Posted by Civilian Sair Songz (Counselor) in Fitzgerald’s boarding psych eval

Posted by Ensign Anna Fitzgerald (Medical Officer) in Fitzgerald’s boarding psych eval

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Anna pondered the question for a moment. Then, she said: “Yes. I’ve told you my story. It’s not the kind of story I’ll tell everyone I meet, right after meeting them. Perhaps not even my immediate superior, depending on how that goes, although I’m sure he’ll see the traces of it in my personnel file.”

She looked at the Counselor with purpose. “I’d like to ask you to be my … emergency brake, for lack of a better term. I’ve been warned that this is still fresh and recent, though it often feels to me like it happened in a different lifetime. People in the know have said that I may struggle for a while with finding the right balance … between either not allowing myself to feel at all, or being completely overwhelmed with emotion at inopportune times.”

Anna shrugged, a little sheepishly. “If you see me veering too far off course in either direction, I’d like you to tell me to take a beat. Take care of myself before I try to care for others. Can you do that?”

~ Doctor Anna Fitzgerald

Sair’s warm brown eyes were filled with compassion as she nodded. “Absolutely,” she said with no hint of hesitation.

She pondered for a moment and set her cup back down on the table, leaning forward. “I don’t share a lot of personal details when I’m in sessions with people, but where it makes sense to, I will. I don’t know what it’s like to lose a child I have birthed and watched grow. But I do know what it is like to want a child so badly and have my body fight me at every turn. I know what’s it’s like to mourn a child I wouldn’t get to hold in my arms, fearing that that was my last chance to be a mother. I did become a mother, Anna, and he’s on this ship with me, just so you are aware and not caught off guard. And I can imagine the deep pain that losing him would cause, because I constantly fear it. It’s hard not to want to protect him from everything. But I can’t and that is a painful reality. I’ve also watched a lot of people die, and very soon my own mother will die as she in the end stage of her life and her condition is rapidly deteriorating.” Sair inhaled deeply. “I share this so you understand that I know what those emotional flip flops are like. Some days its maddening and it’s just plain terrible. But we will get through it. You will get through it. It won’t stop hurting, but eventually it won’t be all consuming. Until then, I am here for you and we’ll figure out the murky steps along the way together. Agreed?”

~Sair Songz, CNS

Anna smiled a small smile. “Thank you for sharing that, Counselor. Though I suspected, based on your origins, that you may understand what I was talking about better than most, it’s good to know for sure. I couldn’t have predicted where I’d land, I just grasped at the one straw I had to get a chance to start over somewhere. And here I am. Grateful to have landed on a ship with someone like you on it.”

~ Doctor Anna Fitzgerald