Not all better, but much better than I felt before, thanks to sambear.
I had my own un-missable appointment this afternoon. It required going to a government office that I’d rather have avoided, but hey, we all have our bureaucracies to bear.
There was a poor woman there who’d obviously been there a while when I arrived. She was trying valiantly to fill out paperwork to try to get some health care through the county’s systems, but she was (in my totally non-professional opinion) in the throes of some serious psychosis. She was talking non-stop, with words and phrases that bore absolutely no relation to each other. I mean, NONE. They were all English words, but that was it.
The only exception was that every few minutes she repeated something like, “I can’t help it.”
Anyway, I peeked over her shoulder at one time—she was putting some mark into every blank of the bluzillion-page forms, but they weren’t words. She was just marking things, trying to do what someone wanted her to do.
I sat next to the woman for about an hour because there wasn’t anywhere else to sit, and I wasn’t in any shape to stand—the place was REALLY crowded.
After my appointment, I came back through the waiting area and saw the woman standing, still talking. Unfortunately, that put her “over” people on some of the benches, which was obviously uncomfortable for those people. They seemed to think that she was talking to or about them, when in fact she was just continuing. She never made eye contact with anyone—just talked.
I went off to file paperwork with yet another official, and when I came back through there was a sheriff’s deputy standing a couple of feet away from the woman. Apparently, the deputy didn’t see her as a threat, because the deputy wasn’t interacting with her at all. There was no other reason for the deputy’s presence, though, and it was a very palpable “presence.” You know, the kind you project when you want it damned obvious that you are RIGHT THERE and the kids had best get on with what they’re supposed to do?
Anyway – I’m glad the deputy was understanding. I figure she might have headed off any confrontations.
But I’m still pissed off that a woman who very obviously needs professional care was sitting there like that with nobody even trying to help her. They wanted their paperwork, which she couldn’t do, and weren’t offering to help her fill it out or anything.
I was also sitting there thinking, “Where is her FAMILY? Who the hell could let their daughter/mother/wife/sister/aunt/cousin wander around like that?” Unfortunately, I know that some people really don’t have real families, and some families are so backward about mental health issues that they wouldn’t have been much help anyway 🙁
