Tales From the Mental Hospital

I'm trying to remember some of my more meaningful experiences at the mental hospital so I'm going to start documenting them occasionally on here. You might like them and it will be a good way for me to save them so there ya go.

I started as a tech on the nightshift and I liked the patient interaction really. There was a lady that came in one night and by the time I got to work she had hit 4 people and her Dr. Not good. I should also mention that I've only ever been hit twice at the mental hospital-both by women over the age of 80 who were less than 90 pounds. Do not be deceived by their looks-they are deadly!! So when the charge nurse asked me if I would work with her that night I said sure why not fully expecting her to rank #3 on my "tried to kill me" list. I read her chart and realized she had been in farming her whole life. When I looked over at her they had her in a geri chair and she clearly wanted to get out. Needing a good walk myself I asked her if she wanted to go for a walk with me and I took her out of the chair. Immediately several people backed up! So, I let her lead and we walked, and walked and walked the halls of the hospital from 7:30 pm to 3 a.m. She would stop occasionally to "work the ground" and I would wait. She asked if I wanted to help and I told her I wasn't very good at farming. She said youth was wasted on the young (Ha!) and we kept going. When she (and I!) were sufficiently worn out I asked her if she was ready for bed. She said she needed a snack first and did I have any peach pie. I did not. Knowing that not having the appropriate dessert had caused the 4 earlier people to get hit I was not about to tell this aggressive alzheimer's patient we were out of peach pie. I told her I would check. I placed 2 graham crackers on her tray. She said thank you and asked for a glass of white wine. Hmmm. I gave her a glass of apple juice that i had shaken up. She said it was the best peach pie she'd ever had but the wine tasted funny! I told her it was probably old and she went to bed. She proceeded to hit 4 more people that week, but she never hit me. One night she said I reminded her of her daughter. Prematurely assuming that was a good thing I thanked her and told her that was sweet. She replied, "Well, I hate my daughter but I don't hate Bill Cosby!" Hillarious. She died a few weeks later. That was almost 5 years ago. I hope she's somewhere happy planting flowers and eating the best peach pie she ever tasted. And I really hope when I'm 85 and confused someone will lie to me too and give me some graham crackers so I don't have to hit them!