Follow the Directions

I am a data entry clerk. I enter numbers from patient surveys into spreadsheets and pass that data into storage for further referencing. Last year I was introduced to database, this is not only entering data into working forms and tables, yet it is constructing those tables and forms as well as charts and reports to place the data within. My Mental Health Recovery program has been altered; I am seemingly reaching for the outer limits, where I am no longer being guided, yet given the opportunity to reach out express myself in my endeavors with new tools.

I don’t mean I have lost control; I am still on earth, yet this database excursion requires a whole new set of directions. In recovery, you are given a case manager, a nurse, a clinician and a whole new set of rules aside from dereliction, destitution, drunkenness and paranoia and the likes of the mean extremes, if you want to go beyond what besets you mentally and physically. At MHCD, your guidance comes from those who can help you walk in the light of your needs, if they are medical, physical or mental as well; you are following directions to overcome the debilitation bought on by an illness.

What does this occupation of computer database (data entry) have to do with Mental Health Recovery? Nothing. Yet, this occupation has terminology which guides me in my everyday life since I am becoming used to working in it. Words like, objects, instances, control source, records, fields and references of which I am confronted with everyday help me to understand what I must do with my personal life, where I should be, whom I should trust. They are not of course psychiatric terms used in Recovery, yet they are attitudes to set me on the right course when constructing a database; forms or tables, as well as my life, because they are that similar to the objectives I am reaching for in my recovery.

I am guiding myself and following directions to overcome my boundaries to enhance my well being. Artist do it with their medium, psychiatrist, mechanics, lawyers, they all have a medium of definition that they can follow to get themselves through the tough times, they all follow directions, try it and see, the advice is in what you perceive, in what your are working with; it’s your language to overcome that instance of your disability which brings you down, its following the directions which is uplifting.

Written by Donald Sammons