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 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

A genuine smile appeared on Sair’s face, shifting her expression rather dramatically. She had been told once that her neutral expression looked aggressively serious, but that’s just how Sair was and it wasn’t at all a reflection of her internal feelings. “I was an emergency room physician for many years before I joined the exchange program and became a doctor off world. My switch into mental health was a necessary and more recent change, but the fact is that as doctors we get used to death, to bad outcomes. Its just life, no matter how much we wish otherwise. But it’s a different concept altogether when it becomes personal. So know as well that you are returning with a new outlook and that might not always show up the way you expect. Trust me, I know,” she said with a more rueful smile.

Anna looked at her pensively. “That’s interesting. I’m making the same switch, but in the opposite direction. It … feels like, on the physical care side, there’s more that I can do for people, besides just sit, and listen, and wait for the worst of it to scab over.”

“Now, I will aim to support you however I can and I believe you best know what you need. So, what forms can this support look like? We don’t always have to meet here, either.”

~Sair Songz, CNS

Anna shook her head. “No. We don’t. But I don’t know how open you’d be to something like … a scheduled get-together in the lounge, maybe once every four weeks or so? That way, when everything is going as it should, we both get to just have some fun. But when there’s anything going pear-shaped, you get to tell me to take a breath and think. And maybe then, if necessary, we can agree on meeting here? I don’t know. I’m just throwing stuff out there and seeing if it sticks.”

~ Doctor Anna Fitzgerald