Psychiatrists' apointment...

Yes I made it to the psychiatrists appointment. One step closer to getting surgery. I don't think that I had to worry much about it. Well my doctor, and even my case manager agree that I can get surgery at this time. P'nina my case manager is I think a little less enthusiastic about it. Though I think she likes to err on the side of caution and not having me take risks that could be a significant blow to my self esteem.

So, how did it go? Really well actually. There were two psychiatrists who I expected there, and one other person who I didn't expect there, and I don't know if she was a psychiatrist or some other proffesional. They asked me a bunch of questions that I've gone over, but have yet to write a script about (hey I have to be honest, and being honest means talking from where I'm at, not from where I was at when I wrote the script). It was somewhat difficult. They were glad to see that I'm getting ongoing counselling. They generally I think felt that I am indeed a good canditate for surgery, and that the surgery should proceed shortly.

Some surprises, but I was kind of expecting some surprises. The one surprise that I wasn't expecting and really hadn't even considered is the loss of choice as to what surgeon to go to. There is now a surgeon looking for a hospital to do the surgery in, who is located in Vancouver, and I either pay for getting surgery from someone else, or get MSP to pay for this surgeon. Well, he only has a wait list of 40 patients, I don't know how much surgical time he's likely to be able to get, so I don't know how quickly he will get through the list. I would think at the most rapid (and this may even be unrealistic) he'd be able to get through that list in about a month. That list is growing, but I'll be contacted probably fairly soon about some of that.

Then I spent the day in Vancouver, mostly shopping. Almost exclusively shopping. Got a new answering machine (now you can leave me messages). It seems that sometimes the answering machine I have refuses to take messages, which is very annoying. Got some books inclidng The Gateless Gate which is a classic Zen text which I've been reading since I got on the bus. Looks like I have some good reading to get caught up on, if I have time on my retreat. I'll probably be able to read a few cases per day. They don't take long to read. I'm not really trying to understand them. I'm just reading them to get a feel for them. Maybe when I get back I'll start to try to realise the meaning of the koans.

That's about it. My parents got a new scanner which they are hoping to connect to the new computer. Right now, I think I am going to try to get an hour or two of sleep. Maybe even 3 hours.

Jessica