My next series of blogs will show a 10 year spiral of my mental health. I will add links at the bottom of the pages with additional information on mental health issues pertaining to things we dealt with during this time period. During the years from 2000 - 2010, most of my spiral was caused from my BPD and low self esteem. I'm not justifying anything I did, I realize it was all VERY WRONG. I'm demonstrating how my reckless behavior and constant need for attention are very typical for a borderline personality disorder (BPD) patient and someone suffering with low self esteem. Also, let me remind all of you before you say you would never do any of these things, I thought I would never do them either. We all are one bad decision from changing our life forever. The truth is, I know some of you talking about how you would never act this way are already guilty and don't have the guts to admit it. Some more of you may not have been unfaithful in your marriage, but you had relations or a relationship with a married individual. That makes you guilty too. Those of you looking like a lemon has been shoved up your ass because your appalled at my behavior, let me remind you judgment is also a sin. Now on to the blog.
I often wonder if I could relive my past, if I would make the same decisions I made. The majority of me thinks absolutely 100% NOT! Then I start to wonder, would I be the same person if I hadn't made all of the really bad decisions I have? I see a meme such as the one above and I start questioning things. Would Perry and I be where we are now if we wouldn't have gone through the hell we have? Would Sam and I be as close as we are? We talk every day and can literally talk about anything and everything. Would Josh still be fighting his demons if I would have done things differently?
So I need to backtrack a little. In 1994, I was friends with a resident. This resident and I were talking one day. We'll call him Dr. Guitar. He told me about how he and and another physician were going to open a vocational medicine clinic named Vomed. They had designed a piece of equipment to test and see how much weight a person could lift from 6" to 72" at specific increments increasing each time by a specific amount of weight. This was called a Functional Integrity Test (FIT). The nurse would take vital signs before, at intervals during, and after. The test was to be performed as a post-offer physical to ensure once a person was offered a job, he or she was healthy enough to be able to perform the essential job functions without any health concerns. The amount of weight the individual had to lift was based on their job description. Vomed also did hearing and vision testing, as well as spirometry testing for lung function. All of the testing was entered into a database and the employee would be ranked and compared to others in the same age category. Not only would Vomed perform these test, they would sell this equipment to other clinics and receive a portion of the profits when it was utilized. Unfortunately, Vomed didn't make it. However, they did sell some of the FIT machines to use at some of the local clinics.
Because I knew how to do the Vomed testing I was asked to work in the Carraway industrial clinics to do training with their staff. The businesses who had purchased this equipment and software to do the testing needed training as well. I was asked to go to a clinic downtown that was an occupational health clinic named AmHealth. This clinic was similar to Vomed but had a lot of contracts with several businesses including Alabama Power and Jefferson County. It was BUSY! Most of what they did was perform drug screens but they did it all: DOT physicals, BAT (breath alcohol testing), FIT testing, drug screening for the Physicians Recovery Network (PRN), post accident exams, etc.... Once I went to AmHealth to do training in 1999, I was asked what it would take for me to work there.
At this time in our lives, Perry and I were both working and had two young boys. They were 2 and 4. Perry had left O'Neal Steel after Mike's accident. He didn't feel like he could work there anymore. He had just started working as a mortgage broker. This was an adjustment for us since he had worked evenings and nights the seven years we had been married. I had been doing critical care float pool and working in all the intensive care units at Carraway, as well as the Emergency Department (ED) and Hyperbaric Medicine Department (HBO). I thought floating around and not staying in one place might keep me out of the drama and rumor mill. I was even picking up some shifts at some of the Carraway Industrial Medicine clinics. I had put the boys in a mother's day out program and had arranged for one of the teachers to keep them afterwards until Perry or I could pick them up. I told AmHealth I wanted to work four 10hr shifts Monday - Thursday and named my hourly wage. They agreed and I started working there.
At first, I was so busy, trying to learn everything and set up the FIT room, my first 6 months flew by. I stayed back in the FIT room and organized everything. We had a manager who was a nurse practitioner, a secretary, and two nursing assistants (NA) who would take vitals, do drug screens, vision testing, etc. I thought we all worked well together. We made it through Y2K without the world ending.
I was always the 1st to get there and the last to leave Monday - Thursday because of my 10 hr days. As time went on, one of the Drs. in the PRN program started coming in early every time his color was called. I'll call him Dr. Gripe-o. My understanding is if a MD or RN is in recovery, they call a # every day. If the color they are assigned is called that day, they must go and get tested before the end of the day. Dr. Gripe-o came in on a Friday and asked about me. One of the NA's told me the following week she thought Dr. Gripe-o was crushing on me. I just laughed because we all talked about how cute he was and how good he smelled. I started paying more attention. I started to think she was right.
It was the week after Mother's day in May of 2000. Perry and I had taken the boys to Disney for a week. When we returned, I saw Dr. Gripe-o one morning. In making conversation with me, he asked what my husband had bought me for mother's day. I told him nothing. He was very surprised. He asked if there were problems. I told him no. We had been at Disney and were just busy with our boys. The next time Dr. Gripe-o's color was called, he arrived really early at AmHealth. He met me at the door and handed me a gift for mother's day. This was when I finally started believing he was interested in me. We started talking more and his drug testing started lasting a bit longer.
Meanwhile, things with Perry were falling apart. Perry was as passive as ever. If I saw a white wall and asked Perry what color it was, he would tell me it was pink if that's what color he thought I wanted it to be. He would tell me anything to avoid confrontation. The more lies he told, the more I thought he was lying about important things like fidelity. We had gotten back into the pattern of not making time for each other. I was leaving very early to get to the clinic and open it up by 7am. He would go in later after he took the boys to mother's day out. He would often leave early and take Sam to t-ball practice. After we were all home, Perry would work from home and I would take over baths and bedtime.
Not only were we dealing with two young busy boys and our full time jobs; now my jealousy was on out of control because Perry hired an 18 year old secretary at the mortgage company without even discussing it with me. We both knew her. Her mom was a teacher at mother's day out and watched our boys afterwards. We adored her mom. I just didn't realize how much trouble it would cause in our marriage. I would try to talk to Perry about how uncomfortable I was about him being in an office with her alone so much. He would always tell me I was being silly and worrying about nothing. I might have been, but I caught him lying several times about her. There were occasions he would tell me he was leaving the office to go see a client and get documents signed. I would call him back and I would hear her in the car after he told me he was going alone. There were also times he went to lunch supposedly alone and during lunch, her voice was in the background. My jealousy was usually only based on his past relationships, but this girl was gorgeous! There was something about her that made me very uneasy. Perry's lies about her definitely didn't help the situation. I saw her one day and she asked to talk to me. She told me she could understand how if she were old like me and her husband worked with an 18 year old hottie, she would be jealous too. She assured me nothing was going on between her and Perry.
Anyone that knows me, knows all that did was make my head spin even more. I was livid Perry had shared my jealousy and fears with her. I was even more livid she had called me old! I was 31 and busted my butt to stay in shape! I spent every penny I made on hair, nails, gym memberships, tanning, and dressing cute. I was fighting age everything in me. I had just battled my first serious near break down on my 30th birthday! That very night, I called Dr. Gripe-o and met him out at a mall. We sat in a bookstore and talked. We looked at CD's and talked about music. I asked about his family. He explained he was separated from his wife because he had recently been caught in an affair. I should have run as fast as possible, but instead I started meeting him more when I had the chance. I knew it was wrong. I justified it because I thought Perry was doing the same thing with his secretary.
Fast forward until 2001. I was now the manager of the clinic. We were busier than ever. We had moved up to four nursing assistants. I had recruited one of my best friends to come and work as a NA. I'm not a huge rule follower about always being on time and things that I don't consider to affect the outcome of patient care. I dance in the gray a lot. However, I would fuss about the same mistakes being repeated which affected patient care - missing the same signature line on the drug screen form, forgetting to check something on a DOT card, etc. It was the same NA that always seemed to make these same mistakes. She felt as if I was picking on her and letting my friend by without reprimand. She went to upper management and I was told I had to enforce all of the rules. She also told upper management about my affair with Dr. Gripe-o. I denied it completely. We actually had quit seeing each other because he had moved back home to work things out with his wife. Upper management put restrictions on me performing his drug test and made it clear I was not to see any of our patients.
My friend still hadn't done anything to get into trouble but one of the other NA's who had been tardy and absent several times now had to be warned and then written up if it occured again. She explained to me she was having a hard time with her anxiety. She said she was out of her medicine and couldn't get an appointment until she could take a day off. It was pretty well known by this time that Dr. Gripe-o and I had a history of seeing each other. She asked me if I could get Dr. Gripe-o to call her anxiety medicine in for her until she could see her own MD. I asked him and he gave me permission to call her medicine in for her.
Things were ok for a few weeks until the NA that was always making mistakes asked me to call an antibiotic in for her boyfriend. He had some symptoms of a STD. I told her he really needed to see a MD if that was the case. She thought once again I was playing favorites since I had called in a refill on a controlled substance for one NA, but wouldn't call in a new prescription for her boyfriend. She went to upper management and told them I had called an anti-anxiety medicine in for one of the NA's under Dr. Gripe-o's name. Upper management interviewed all of the other nursing assistants before they called me in and gave me the option to resign or have Dr. Gripe-o reported for giving permission for a controlled substance to be called in under his name on someone he had never seen as a patient. I resigned and my friend I had hired walked out with me that day.
Now, I could've told Perry some BS about quitting but I'm an open book. Most of the time I did see Dr. Gripe-o, I told Perry where I was going. I just didn't mention he would also be there. I sat in the car and told Perry the whole story. I don't think I will ever forget the look on his face. It was of pure anguish and devastation. He never even mentioned leaving me, but something in him changed that day. It created a domino effect of hurt followed by retaliation and it became a vicious cycle for us. We went to marriage counseling. We became involved in church. We had no idea what affect all of this would have on all of us for many years to come.
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