Decisions Decisions

Wow. How do people decide what to blog about every day? For me, decisions sometimes get exceedingly difficult, moreso with meaningless small decisions: such as what brand of macaroni & cheese to buy. I once stood in the grocery store aisle for at least five minutes debating whether to buy Annie's or Kraft macaroni and cheese. There were apparently many pro's and con's I felt I needed to weigh.

And now I've been sitting here for five minutes trying to decide what to write about. The class on spirituality that I taught to five men with schizophrenia today? A post about my best friend's daughter, Lili, who had her ostomy take-down procedure last week & is the biggest champ in the whole world? Yeah, those are two good topics.


One of the clinics that I'm director of is for people with "serious mental illness" (SMI), which is generally defined as schizophrenia, schizoaffective disorder, or bipolar disorder. We have fifty patients who meet this criteria & are enrolled in our psychosocial rehabilitation clinic, and our focus is on recovery. The recovery model was not emphasized in my residency training program, and it's been exciting for me to learn about & embrace the concept. Basically, in the past, the the goal for treating people with SMI was to have their symptoms somewhat well controlled on medications. The recovery model posits that the individual decides their own treatment goals and the clinicians work with them to help them achieve them. And our rehabilitation program is designed to teach patients the skills that will help them to achieve their goals (which often include things like having meaningful relationships, getting a job, living independently, etc.). So we offer "classes" on topics like Social Skills, Humor, Resiliency, Relaxation, and Writing Your Story. I teach the Healthy Living class every week. Today I was supposed to sit in on the spirituality class, but when I got there, the instructor hadn't shown up. So I decided to wing it and lead a discussion on spirituality with five schizophrenic men, only two of whom I knew. And it was awesome. We had a great discussion about forgiveness, including forgiving yourselves. They had a lot of great insights, and I came away feeling like I'd learned something from the class as well. I love my job and I am so honored to have the chance to get to know & to work with these awesome people, and to be a part of their recovery. It's amazing.


And then there's Miss Lili. She deserves a post all to herself. For now, here's a portrait of the artist at work.