My addicts

After getting my first taste of Mental health life I have to admit I was pretty excited about my second. In life I try to look at everything like an adventure and I am treating these placements at a mental health institution like a series of mini adventures with their own separate challenges.

In this unit, there are only males and all of them had some previous drug addiction, mostly heroin, a few on cocaine. However one can not just stop there. These patients are people, creative and even loving people who are very aware of social stigma and appreciate anyone who can see past the problem and past the addiction. I heard a colleague of mine saying how he began to “hate a patient's guts” because he pimped out his girlfriend to finance his heroin addiction. Well, yes its really horrible, but drugs take over your life and soul, and after some discussion, this patient opened up and even started to cry because he was so sorry about what he did. That sort of attitude, the “let's-hate-anyone-who-is-not-like-me” attitude makes me see red. Nobody can ever know what they would do in a situation like this patient was in. Also, life goes on. If we all remained in a rut and did not learn from our mistakes, we would still be in nappies having accidents on the floor.

I was really impressed by the group sessions that were carried out during the day. In the morning, they had a serious one and in the afternoon it was more like a game the group could learn from and learn a little about each other. The game was as follows:
There were a number of statements written down on bits of paper like "someone who talks a lot about drugs" or "someone who people can trust" and each person of the group had to pick up a statement and give it to whom it suits most. they gave me:

nicest eyes
sexiest person
biggest smile

I guess I made an impression.
I shared a conversation with a particular patient which really left an impression on me. Before I relate it, its useful information to know that I was born in Canada and I have my Maltese O level but I still find a lot of difficulty expressing myself, which sometimes makes me feel a little different from my friends, but I cope well.

I was speaking to this one patient in Maltese and i noticed he found it quite difficult to answer. Then finally he told me he was half Irish and he found difficulty expressing himself and sometimes felt marginalized by the others in the unit. For the first time I was able to truly empathize and from that moment on I spoke to this patient in English. He was so relieved by this that he began to tell me how he was feeling. He told me he had the power to stay clean and sober but he does not know why that when he enters the outside world he falls into addiction once again. He told me he had many thoughts running around his head. After some careful probing on my behalf he came to the conclusion that he has to get rid of his drug-using friends and change his crowd and possibly go join his twin sister in Dublin. From this patient, I got the impression that it was the first time in a long time that he was really listened to and that he expressed all he felt in a way that was comfortable for him.

In the morning, the patient was asked how he felt on a scale of one to ten, ten being the best, one being the worst. He chose two. In the afternoon, he was asked again and much to my happiness he said seven. I like to think I had something to do with it.