Say again

    I had been placed in the position of Ward aid at the county mental institution. The facility actually took care of 2 counties, a geriatric population, and juvenile population so it was a rather large psychiatric campus. This was my work relief job that I had to maintain in order to receive any of my social services benefits such as food coupons, rent voucher, utility voucher and clothing allowance. 

   You see at the age of 18 I had been caught stealing food and had to go to court. I was assigned a Nun from the order of Saint John’s as my probation officer and she was helping me develop an independent life. I had told the judge when he gave option a) 1 year in county. b) go back to Westchester and live with my parents, or c) 1 years’ probation with the nun lady, that I would choose a over b but thought I could learn are great deal if I picked c. So, voila 18 in my own apartment and a job, 11pm to 8am at a looney bin. Graveyard shift. All done with the help of my probation officer.

  My training occurred in the Chemung County ward. This ward was also the ward that provided care to transfers from the Elmira Correctional Facility. My first week on the job I came into work and a 98 pound 74-year-old woman had a melt down and thrown a chair through the nursing station window. By the time I had punched in she was already in a straight jacket and in the padded room awaiting the Doctor to come a evaluate her. My job the evening was to sit out side the room and observe her through the door window while we waited. When he did get there, she was taken to the hospital for further testing and then 2 days later was transferred to another facility.

 I meet a great many interesting cases while working there. My main duties were to insure everyone slept well. Assist them with needs in the evening like more or less blankets, walking them to the shower if they had accidently wet themselves and then help them wake up in the morning and get ready for the day. Depending on who was in the facility at the time I might walk into a room and meet the Queen of England, Jesus Christ, God, Mrs. Jesus Christ and a host of other renowned people that were being kept there for treatment. There was a unit that was connected to the Chemung ward that was for children. On particular young person had been there since he was eight and by the time, I meet him he was about 13. Every morning they would unlock the connecting door so he could come in and say good morning to the older patients. He told me it was his job to make sure everyone started their day out with someone smiling at them and wishing them a good start to their day. After everyone was up and dressed my last task of my shift was to walk those who had privileges over to the main dinning room for breakfast. After that I would go home.

 About two months on the job, we got a late-night admission. It was a man the hospital transferred over and they want a twenty-four-hour suicide watch on him. He was not placed in a straight jacket but was put in the padded cell as a precaution. I was on the door for the first part of this observation period. For eight hours all I could hear from the room was him saying,” It wasn’t me!” Sometimes loudly and sometimes softly. Since I was not allowed access to patient files, I had no clue as to what he was referring to. When I came back the next evening, they were releasing him to his own room and I was tasked to help him get settled in.

   When you work in a psychiatric facility you quickly learn that the clients’ senses do not work like the normal people. They might have visual, audio or other sensory illusions. So, as you get to know each of them you have to learn how to portray someone that is non threating. For this dude that would only repetitively say it wasn’t me I had to be careful because I didn’t yet know if he was a delusion person. I had learned to watch for meds that were being given and knew which ones were used on people that had these types of problems. His meds were very heavy sedatives but no anti-psychotic. After a few weeks he would only mumble his phrase of,” it wasn’t me,” maybe once at the most twice a day. He was slow to interact with others, both staff and clients. He did keep himself and his room clean though.

  After three month he was released from the facility. Rumors had circulated that he had come home and found his wife dead in their garage. She had committed suicide by closing the garage door and turning on the car engine. To make it even worse one of his two children had a bedroom right up above the garage and the carbon monoxide had killed her too but the other child survived. Another rumor was that his whole family had been killed in a car accident while on their way to their vacation home and he was going to drive up and meet them later. Rumor are often usually based on some kind of truth but with so many people in and out of the unit these stories could have belonged to anyone.

 I had finally found are real job so I no longer had to work at the psychiatric facility. I was weaning myself off of government assistance and had enrolled in college. The people I meet with and worked with at the facility I will not easily forget. I learned to view things and hear things in a totally different manner then before that experience.