Where is the Next Knife Coming From?

On days like today I just want to yell fuck you to the world. Wracked with toothache since Saturday and having had emergency dental treatment yesterday I do not need to be stabbed in the back from all sides. Systemising something that cannot be neatly packaged into sterile statistics, petty point scoring and general you are useless attitude is as toxic as it gets. Do not judge me on what a flawed spreadsheet says. I work extremely fucking hard and have helped save many lives over the past 15 years. There is a reason why people have my mobile number scrawled in big letters across their boards in offices.

Having had to come home early yesterday and feeling pretty shitty a volley of "you fucked up" was not what I needed. I know what goes on in mental health world, I know what to trust and I know what to write so don't attack me for protecting an institution that yes gave me a chance but like me does not always get it right.

I've been in this business so long on one side of the fence or the other I know who I work with, I know what's possible and by god do I know my flaws. I'm not perfect. I'm not a machine. I cannot respond to everything immediately without emotion like some super being. I am not that.

At the age of 23 I was branded a narcissist by one of the most eminent psychiatrists of his generation. In those days I was angry, traumatised and damaged. I also had what they failed to recognise a significant mood disorder that needed medication rather than therapy.

All theses years later I'm back in therapy and it's making a difference. I'm also one of the most respected mental health practitioners in the county who people rely on to know what is going on and to most of the time get it right. It was a hard fought reputation.

There are reasons why I write my notes the way I do. Reasons too why my engagement with students is fluid, reactive and not set in stone. Being told what and how to do it is not always helpful. Being criticised for not doing what others want for very good reasons does not help.

Coming home my first thought was go out, eat expensive food and get pissed. But I stayed home against my raging desire and cooked. The resultant Moroccan sardine balls seasoned with garlic, cumin and coriander with a tomato and coriander sauce surpassed all expectation. What a triumph. Seeing my psychiatrist today and assessing where we are at led me to my food and its decadence. There is nothing decadent about spending 76 p on a couple of sardines with a few additions and sating my anger. Not sure it did that and some time later I'm still ruminating but listening to Beethoven as I write I know that there are better things than knives, bitterness and regret.

Maybe I will regret this post tomorrow. But it needed to be said.

I Heard a Voice.