The Fear Word

There Goes the Fear (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Fear. It can take over your body, mind and soul, in a second. Sometimes it isn’t something that comes out and spooks you. It can just be a word. A memory. A frightening memory, that you had buried somewhere deep in your head, to never step forth again. I heard that word today. Normally, this isn’t a bad word. Often, people feel comfortable with the word. Follow me through this story, going back to the times you have often taken this path also. Help me to understand and respect this word, so that I can once again, lay it to rest. You have to visit a doctor. It doesn’t matter what type of doctor. The first thing they do is take your ID and insurance cards. Check! Next you fill out your medical history. You place down on the unfamiliar papers, letting them know all of your history. Now, this includes any surgeries, allergies, your parents information, also going a bit farther, your mental health. Have you ever thought of committing suicide. Have you ever tried harming yourself.Check! Now sign the most important document, your HIPPA  paper. This paper is to protect your very important information. No one is to see it. Check! All finished, you go back over your work, making sure your phone number, address, social security is all correct. Check! You hand the smiling receptionist your finished papers, and sit down to hear your name called. While you are waiting, your information is being typed into a data base in the office’s computer. Your name is called, your paper work is finished, it is typed in, and you officially now have a file on yourself.Remember, HIPPA. Your rights to privacy. Never should we forget. Did they forget to tell you , that there are special rules that can pertain to this? I didn’t think so. This is how I became afraid of THE WORD. Now, switch gears with me. We all know that I have been letting you in on my brother’s health. He has a few too many problems, including mental  health. At one visit some time back, I filled out one of those many clipboards. We waited our turn, got called in. The doctor seemed nice. He checked my brother over thoroughly. He talked more to him, the mentally challenged one, than he did to me, the guardian and sister. The doctor asked certain questions, and with my brother’s not so good of understanding, answered the best he could, sometimes adding how he got mad at this person or that. The doctor made notations from what he had heard and noted the bruises on my brother, which is from his heart medications. Nice doctor, not bad visit. A stop at McDonalds on the way home for ice-cream. Cool!! The day had gone well. A few days later in the week, we got an unexpected visitor. From the information provided in our paper work, the bruises, the comments from a mentally challenged patient, the WORD, was at our door. Social Services. Here to check on his living arrangements. Just doing a routine check, they said. Check!! I ended having to go from the nice person who opened the door, to being on total defense, proving myself innocent. After much sweat, and shaky legs, and nerves shot, she said she found everything was alright. That he was really lucky to have such a caring sister. She could tell that I loved him and cared about him a lot. She left, and I sat down and smoked a couple of cigarettes in a row, wishing at that moment, I drank the brew. Now go with me today. We had an appointment for my brother from a different type of doctor. A psych doctor. The regular doctor wanted a second opinion to see if maybe a medication change may be needed. I could deal with this, right? Anything to help my brother get through this Parkinson’s. He agreed, there was not much more that could be done, and said to come back in a couple of months, just to touch base, and see if there was anything we may need his help for. Nice doctor. We leave, or we try to leave. A young lady, looking to be a teenager, who I found out did work for the office, wanted to talk privately. My brother started crying, because as we were leaving, I told him we would stop for ice-cream, as he had done so well with this new doctor. The lady says she will take us into a quiet office. She wants to have me sign some updating papers. I asked, what kind? I explained that they had already contacted me, and all information, address, phone, etc. was all updated. She said that this was a normal procedure. She takes some forms from her brief case and lays them on the table in front of me, and I read the top line. Social Services. I asked what this was about. She stated it was routine, that this information stayed within the office. Of course, I knew better. I knew that all of your information stays within the office, inside the data base, and isn’t given to anyone, UNLESS certain words are kicked out, such as anger, bruises, emotional, etc. I smiled, and froze at the same time. The FEAR word had made its way from the back burner right to the front burner in less than a blink of they eye. I said smiling to her, I am not signing anything that you have here. All paper work was signed when we first came in for the visit. I helped my brother up from his chair and took a hold of him with  one hand, his cane in the other hand, and we left the building