Waiting Room

Sitting in the at the local medical centre. Not for long but there none the less. Sitting in an empty waiting room. Memories flooding back of times past. The many frequent visits. Sitting in here waiting for my name to be called and another fruitless journey thereafter. Of the flood of words and explanations and hope that the doctor, of which there were many, would understand and see the problem and write a prescription for a bottle of pills that would take it all away and make me better.

I had been living here about 4 years permanently and in that period had gone to the doctors probably over 20 times for various things but about 75% of those visits were in the last year of that period where I was constantly back and forth searching in vain for an answer. Just an answer would do. What the hell was happening? Sitting here nervously. Partly hoping today was the day and partly fearing what the answer might be.

Yes for all the frequency of those visits I stayed up North for 5 years before that and only went to the doctors once in that whole time. That was strange because I never even registered with a medical practice until right at the very end when I had to after coming back from a holiday abroad with an ear infection. All that time working and not a problem to note and that visit was probably my first in about 8 or 9 years to a doctor such was my fine health- mental and physical.

And tht makes me wonder why the sudden change. Two big changes. Firstly a change of abode but I was fime for the first two years of that. The second change was the eventual change of job and that is when my problems began, at the refinery. That in itself had two problems. I remember a big old Geordie in the smoking room cursing and moaning about all the idiots confining the few to a single smoking room and if only they knew the shit they were breathing around about them pumped into the air from the refinery before going on to list a dozen and one different chemicals. The other problem was spending all day facing a wall in my own world cut off from the rest.

The last time I was here, in the waiting room, was January 2008. My wife was in hospital pregnant with the boy. The youngest girl was up North with her grandparents and the oldest girl I had managed to drop off at nursery that morning. I had to pick up a prescription. A neighbour had offered to get it for me and that was the easy way out but I was pushing on my own trying to force normality and so ended up here panicking in a queue waiting for a little bit of paper to take to the chemist and then run off with a bag full of diazapam to stop me falling off the edge- as I had pleaded to the doctor over the phone. I did it and it felt great but I was in no hurry to go back and the diazapam remain untouched to this day- well they are out of date now.

So 5 years since I had last been here and thankfully not sitting here because I need to but because I want to. The push continues as I try to get myself out further and for longer and I keep pushing. This is part of the push. This time it was my wife who was in for a prescription. The boy was not even born last time and there he was battering about some balls of a little toy on a table as he nears the time to start school. Another little achievement like last time but this time I will return again. That is what I have been doing. Pushing to get there and pushing to go back. Trying to force normality again but unlike last time it seems tiny step by tiny step to be working this time.