Yoodoo Voodoo
Nurse Undeniable had an interest in all things occult. This stemmed from a past patient who had believed that she was possessed by the devil who would only speak to female nurses. Nurse Undeniable often found herself in the position of listening to deluded and graphic descriptions of hell but when this patient fell to her knees whilst the Virgin Mary was manifestating herself agains the wardrobe, Nurse Undeniable wondered whether there was more to insanity than she had first believed.
Since then, she had visited spiritual circles and read every paranormal book she could lay her hands on. But this book was different, its introduction capturing her attention immediately. Picking up her last peanut from a kidney dish, she read with excitement....
"Do you know somebody who always beats you at the sluice cleaning contest or who likes to swat you on the head and call you "Old aardvark?" Then you need the amazing Voodoo Kit. With this you'll spend many happy hours sticking needles into a little doll and pretending it's your playmate. It can be given any name and dressed in all manner of things. Your Yoodoo Voodoo Doll, the art of inflicting pain, sickness, death and bad luck. Read on...."
Nurse Undeniable couldn't believe her luck. At the top of her mental list of names Big Ears Dobson, the Liverpudlian personality disorder with an over sized ego. She lay down her book and whispered. "Come to mamma my little Liver puppet.
I'm sad that I'm leaving a group of people that have made my work life bearable at the bin. They are a good crowd with an unmatcheable sense of humour. If it hadn't been for them, I'm not so sure I could've dealt with what amounted to bullying at the hands of the poison dwarf. Yes, I'm definitely being moved to a learning disability ward. There are a few things to iron out though. Apparently they work 13hr days on that ward, no way will I do that. So unless the ward manager will accomodate my current shift pattern, I may still not be going. It's a ward that has had a lot of difficulties with staff, why doesn't that surprise me. It's rarely patients that cause the real problem. I've been told they need someone strong, a leader. One way of buttering me up I suppose.
Oddly, I'm looking forward to it too but I'm under no illusions that we minions are ten a penny these days. One of my current patients, who happens to have a mild learning disability cried buckets when I told him. I've worked closely with him for over 4 years. Even with boundaries in place, the relationships we build with some of these individuals is all they've ever known. We become their family. The wrench is just as hard for me, like I'm letting them down. Another said "Oh no, so you are not going to see me through?" It's touching and sad as it is for the individual, their reaction to my departure makes things worthwhile. It reassures me that I continue to be a good nurse.
So I'm packing up my things and tying all the loose ends and 2 weeks today I'll be gone.
I am! yet what I am who cares, or knows?
My friends forsake me like a memory lost.
I am the self-consumer of my woes;
They rise and vanish, an oblivious host,
Shadows of life, whose very soul is lost.
And yet I am -- I live -- though I am toss'd
Into the nothingness of scorn and noise,
Into the living sea of waking dream,
Where there is neither sense of life, nor joys,
But the huge shipwreck of my own esteem
And all that's dear. Even those I loved the best
Are strange -- nay, they are stranger than the rest.
I long for scenes where man has never trod--
For scenes where woman never smiled or wept--
There to abide with my Creator, God,
And sleep as I in childhood sweetly slept,
Full of high thoughts, unborn. So let me lie,--
The grass below; above, the vaulted sky.
Poem by John Clare