facility. He continues to be violent, has attempted to assault both his doctors and his attorneys on several occasions (which I can guarantee means he's also assaulted the nursing staff, but of course nurses are far less news worthy than doctors so that never even gets mentioned), and was refusing all medication. So, his psychiatrists, being trained medical professionals who have years of experience dealing with potentially violent delusional paranoid patients who have no insight into their illness, took the appropriate action, which was to order that Loughner be forcibly medicated.
For those of you who don't know how this works, this means that Loughner would be offered the option of taking his medication voluntarily, most likely in pill form. If he refused, he would be restrained for his and the staffs safety, and the medication would be given in the form of an injection.
I've had to administer medication this way on several occasions, and it's not something that anyone working with the mentally ill looks forward to. It's frightening for the patient and dangerous for the staff. I've been punched, kicked pinched and bitten administering medication to patients who were being restrained and managed to get loose. Forcible medicating is not something that's done lightly, and is always a last resort. It's only used when the patient is clearly a danger to themselves and others, has no insight into or understanding of their illness, and is unable to determine reality from delusion. Jared Loughner would have had to meet all of these standards before an order to forcibly medicate him would have been written.
Unfortunately, Loughners lawyers did what lawyers tend to do, and filed an appeal to stop the forced medication administration on the grounds that it was a violation of Loughners rights. At the initial hearing a judge upheld the doctors orders on the grounds that Loghner was not legally competent to stand trial for the murder of 6 people and the attempted murder of 13 others, due to his mental illness, and therefore was also not competent to make medical decisions for himself.
And here's where things start to piss me off.
Loghners lawyers appealed the decision, and a 3 judge panel agreed that he has the right to refuse his meds.
This is one of the stupidest things I've ever heard. Loughner is SO delusional that he murdered 6 people, including a 9 year old girl and a federal judge, shot a US congresswoman in the head, and wounded 12 other people. He is so disconnected from reality that he is not competent to be held legally responsible for his actions, yet he has the right to make decisions regarding which medications he will or will not take?! He has the right to refuse medication that can treat his delusional state, thereby making him less of a danger to the other patients in this facility and the staff that has to work with him?
This is where the lack of understanding about mental illness by the legal system becomes glaringly apparent. Loghner is a newly diagnosed paranoid schizophrenic in his first psychotic break. There's no telling how long he's been in a delusional state, although based on stories from family and former friends and classmates it's probably been building for several years. Loghner has no understanding of what is real, he sees plots and conspiracy everywhere he turns, and he tried to KILL A CROWD OF INNOCENT PEOPLE. What more information does anyone need to prove that this man is in NO condition to make health decisions for himself?
If Loughners attorneys are so concerned about protecting his rights, then what about his right to participate in his own defense? He won't be able to do that if he's in a delusional state. Then again, that may be the goal - to keep him in a state of mental incompetence, so he's not able to understand the consequences of his actions, and therefore cannot be held legally accountable for them. It's actually a clever criminal defense strategy - if he's never brought back to reality, then he can never be held responsible. So what if he's a danger to the people who are attempting to care for him? So what if some staff member who has a family to support ends up being injured or killed bacause Loghner can't separate reality from his paranoid delusions? Isn't it more important that he be given the right to refuse to be treated, even though he's incapable of understanding the danger of that refusal?
I'm sure that his attorneys will be able to explain that to the next nurse or doctor that he assaults.
I've been very curious to see how the legal system would handle the case against Jared Loughner. He's been declared mentally incompetent, and is now being held in federal custody, in a secure psychiatric facility. He continues to be violent, has attempted to assault both his doctors and his attorneys on several occasions (which I can guarantee means he's also assaulted the nursing staff, but of course nurses are far less news worthy than doctors so that never even gets mentioned), and was refusing all medication. So, his psychiatrists, being trained medical professionals who have years of experience dealing with potentially violent delusional paranoid patients who have no insight into their illness, took the appropriate action, which was to order that Loughner be forcibly medicated.
For those of you who don't know how this works, this means that Loughner would be offered the option of taking his medication voluntarily, most likely in pill form. If he refused, he would be restrained for his and the staffs safety, and the medication would be given in the form of an injection.
I've had to administer medication this way on several occasions, and it's not something that anyone working with the mentally ill looks forward to. It's frightening for the patient and dangerous for the staff. I've been punched, kicked pinched and bitten administering medication to patients who were being restrained and managed to get loose. Forcible medicating is not something that's done lightly, and is always a last resort. It's only used when the patient is clearly a danger to themselves and others, has no insight into or understanding of their illness, and is unable to determine reality from delusion. Jared Loughner would have had to meet all of these standards before an order to forcibly medicate him would have been written.
Unfortunately, Loughners lawyers did what lawyers tend to do, and filed an appeal to stop the forced medication administration on the grounds that it was a violation of Loughners rights. At the initial hearing a judge upheld the doctors orders on the grounds that Loghner was not legally competent to stand trial for the murder of 6 people and the attempted murder of 13 others, due to his mental illness, and therefore was also not competent to make medical decisions for himself.
And here's where things start to piss me off.
Loghners lawyers appealed the decision, and a 3 judge panel agreed that he has the right to refuse his meds.
This is one of the stupidest things I've ever heard. Loughner is SO delusional that he murdered 6 people, including a 9 year old girl and a federal judge, shot a US congresswoman in the head, and wounded 12 other people. He is so disconnected from reality that he is not competent to be held legally responsible for his actions, yet he has the right to make decisions regarding which medications he will or will not take?! He has the right to refuse medication that can treat his delusional state, thereby making him less of a danger to the other patients in this facility and the staff that has to work with him?
This is where the lack of understanding about mental illness by the legal system becomes glaringly apparent. Loghner is a newly diagnosed paranoid schizophrenic in his first psychotic break. There's no telling how long he's been in a delusional state, although based on stories from family and former friends and classmates it's probably been building for several years. Loghner has no understanding of what is real, he sees plots and conspiracy everywhere he turns, and he tried to KILL A CROWD OF INNOCENT PEOPLE. What more information does anyone need to prove that this man is in NO condition to make health decisions for himself?
If Loughners attorneys are so concerned about protecting his rights, then what about his right to participate in his own defense? He won't be able to do that if he's in a delusional state. Then again, that may be the goal - to keep him in a state of mental incompetence, so he's not able to understand the consequences of his actions, and therefore cannot be held legally accountable for them. It's actually a clever criminal defense strategy - if he's never brought back to reality, then he can never be held responsible. So what if he's a danger to the people who are attempting to care for him? So what if some staff member who has a family to support ends up being injured or killed bacause Loghner can't separate reality from his paranoid delusions? Isn't it more important that he be given the right to refuse to be treated, even though he's incapable of understanding the danger of that refusal?
I'm sure that his attorneys will be able to explain that to the next nurse or doctor that he assaults.
Saturday, July 2, 2011
Ow, Ow, Frigging OW!!!!!
"If you had been trying to damn your man by the Romantic method--by making him...submerged in self-pity for imaginary distresses--you would try to protect him at all costs from any real pain; because, of course, five minutes' genuine toothache would reveal the romantic sorrows for the nonsense they were and unmask your whole stratagem." --Screwtape
From The Screwtape Letters, by C.S.Lewis
Yes - I've had a toothache this week - I'm sure that if you missed my UMPTEEN postings on Facebook about it, this is a complete shock to you, but Yes, I've had a FREAKIN toothache this week.
For those of you that have never experienced the unique form of agony that is a dental abscess, first of all let me say Lucky You. Then let me conclude by saying Fuck off and Die.
Don't tell me about the time you stubbed your toe and ask me if this is as bad at that was, because it's a BAJILLION TIMES WORSE!!!! Imagine having your eyeballs pulled out with a dull, rusty pair of tweezers dipped in vinegar, while a 700lb man stomps on your fingers in spike heeled pumps. Then take all that pain, and put it in the space occupied by one tooth, and have it pulse to the same rhythm as your heartbeat.
Fun, right?
Normally I try to head these things off before they get to the Oh God Kill Me Now stage of agony. I've been dealing with dental issues ever since I was a kid,thanks to the crappy genetic dice roll I got in the tooth department. It comes from my Mom's side of the family, along with my freckles and turned up nose.
So, it's been a sucky week, what with the wanting to pry out my aching tooth with an ice pick and all. But silly me, ever determined to find an up side to things, I did realize that having pain like this really does put things in perspective, hence the opening quote. (And a special thanks to Scott Robinson for posting it to my FB page).
This week I haven't given a single turd about what my lawn looks like, or if the dishes are done, or what's going on with any of my neighbors. I haven't cared a bit about the Casey Anthony trial, what Charlie Sheen is up to, or what idiotic nonsense Michelle Bachman or Sara Palin have spouted. No celebrity gossip, no headline news, none of that garbage was anywhere on my radar, all I cared about was getting through the day so I could come home, medicate myself into a stupor and hopefully get some sleep.
I've been in full on, just let me make it through the next 5 minutes mode for 6 days now, and it has SUCKED like you would NOT believe. It's also got me thinking about what it must be like to have to live with chronic pain.
I've cared for a sizable number of patients with chronic pain issues over the years. I like to think that I've treated them with compassion, even though most have been pretty unpleasant people. After spending a week with a tiny little taste of what life is like for them on a daily basis, I hope that the next time I'm caring for someone with chronic pain, I'll have more patience for their temperament.
I'm going to curl up with wee glass of Jamesons and some bad TV now - until this toothache is completely gone that's all the silver lining I'm capable of seeing right now!
From The Screwtape Letters, by C.S.Lewis
Yes - I've had a toothache this week - I'm sure that if you missed my UMPTEEN postings on Facebook about it, this is a complete shock to you, but Yes, I've had a FREAKIN toothache this week.
For those of you that have never experienced the unique form of agony that is a dental abscess, first of all let me say Lucky You. Then let me conclude by saying Fuck off and Die.
Don't tell me about the time you stubbed your toe and ask me if this is as bad at that was, because it's a BAJILLION TIMES WORSE!!!! Imagine having your eyeballs pulled out with a dull, rusty pair of tweezers dipped in vinegar, while a 700lb man stomps on your fingers in spike heeled pumps. Then take all that pain, and put it in the space occupied by one tooth, and have it pulse to the same rhythm as your heartbeat.
Fun, right?
Normally I try to head these things off before they get to the Oh God Kill Me Now stage of agony. I've been dealing with dental issues ever since I was a kid,thanks to the crappy genetic dice roll I got in the tooth department. It comes from my Mom's side of the family, along with my freckles and turned up nose.
So, it's been a sucky week, what with the wanting to pry out my aching tooth with an ice pick and all. But silly me, ever determined to find an up side to things, I did realize that having pain like this really does put things in perspective, hence the opening quote. (And a special thanks to Scott Robinson for posting it to my FB page).
This week I haven't given a single turd about what my lawn looks like, or if the dishes are done, or what's going on with any of my neighbors. I haven't cared a bit about the Casey Anthony trial, what Charlie Sheen is up to, or what idiotic nonsense Michelle Bachman or Sara Palin have spouted. No celebrity gossip, no headline news, none of that garbage was anywhere on my radar, all I cared about was getting through the day so I could come home, medicate myself into a stupor and hopefully get some sleep.
I've been in full on, just let me make it through the next 5 minutes mode for 6 days now, and it has SUCKED like you would NOT believe. It's also got me thinking about what it must be like to have to live with chronic pain.
I've cared for a sizable number of patients with chronic pain issues over the years. I like to think that I've treated them with compassion, even though most have been pretty unpleasant people. After spending a week with a tiny little taste of what life is like for them on a daily basis, I hope that the next time I'm caring for someone with chronic pain, I'll have more patience for their temperament.
I'm going to curl up with wee glass of Jamesons and some bad TV now - until this toothache is completely gone that's all the silver lining I'm capable of seeing right now!
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