I'm the new medical secretary for a private psychiatric clinic on the outskirts of Dublin, a short-term temp assignment before going back to school in September. You have to pass through a wheat farm and literally through a dark forest to get to the front doors. The grounds are beautiful, no mistaking. The psychiatrist I work for is what the nurses have termed 'old school' - he prescribes a bounty of medication for middling mood disorders and saves overdose cases by upping mgs on old prescriptions. For what it's worth, I've my own office and get free coffee whenever I like: a huge improvement on what I was doing two days prior to getting this assignment.
If you didn't know already know, jobs are scarce in Ireland. I've many years experience in the office world, an undergrad, a post-grad diploma and almost a masters degree. My phone manner is good, I type at 95 wpm, etc., etc., etc. I have June-August off between first and second year of my masters and I just needed a job that wasn't McDonalds. Actually.
No dice. Sure, I got a couple one-day assignments here and there, but nothing for longer than three days. So, as it goes, I accepted a job as a door-to-door fundraiser for Oxfam. I got 'trained' in by a 35-year old man wearing a muscle shirt and the thickest Dublin accent I've ever heard. He's the best fundraiser on the team. His main words of advice: be yourself.
The emergency appeal you're supposed to 'sell' is the crisis in Syria. Something I actually care about. Great, I thought - right, I can do this. The brochures say that 81% of all funds raised go directly to this appeal. I could get behind this.
We were in a wealthy suburb of south Dublin - an old-ish blond lady opened the door and engaged in conversation with me for more than a few seconds (usually a good sign). She lived in a fabulous house. She was fully made up, perfumed and everything. Pearls. It was 2pm. She insisted I wasn't interrupting anything. I went over some of the Syria talking points and it was all "oh, how awful....child soldiers" and "can you imagine". To a point.
The wind had changed, the sky grew dark or something - because in a moment she changed her mind about me, about Syria. "What a nerve you have... don't you know there are people struggling here in Ireland? Don't you know that everyone is struggling? I can't account for children of color in a different country. What gall you have! DON'T YOU KNOW THAT CHARITY STARTS AT HOME."
Back at the psychiatric clinic - on Friday I got a call from a hospital's E.R., an old patient of the good doctor had overdosed "following a row (fight)", the E.R. doctor said. Could you please fax over a new script. Later in the day, an old woman with a shaky voice asked if she could please talk to somebody. As instructed, I took down her details and asked questions resembling, but not quite "are you thinking of killing yourself" to determine the urgency of the call. You see, the psychiatrist has a full schedule of patients, every morning, every afternoon, everyday. I told her I would pass on her message as soon as I could. I wanted to comfort her, but I've no capacity for writing scripts, so didn't know how to really.
She then told me, in a truly heartbreaking tone, "I'm a woman living alone. I can't sleep, I don't know what to do. I AM ALONE. Please tell the doctor as soon as you can." She was crying at the end. I faxed off a script to her before end of day.
I'm training to be a social worker. We don't prescribe medication or fundraise, though both of these are involved in the work. Our mission is social justice and we attack the problem at its roots; we look at all angles. Medication and money, certainly, are necessary and helpful. These encounters I've described above are perhaps less dramatic than what I've experienced thus far in social work, but somehow feel so much darker and depressing.
