Amie headed for home as soon as she woke up. When I woke up, I thought about my life. A lot of girls would kill for a life like mine. Plenty money, bright future, loving people.
I hate my life!
I don’t mean that. It just all suddenly seemed so futile. I hadn’t been to church much, but I had read the bible through as well as some books about the bible written by authors who “knew” hidden meanings in the scripture. I had read about religions other than Christianity and found major flaws in them all.
The bible was not only filled with beautiful prose, it touched on each and every aspect of life. Detractors were many and, if the bible could be disproved it would have by now. Instead, most advances in science actually made the case for the bible stronger. I had two major problems with the bible. Not its validity, but its application to me.
The first was “Male and female created he them…” The bible actually proscribes cross-dressing. Sex reassignment was not addressed, but most scholars don’t believe it would be acceptable.
The second was “what’s the point?” Are we God’s experiment? We live, work, build things, have children…then we die. Was the afterlife like that described in the bible?
My cell lit up and buzzed. I put it on silent and pulled the covers over my head. I just wanted to sleep. I slept.
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“Jamie! Wake up!”
I opened my eyes. Amie was sitting next to me on my bed. “Jamie, it’s four o’clock. Are you sick?”
“Amie, I just don’t feel good. I don’t want to do anything. I feel really tired.”
“You’re depressed?”
“Yeah, I guess. Please let me sleep.”
“OK.”
She left. That was easy. I half expected her to try to drag me out of bed.
I got up, took a bath and dressed. Mom would be home soon. Hannah was somewhere in the house, but she was obviously making it a point to not intrude.
I warmed up some pizza from the fridge and ate about half of it, decided it wasn’t that good and threw the rest away. I went to lie down and wait for Mom to come home. I fell asleep and woke up in the dark. It was 4am. Mom hadn’t awakened me. I closed my eyes and went back to sleep.
Amie came by the next morning. Again, I asked her to leave. This time, however, she wouldn’t leave. She insisted I go see her dad at his office. Reluctantly, I got dressed and let her drag me out of the house and to Dr. Adams’ office.
When we got there, the waiting room was empty and there was a new receptionist. She was reading a copy of “Vogue”.
“We’re going to see my dad,” Amie told the girl.
“Hold on,” said Miss New Girl. “I’ll send you back when he’s ready for you.”
“I’m his daughter, he’ll see me now.” She headed for the door to the hallway. It was locked.
New Girl had a sarcastic smile. “I know who both of you are. Sit down and I’ll send you back when I’m ready. Things are going to change around here because I’m the new office manager and things will go as I say! Now…sit down and please be quite…I’m trying to read.
At this point, I knew Miss New Girl was done for. I cringed a little, preparing for Amie to cloud up and rain all over this arrogant bitch.
Instead, Amie sat down and said, “Yes, ma’am.”
For a moment, I was speechless. I felt the blood rush to my head. My face must have been bright red. I looked at Amie in disbelief. “Amie, what the hell is wrong with you? Are you gonna let this little twerp tell you that you can see your dad whenever you please?”
I got up, walked toward the reception desk and opened my mouth to give this intruder the tongue lashing she deserved, but at the moment Dr. Adams opened the door.
“Come on back, girls.”
We followed him to one of the rooms. He held my chart and looked over it. “How’s it going, girls?”
“Fine, dad,” Amie said matter-of-factly.
Again, I was stunned. “Amie…what the hell is the matter with you?” I turned to Dr. Adams. “You’re not going to believe how your new employee treated your daughter Italicsand me. You might not believe this….”
Dr. Adams held up his hand for me to stop. “Amie tells me you’ve been a bit depressed.”
I was surprised and confused that he would not even want to hear a complaint from us by an employee of his. “Yeah, I’ve been a little down.”
“Sleeping a lot?”
“Yeah…I’ve been feeling so tired.”
“How do you feel now?” He folded his arms.
“I….” What? Why is he asking me that? Nothing has changed! Nothing, that is, except I couldn’t wait to get back to the front of the office and scratch the eyes out of a smartass little bitch! But wait…how do I feel? I was angry, but the depression was gone like magic! “Oh. I feel better, actually.”
Dr. Adams smiled. “When Amie told me how you were acting, I knew it had to be depression. Instead of medicating you, I set up this little experiment.” He pushed the button on the intercom. “Kaye, could you come on back?”
Miss New Girl came in the door smiling.
“Kaye is the daughter of a friend of mine. She’s a nurse, but she enjoys acting in local theater productions. Based on your reaction, she must be pretty good.”
Kaye curtsied and said “Thank you. It was the most fun acting job I ever had. The look on Jamie’s face was priceless!”
Dr. Adams continued. “I arranged for you to get angry because anger can cause your body to release adrenaline. Adrenaline can overcome depression.”
“You were so distracted; you didn’t realize that this is my dad’s off day,” Amie interjected. “That’s why the office was empty.”
“This type of therapy is not in the medical books,” Dr. Adams warned us. “We’re almost family, though, so let’s keep it among us in our little group. Besides, it probably wouldn’t work again because you would be wise to my little trick if I tried it again. Let’s hope you don’t need this 'therapy' again.”
“Thank you so much, Dr. Adams.” I turned to Kaye, “Thank you, Kaye. Wow! What a difference a few minutes makes! If Dr. Adams hadn’t stopped me, he would have been dealing with a case of ‘scratched out eyes’.”
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As we left the doctor’s office, I thought about the complexities of the human mind. I was almost certainly going after a medical degree. Now, I thought about psychiatry as a specialty.