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You know what, Chris,

I get slapped, spit on, kicked, hit, I have had my bones broken, my eyes blackened, I have had bones in my neck fused, I have bulging discs in my neck STILL, I have had furniture broken over my head, I have been bitten, I have had my hand sliced open with a plastic spoon last year, I got a needle stick while doing a fingerstick on a diabetic junkie, I clean up peoples feces, urine, vomit, clean their abcesses that were the result of their needle use, have been exposed to MRSA on a near daily basis for YEARS, I got tuberculosis from a patient resulting in having to take a nasty medication called INH for nine months.

I have been taking care of that lady with Hepatic Encephalopathy for the past 13 years. I have cared for her as an inpatient, as an outpatient, I have taken her to Yosemite, to pizza, to the snow, swimming, cleaned her up when the Lactulose did to her what lactulose does - I give her the lactulose so that she can live longer, I brush her hair and her teeth, I help her get dressed every day that I work. She hugs me, she tells me she loves me.

I have been getting my ass kicked by patients for almost thirty years, and I go back to work, I look forward to it, and I can't imagine doing anything else for a living, ever.

But you know what? If you don't have a sense of humor when you are called a "Twamp," a Bytch, and every other name in the book EVERY TIME YOU GO TO WORK, if you don't have a sense of humor when you are being beaten by people you only mean to take care of, if you don't have a sense of humor when the very people you care so much about think you are poisoning them, think you are there to hurt them because they are so sick they can't understand otherwise, do you know what you turn into?

You turn into a cruel, heartless turn key who has no business taking care of people. I've seen some cruel people working in mental health who, if THEY were called a "Twamp" by this woman, might turn around and yell at her, who might let her sit in her piss for a little while longer, who might do something worse.

I have had to turn those people in so many times during the course of my career it isn't funny. I refuse to become one of them. I don't care if she calls me a "Twamp." Later that day, she asked me to put a CD on for her, and she gave me a huge hug with feces caked under her fingernails - so I let her hug me, and then I took her into the bathroom and helped her wash her hands.

She came into the hospital in a wheelchair - today, she is walking.

THAT is what I DO for a living. So if that offends you, sorry. I refuse to become Nurse Ratchett. I care a lot about those PEOPLE. If I want to laugh about being called a "Twamp," then I am laughing about being called a "Twamp." I am not laughing at the patient. I've taken care of her for more than a dozen years, and chances are good I will have to watch her die. You think I'll be laughing that day?

I don't.

commenting on her symptoms wasn't IMO...

Yeah, nothing funny about what's happening to her. She's not old. She's just a little older than me. And regarding my friend, thanks, I'll continue to pray for him as I have for years now, I'll continue to support him, and to be with him as I have for a long time now.

Warden, I hear ya. I guess the thing is, so called "Normal People" have no excuse for the way they behave - they should know better. At least we can understand why we're getting slammed by the patients we take care of.

Many years ago, I used to do activities and groups in a day treatment program with the same people I take care of now on the inpatient unit. We had a kiln, and one of the activities we did was to take clay, and make a mask of our own face - of what we each felt we looked like. A lot of the patients left thier masks behind, or gave them to me when the day treatment program was closed because of funding cuts. Here is this lady's mask - I love it. I should post a pic of the whole collection sometime. They are pretty cool. Anyway, here's hers:



I like it. Lot's of make up!