Psychiatric Maladies

“Sir, Trishi has done it again” my Registrar complained. “She was woken up by her roommate at 6 a.m. for going to the ward. She got up, got ready and went back to sleep. The roommate woke her up again at 7 a.m. She left the room and never reached the ward. She is not reachable on her cell.” Trishi was one of my house officers. She had troubled us a number of times. She would not attend night calls, and the patients would suffer. She would run away from duty without informing anyone, and the co-residents would be burdened with her work. This time looked similar. One of us called her parents, who stayed in another part of the state. Her mother informed that Trishi had reached another city in one of the southern states where her brother stayed. It seemed she had left in a trance, and when she came to, she found herself at the airport. So she just boarded a plane and went to her brother’s place. When she came back a few days later, our chief psychiatrist saw her and diagnosed something beyond my comprehension, warning us that she was likely to commit suicide too. I never knew air-travel was so easy. I myself always needed an agent to book my ticket well in advance. The story Trishi’s Mom told me was different. She told me Trishi had told her that her current post was quite heavy. She had to just get through this post, and she would be all right once she began her next post, which was in a very light unit. After joining duty, in a week’s time Trishi had another breakdown, and the psychiatrist advised her rest for 15 days. Her Mom took her home for rest. But my residents had another story altogether. “Sir, Trishi has gone home to get engaged.” Trishi came back after 20 days, and indeed she had got engaged. She told me it was not planned at all, and her parents had forced her to do so or something to that effect. One week later Trishi was found asleep in her room and she wouldn’t wake up. It was found she had consumed an unknown number of sleeping pills. They rushed her to the ICU, where she made a recovery so dramatic, that when our people went to see her, she was found to be absconding, and was later found to be in her hostel room with her fiancé, in perfect physical health and best possible mood. Trishi went through these cycles of joining duty and absconding or taking sleeping pills, until that post ended. She joined a new unit with very little work, and indeed she had a total recovery. Not once did she remain absent or take a single pill for committing suicide. Her psychiatrist would call this a remission of whatever she was suffering from, but Trishi had known about the time of her remission a few months in advance, and had told her mother the exact date when it would happen. “Sir, you are very naive” said my ex-Registrar who knew Trishi very well. Trishi has not submitted her topic of dissertation to the University until after the beginning of this post. Now she cannot appear for the University exam at the end of her 3 years of residency. There is a rule that there must be at least one year between the time of submission of the topic and the exam.” “But why?” I said. “Does she not want to pass and do whatever she plans to do afterwards?” “She has her reasons. She needs an excuse to give to her in-laws for postponing her wedding by another six months.” I wonder if Trishi’s psychiatrist knows all this, she will still stick to her original diagnosis. Trishi is not alone. There are quite a few Trishis or Trishs around with somewhat similar behavior.