Self Care

One theme that contunually pops up during a residency and becomes even more important during the stressful seasons (such as holidays) is self care. The demands of a residency can easily consume our lives if we neglect to take some needed and periodic personal time. The point is we need to fill our own needs too.

Well, today I recieved a lesson on self care in an unexpected place and in a most unexpected way.

The common area of the Behavioral Health unit is one of my favorite places to visit. Most often there are several patients just sitting around talking or watching the large, loud, flat screen enclosed in a glass case. As a chaplain I enjoy walking in and engaging a number of patients in this casual setting.

A very quiet man sat in his chair just beside another patient and I while we talked about regular everyday things in her life. After about 10 minutes this man decided he had a need. He filled this need after slowing climbing from his chair and fraily limping around behind it so he was next to me by covertly pulling down his pants and urinating on the floor!

I went to the nearest nurse, and unable to speak in fear of letting out some of my laughter I was only able to poke her for her attention and point. "Ooh, not again," she blurted out as she s curried his direction. As the man finished he simply pulled up his pants and proceeded to sit back down.

Self care, at its best, I think.

This is actually pretty biblical. As far as I can tell there are at least 8 different verses in the KJV that use the word piss. 1 Sam. 25:22; 1 Kings 14:10, 16:11; Isaiah 36:12 are a few. Most of these references use the phrase "any that pisseth against the wall" as a way of denoting males. I guess this patient was simply excercising his right to pisseth against the floor.


So while I'll be making efforts to do some self care this year, I think I will stick to pissething against the urinals.