Pom-poms and dryer sheets

images from Le love and Free People

My boyfriend was out of town a lot this past month and so I was forced to embrace some alone time. I'm typically a social person, so I wasn't thrilled at the prospect, but soon found myself enjoying some time to myself. Most of it consisted of doing what I had been doing already, but in my underwear. For some reason, doing mundane things in the house becomes a thrill when you're just in your skivvies. It's weird, but I felt even more like an adult. I could cook dinner, provide for myself in the apartment that I pay rent for, AND I could do it in my underwear because there were no rules but my own. Surely, the boyfriend would not object to this behavior when he is indeed home, but it's different when you're alone. It's not like you're in your underwear to be sexy or alluring, you're just comfortable and free, and I felt like a kid, and I felt like such a grown-up all at once. Being in your underwear makes everything you do more fantastically sensory. You lie on a soft blanket and it is that much better because it is soft on your back, and your shoulders and your calves, all at once. Or you go with that urge to stretch your legs while you're standing in the kitchen because you can, because you don't have the constriction of jeans. Or you hang out outside on the porch (yes I hung out on the porch in my underwear.. our backyard is fairly tree covered I promise) and the breeze is so much more potent.

At my old hospital, after we had breakfast on the unit, the kids were sent to their rooms to get dressed, brush teeth and make their beds. They were mostly encouraged to do this on their own whenever possible, and the staff would monitor the halls to make sure the toothpaste wasn't being spread on the mirror and that no one was hiding dirty bed sheets in the closet (which someone tried almost daily). Anyways, all the kids had come back to the group room and we were going to start our daily programming but one was missing, let's call him Ron. He was the youngest of the little kids group, he had just turned 5 and had these big blue eyes that would just make your heart melt, even when he was screaming at you while pouring milk all over the kid next to him... okay, he made MY heart melt anyways. So, I went to his room to go check on him. Ron had a lot of sensory sensitivities and was likely somewhere on the Autism spectrum. When he was upset, he liked to be wrapped tightly in a big blanket and he would sit there and rock himself calm and while this image of quiet rocking just screams of instability when you picture it on an adult, when you're 5, it's cool. Anyways, I went to Ron's room and he was standing on his bed in nothing but his Lightning McQueen, Cars, pull-up. He had attempted the whole, getting dressed thing, but was distracted by the dryer sheet that was left in his laundry basket. He held it to his nose and was just breathing it in. His eyes were closed and I watched him for a good 30 seconds, not wanting to interrupt what was such a blissful moment.

For all the problems that Ron had, he was able to find complete joy and serenity in a dryer sheet. It went on for about ten minutes before we finally went back and brought him to group. Before we went back to the group room, he stashed the dryer sheet under his pillow, his secret hiding space that was also inhabited by a piece of thread and a tiny red pom-pom from crafts.

Just a reminder, that no matter what larger problems you have going on -and believe me, if you're 5 and you're in an inpatient psychiatric hospital, you probably have some heavy stuff happening in your life- having some quiet time to just be alone in your underwear, enjoying the simply things around you, is the most therapeutic thing you can do.

Happy lounging.

No monsters in the closet

photo from- http://www.flickr.com/photos/ruminating_slav


sitting in bean bag chairs
eating pretend plastic meals
wrapping up in blanket cocoons
choosing breakfast cereals
playing kickball
making sand castles
riding bikes
drawing pictures on the floor (on paper... just lying on the floor.. mostly)
making endless race car tracks
reading stories
over
and
over
bed time hugs
tuck ins
checking for monsters
leaving the doors open juuuuust a little bit


A list of normal things that kids do.

Also a list of things we used to do all the time at my old hospital on the inpatient children's unit.

I think there is a lot of misconception surrounding mental health in almost every aspect, but it certainly just obscures all knowledge of fact when it comes to hospital images. It goes without saying that there is of course, a wide range in the hospital facilities in this country and even starker range around the world. Still, there is need for some clarification here and it is understandable since 'mental hospitals/psychiatric facilities' (I work in one and even I don't know what politically correct term to use now, which says a lot) are so closed off from the public to (I believe) protect the patient's privacy. Of course every patient has a right to privacy in any health related matter, be it cancer or pink eye or bulimia. However, what we may gain in the momentary protection of the patient's rights, I think we also sacrifice in perpetuating stigma and the mysterious dark imagery surrounding these places. If people had a more accurate picture of what treatment centers looked like I think it would be a big help. Unfortunately, the powers that be would disagree and I do understand that the protection of the patient comes first.

So I cry out to the media! To the arts! Those who make a living in showing us aspects of life that we can't otherwise get exposure to, because it is from another culture, another time, another city, or just someone's life whom we will never meet. Now the film industry has created a number of very popular movies surrounding mental health, and some of which I would greatly suggest you watch (I'll keep doing research and come up with a list soon), while others might as well be filed in the horror genre. The psychiatric field is certainly not some pristine branch of medicine where everyone just lies on plush couches and plays racquet ball on the grassy hillside of the hospitals for months at a time and magically wind up cured of depression... though... it seemed to be at one time. On the other hand, there was a time when hammering an icepick through someone's eye socket and scrambling the pre-frontal region of the brain was widely practiced and it might shock you to know that was continuing in the U.S. until about 50 years ago. Just like any other field, it's been through a lot of change, especially in the last century. I won't go into a full lecture, the point being, I think there have been some mixed messages out there about mental health treatment (for good reason given the checkered past) and I'd like someone to clear it up.

Then again, if there was a movie about mental health as it truly is today, it probably wouldn't attract too much of an audience (maybe that's why it hasn't been done). Where it does seem to be mainstreamed is where it's leaking out in the Hollywood culture, in the destructive relationships and drug use and self-harm that has been splashed all over the tabloids. So I would ask you, Hollywood, to try and create a really realistic movie about mental health treatment as it is today, but it seems you're sick yourself! So now I return to my first post, what is this undeniable connection between mental illness and creativity? Maybe I'm totally wrong, it could simply be that because these artists have garnered so much fame and attention, from Van Gogh to Lindsay Lohan, (and I'm sorry for referencing those two in the same sentence) that it merely seems that there is a connection because we KNOW about it in those personal cases that are exposed. What we DON'T know is that our neighbors, and the people in front of us in the grocery store or next to us in the movies are being treated, or have been. We don't know because know one talks about it in the industry itself because of confidentiality, and no one talks about it in their personal lives because of stigma. So don't you see the cycle? We can't talk about it, so no one knows what these illnesses are really like, and we can't show the treatment centers, so no one knows what they really look like, and we can't share the treatment plans etc. etc. etc. so NO ONE KNOWS ANYTHING. Since we are curious by nature, we make up ideas of what it must be like, and we buy into the dark imagery because it scares us and makes us excited, so people with these issues sure as hell won't talk about it because they know that we've already made up what it looks like, and that it's not pretty, and they don't want to be looked at like that.

It has seemed to me that children with mental illness face the toughest battle often times, for a multitude of reasons I will surely touch on later. Sometimes it's not pretty at all. Sometimes it is scary and sad but that is why they are getting help and that is beautiful. So I want you to know, that sometimes, and not always, but sometimes, it can look like:

sitting in bean bag chairs
eating pretend plastic meals
wrapping up in blanket cocoons
choosing breakfast cereals
playing kickball
making sand castles
riding bikes
drawing pictures on the floor (on paper... just lying on the floor.. mostly)
making endless race car tracks
reading stories
over
and
over
bed time hugs
tuck ins

checking for monsters

leaving the doors open juuuuust a little bit



I wish I could leave the door open wider so you could see more.