An Admission

My admission to hospital was fairly standard. A visit to A&E. Triage within about 30 minutes. Doctor a couple of hours later. Bloods, CT scan. Results an hour later. Everything was clear but it was decided that I should wait to see a specialist. That happened about 7 hours later. This is not a post complaining about the NHS being on its knees. Although,at one point, the waiting room packed full and patients moaning and grumbling about how long they'd been there, asking when they would be seen etc, I really did feel like standing on my chair and shouting 'Anyone here vote Tory? It's your fault, not the staff's, that loads of us have been here for 9 hours,' but of course, I didn't.

But there were 'non-standard' things abour my admission to hospital too. They didn't just wheel me along to a ward, they sent me onwards, with Sputnik giving me a lift, to another hospital I hadn't heard of called St Elvis. A staff member in green scrubs showed me round. There was a TV lounge, a pool table, a nicely landscaped garden where, surprisingly, the patients were permitted to smoke, sometimes joined by the greenscrubs. My room had a bed and wardrobe. Nothing else. There was nowhere to hang my suit, not even the corner of the wardrobe which sloped off at 45 degrees. As we went round, I was introduced to staff and patients alike. All were pleasant but one or two had odd quirks, like an elderly lady called Uzma who shook my hand for too long saying 'Dave, nice to meet you....how nice to meet you....'

The decision to admit me was not based on the usual  examination with stethoscope, needle and blood pressure monitor. They did not palpate my abdomen or ask me to push against their hands. Instead, we sat, their three on one side of a large desk, Sputnik and I on the other, holding hands, like a weird job interview. And the questions were a bit odd too like 'What was your social experience like at school?' or 

'Your eyes seem to be flitting around the room. Can you see anything that, perhaps, the rest of us can't?'

'No. I'm just feeling a bit stressed out. I find it hard to remember to make eye contact when I'm nervous'

'To remember to?' he asked, quizzically

'Oh, it's like a sort of Asperger's thing, I think.'

He asked if I had an ASD diagnosis, and I said that I hadn't, but that I'd read a fair bit about it, and I identified with a lot of the markers. He nodded, before explaining that while this was not a formal diagnosis:

'High functioning autism. I'd bet my house on it' as the other two nodded and smiled kindly at me. But anyway, that's not what I was there for. I'd been stumbling around Sputnik's house, shouting, breaking glass, wittering away to her at 100 miles an hour, 5am having had no sleep, the subject of my sentence changing every few words without really breaking the flow:

'What was I saying again? Oh yeah. No I'm fine. I don't need to go to hospital. I feel fucking fantastic. I think that you would agree, my lady love, that I am in excellent spirits, am I not? Behaving unusually? I think not. I wish I felt like this all the time. This is me on normal mode. Sleep is for losers 'YOU HEAR THAT YOU BUNCH OF SAD FUCKERS! SLEEP IS FOR LOSERS! Ahahahahahahahaha. That's a good one. Has that mark on the wall always been there?'

But that was hours earlier, and now I didn't feel like that. Now I felt scared, nervous, pacing as they left me and Sputnik in the room to discuss my case' Worried that they would admit me. They did, explaining on their return, that I would benefit from a spell on the ward. I kissed Sputnik goodbye, and moved to a new room. I had no idea what to expect on the psych ward. Muzak and a huge Native American silently sweeping the floor? Who knows.