The other day, I was waiting in a hospital emergency room with a family member. As we sat there staring at each other and I tried fruitlessly to get my loved one to eat their sandwich, I became aware of the many unusual things going on around me. A guttural voice a few beds away exclaimed, “I don’t very well want to go Number 2 in my pants!” The nurse replied, “I don’t want you to go Number 2 in your pants either.” I felt relieved that they were on the same page. Through the curtain next to us, we heard a nurse tell a patient that he was about to receive his antibiotics. Shortly thereafter, we heard a hissing, buzzing electric sound and wondered what on earth was happening to this patient.
We had spent some time in the ER a few months ago and knew what to expect: the weird and unexpected, along with a heavy dose of uncertainty. Uncertainty about how long we would be there, how soon our relative would be seen, what the outcome would be, and why it was so hard to get a box of Kleenex. You sit (believe me, there’s no room to stand or pace), not knowing if or when you can step out of the place to get some fresh air or food or go for a walk. What if you duck out right before the doctor is ready to see the patient, and they are left without your pivotal information?
Being in the ER is like hanging out in a chaotic purgatory. The environment is cluttered with all sorts of equipment, oddly placed seats and cramped waiting areas squeezed into nooks, personnel standing at counters or bustling from place to place, loud beeps, intercom messages (“Code Blue, Dr. So-and-So, Code Blue!”), food trays balanced haphazardly on patients’ laps with the requisite cup of lukewarm tea teetering on the brink. And you just hang out and wait in this environment, desperate for some kind of information, reassurance, or simply a reason to leave. If you’ve read Dr. Seuss’s book, Oh, The Places You’ll Go! You’ll probably remember “The Waiting Place.” The ER is a lot like the Waiting Place. There are many waiting places in life – strange, purgatory-like places where things are ambiguous and it’s not clear when or how you’ll get to move on.
What can you do to cope If you have to do time in these kinds of situations? I found two things especially helpful:
1. As we say in DBT, I found it helpful to remember to stick to my values. I reminded myself why I was there, why it was important for me to be there. The answer was to help my loved one get the best care possible. Remembering my values, or what was important to me, helped fuel my determination to stick around, provide support (even though I was often rebuffed), and see if I can use what I know to influence my loved one’s care.
2. Second, I had a really good book. In fact, I was reading Stephen King’s, On Writing (20th anniversary edition). I had received this as a gift from a former student, and it couldn’t have come at a better time. Over the past year or so, my motivation and enthusiasm for writing had been flagging (pun intended for those of you who are “Dark Tower” fans). This was probably because of severe and persistent life stress. I knew it but had a hard time overcoming it. I used to love writing but had come to feel out of gas and a sense of dread whenever I had to do it. Writing started to seem like an unnecessary, extra long swim when I’d already been treading water for a long time. I’ve never stopped loving reading, however, and I tend to bring a book wherever I go. My wife often teases me when I bring a book, for example, to family gatherings, restaurants, movies, the comedy club, and even work meetings (Zoom and otherwise). When all else failed, one way to shoot a motivational arrow directly into my poor demoralized brain and recharge my interest in writing was through reading – reading about writing, more specifically. During the many hours of downtime in the ER, this book provided something for me to sink my teeth into.
I must admit that, as an old-fashioned book reader, I did look around a little judgmentally at all of the people who were glued to their phones, as if these devices were a thin veil separating them from understimulation-induced insanity. Indeed, if those of us who largely grew up in the 80s and 90s were transported to the here and now and saw all of these people looking down at vertical rectangular devices, we’d probably conclude some kind of horrific mental disease had struck society. And in some ways it has. Sorry, I digress!
My point, I suppose, is that when you’re dealing with ambiguity and uncertainty in an unpleasant environment, it helps to have a touchstone to keep you sane. One touchstone can be your connection with your values. Why is what you’re doing important, even if you hate it at the time? Another one can be a good, old-fashioned book. If the time is right, a good book might even reinvigorate your interests or at least transport you to fascinating worlds beyond the waiting place. ~Alexander L. Chapman, Ph.D., R.Psych.