Who's Crazy Now?!!! (a Rant.)

So the whole looking-for-a-new-psychiatrist thing has taken a turn for the worse.

Having to speak to the most inane, insensitive, STUPID secretaries that seem to enjoy dangling your life in their hands is enough to make anyone either quit the search or have to don armor just to pick up the phone and try to make a simple appointment.

It SHOULD be simple. Make an appointment. Go to appointment. Have yer heart ripped out.

I had gotten the list from my insurance, I had consulted my primary care physician and I have abided by all the rules, crossed my t's and obeyed the q's.

Only to have conversations that include statements like "We don't deal with psychotic people (I mentioned I was Bipolar I and tried to briefly explain what that meant and tried to explain that my last psychosis was 15 years ago (which seems like a KEY POINT). I suspect They deal with psychotic people all the time and I even asked her what they do with them when they run across them, because her responses MADE ME FEEL PUNCHY).

It's a counseling center located inSIDE the local mental hospital, which frankly already makes me nervous. Some part of me is not trusting, not convinced that they are not laying in wait to get me in there on a more permanent basis. I know, I know, that sounds silly and unreasonable but few have ever accused me of being otherwise.

So I asked to make an appointment with one of the doctors and Secretary says no he is not taking patients. Not to be daunted, I had a second name, for the same counseling center (I only had two 'approved' names from my doctor out of a list of 20 or so, and I wasn't about to be hornswaggled into accepting just any old psychiatrist. No, I want the best as I think highly of my primary care physician who went to the trouble of recommending them and if I'm going to leave the County after 15 years I d*mn well want good care!!!!)

Anyway, secretary says she can make an appointment with this second person but it will be a couple of months out (which I don't mind whatsoever, what's a few more months of being bled dry by the County as it will take them a while to copy my ENOURmous chart and get it there anyway, I know the b*st*rds.) and wouldn't I prefer a pdoc that I can get a sooner appointment with. Like it's some kind of switch a roo, like wouldn't you want someone you've never heard of, have your life in their hands type of thing all because I, Secretary, don't want to schedule you out 2 months even though you've expressed it's not a problem.

No I don't want the first available. I want someone good. As Suze Orman says, do what is Right, not what is Easy. I am upset that I am being 'handed' (more like fighting for) a psych like Sears sells power tools (and everthing else, I know I worked in the Men's Department!) with bait-and-switch tactics and no care for the effect on the consumer. I am so angry.

Oh, she tried hard. She said ALL their psychs could deal with Bipolar, and this particular psych was their only woman, and they liked to reserve her for the under-30 set. Which I would have understood (I'm really not unreasonable, and for the record I AM IN REALITY, d*mn it!), but Secretary did not put her foot down and say I could not have an appointment with her, only that again normally they 'reserved her' (whose They, and that's weird) for adolescents and she, Secretary, wanted to make me a SOONER appointment.

Which is so odd, because after the conversation she took ALL my information, asked HORRIBLY INVASIVE questions for a person that I don't know and would never want to - COMBATTED me and cut me off on those questions before I could even explain, not caring anyway what I was saying (which really was the most galling part of it) and was incredibly ignorant of mental health issues yet portended such importance and knowledge (making her triply ignorant, even Husband said so) and then said "We will look up your hospitalizations and GET BACK TO YOU. (!!!!!!!!!!!!!)

That's fine if that's how they treat everybody else. But I am thinking that she is afraid that I am psychotic and will kill her only precious female psych and must evaluate me and my history. That's the impression that I get. I will be pleasantly (??) surprised if she does call back. Really.

I am thinking that she will not call back, until I call next week and ask to speak to the manager, or get Husband to call (which I think I should do all along, as I have become incapable of dealing with these people anymore), or ask my primary care physician's wonderful, NOT-STUPID, gifted, lovely assistant to call and ask them what the deal-e-o if they actually don't call back.

I'm not enlarging the situation, mountains really are mountains (no molehills) and I'm thinking of going to a nearby county or an unauthorized person (on the list but not loved by my doctor) across the street from said mental hospital because this place is a Mickey-Mouse Operation.

On another note it's only Saturday, so it may not be a big deal but it's 4:36a.m. and I haven't gone to bed yet. Yeah. The puppy will be up at 5:30 for pee-peeing. What's the use of going to bed. I'm so wired.

Other than that, I know I'm lucky. I've got insurance and so many don't and I know that I am blessed incredibly to have it.

The County has made it clear that I have to 'move out' of the program, and they made so many promises that they can no longer keep I have to (read: forced) to go through this process and you think, ok, I will make phone calls today, I will make contact with these people and they are awful to you.

I can't imagine what they see, and I am fortunate because I understand that They don't know me, They are just performing a job. But this is my job too, taking care of myself. This is what I do. And apparently I'm a little ineffective at it at the moment.