THE PATIENT (Episode two)

Patient: (Walks into the room starring round with hands folded)..

Psychiatrist: You can have your sit here..

Patient: (Sits down gentlyl) I'm sure like every other person you are here to judge me too right, to tell me that I'm too young to be involved in stuffs like these.

Psychiatrist: First of all, no one is too young or old and I haven't said anything...

Patient: You don't have to okay, it's written all over your face.

Psychiatrist: (Touches her face softly) what's written?

Patient: That disappointed look, thesame look my parents gave me when they caught me with it.

Psychiatrist: Suicide is not right, it's not like they hate you, they just feel very sad that you don't love yourself the way they love you.

Patient: I don't know what to say, I don't know how to defend myself.(folds her hands on her chest)

Psychiatrist: I'm not asking you too.

Patient: Then what exactly do you want from me, why am I here, am i a mental patient? (raising voice in a defensive manner)

Psychiatrist: I just want you to tell me why you did it.

Patient: (Takes a deep breath) Is my reason any significant, I mean I'm already the bad guy that everyone in my neighbourhood is talking about. I heard the gossips and nasty words they said as my parents brought me here. To them I am the most foolish and ungrateful person on earth to have attempted suicide. You know, I even heard one of them jokingly say that if i didn't like my life again, I would have sold my organs instead of wasting them.

Psychiatrist: Well, they will talk because generally suicide is wrong and they don't know what you have been going through inside.

Patient: Exactly... (Open her eyes widely) wait why are you on my side..

Psychiatrist: I'm not, I just want to know why you did it.

Patient: (Breathes deep and bows head down) I know what i did was wrong but at that point i could not think of any thing else. It was as if my thinking sense vanished (throws her hands in the air with eyes wide open), I was just tired. I have delt with my depression and addiction for a very long time, and it was already becoming too much to handle. I have been in the dark for a very long time, I have been so sad for as long as I can remember. I try to be happy, really I do but my best isn't good enough.

Psychiatrist: What are your thoughts about yourself?

Patient: That I am not just good enough and that I can't do anything right. Academically I'm so poor. I am currently on a 1.25 CGPA and I am in my third year, I have just one year to go. It's not like I'm not reading o, I am trying but I just can't be like the others. I am Ugly and I bedwet. In fact, I have being bedwetting since I was five years old. My room mates know but they don't say anything to my face. Sometimes I see the look they give me, like I disgust them. How am I suppose to live life this way, isn't it better to leave than live? I'm so not perfect in anything I do. Sometimes when my parents look at me, I can't stop but think that they are just so disappointed in me. I am so depressed that every night I sleep, I hope I don't wake up the next day and even when I do wake up, I experience a terrible headache. I know I'm deteriorating medically because of how I live my life, but I don't have another way of living.

Psychiatrist: Why do you say you are Ugly?

Patient: Because I am. I'm not as attractive as my peers, I'm sure that's why people don't mingle with me much. I bed wet and I'm dumb academically, come on, who would want to be with someone as worthless as I am.

Psychiatrist: True people would want to.

Patient: If that's the case, then there are no true people anywhere. I wouldn't even want to be with myself. I disgust me.

Psychiatrist: I know you're going through alot, but suicide isn't the way out.

Patient: Why! (Raises voice)

Psychiatrist: It will just make you feel more of a losser because you won't be able to thoroughly deal with the situation by proving to yourself that you are of great worth, and it will make people have a bad preception about you. Remember you told me what your neighbours said about you right, well that's all they will know you for, an ungrateful girl who doesn't value the life she's given. They wouldn't know all the pain you've been through.

Patient: Perfect, so living makes me a losser and dying makes me one too.

Psychiatrist: It's not like that...

Patient: Then what doc, then what? (Rubs her hair with her fingers aggressively). I have gone through this hurt for as long as I can remember. I have tried to get better, to look at myself in the mirror and see worth but all my imperfections keep rolling in on my face, telling me "hey you, you are going nowhere".

Psychiatrist: Calm down okay, we're going to walk through this together.

Patient: Who's going to walk me through, you? My mom? My dad? My friends that I don't have? Let's call a spade a spade, I am done for.

Psychiatrist: No you are not, you are just clouded by anger.

Patient: Says the perfect doc who sits at the other side of the chair but not my chair. Obviously it will be easy to give the orders don't you think?

Psychiatrist: Do you think I have not experienced worthlessness before?

Patient: You haven't.

Psychiatrist: My father fathered twenty children yeah, because he married five women. My mother is the third wife and I am the only girl. I will never forget the afternoon I came back from school and was abused by my elder step brother. He forced himself on me and threatened that if I told anyone, he would kill my mother. I believed him because he was a cultist and moved alot with bad guys, so I had to live with him everyday in that house like nothing happened till I finally left for uni. That event made me feel worthless anytime I looked at myself in the mirror. What made it worst for me was the fact that in school, my friends would talk about their perfect parents and perfect siblings. All those things would just increase the anger and pain in me. So yes, I know what it's like to feel worthless. I may not have attempted suicide but believe me when I say that I killed myself so many times in my head.

Patient: Are you serious?

Psychiatrist: Yeah I am. So when I tell you that you'll be fine, I mean it. I'm better now. The funny thing is, you're the second person I'm telling this to, my husband was the first.

Patient: (Takes a deep breath) So what do I do now, how do I get through this?

Psychiatrist: (Stands up and moves her chair closer to her patient) See yourself beautiful. Don't ever call yourself ugly again because you are not. All those things you are struggling with, you can overcome. Those things do not define you, nor does it dictate who you are. About your CGPA, have you tried talking to your parents about it, is that the course you want to do?

Patient: I don't know, I don't know (puts her hands on her face, while shaking her head). Maybe I stopped trying because I felt I wasn't good enough, and talking to my parents about my grades is like a suicide mission (increases voice pitch), they might just kill me. I don't think they'll understand me.

Psychiatrist: Okay let's do this. I'll help you talk to your parents about these weaknesses but you have to promise me that on your own, you will work harder, let go of your negativity and do your best. You might not come out with a very good grade now but do something in this your remaining one year that would prove you can do better in future opportunities okay..

Patient: Yes I will

Psychiatrist: You are going to get through this. Suicide is never an option. The truth is most people out there has one or two stories to tell, just like I told you mine today (smiles). If I had killed myself, you wouldn't have heard my own story would you. I know our stories are different, but they have one aim and that's embracing ourselves for who we are when no one does. You are beautiful always, never think otherwise. In everything you do, choose to live. Prove other people wrong when you choose to live and overcome your flaws, it's called perfection in imperfection. The process is going to take time but you will get there. Choose to live and tell your story so that other people out there will get better. As for the bedwetting, I will put you on some programs that would help you get a hand of it, is that okay...

Patient: Yes it is (smiles)

Psychiatrist: (Smiles) and I hope that one day, you will be in my chair, talking to someone in yours.

Patient: I would love that. Thank you.