The Road to Recovery

I pulled into the hospital parking lot. I was expecting the hospital to be much bigger than it was. I found a parking spot, purchased a ticket and went through the doors that said Main Entrance. The first thing I saw was a big desk with a sign that read Information. "Good," I thought to myself, "I can ask there where I'm supposed to go." When I reached the information desk there was no one sitting at it. Disappointed, I looked around to see the sign for Patient Registration. I walked in and sat down. There was a box on a table across from the waiting area with a sign that requested that I put my health card in it. I wasn't too sure about that, but I reached into my purse to pull out my health card.

Before I could get out my health card, a woman approached me. She was small with a dark complexion, dark eyes and dark hair. She wore glasses. She smiled at me and asked if I needed to register. I said yes and she asked me to follow her. I followed her to a little cubicle big enough for a small desk with a computer, a computer chair and two chairs facing the desk. It took me a second to decide which chair to sit in, but I finally sat down in the chair closest to the entrance to the cubicle. The woman and I made small talk. We chatted about the weather; it was raining heavily. I made some sort of remark that I don't remember to which she responded "You don't wear glasses." I remember thinking to myself, "How do you know I don't wear contacts?" She asked me regular questions like my telephone numbers, address, next of kin and emergency contact. Then she got up from her desk and brought me a blue card attached with a paper clip to a sheet of paper. She told me to come with her and she'd show me where to go. She took me through a short, narrow hall and on the other side was a wider, longer hall. She pointed to the end of the hall and told me to get on the blue elevator. I hesitated. "There will be signs for two north when I get off the elevator?" I asked. "Yes, there must be signs," she replied. I wasn't very confident with that answer, but I said thank you and went on my way.

I walked down the long hall toward the blue elevator. There were three of them at the end of the hall and one was already open. I stepped on and pushed the button for the second floor. The elevator door began to close and just as it was almost completely, shut, it quickly opened again. I looked out to see who had pushed the button to get on, but there was no one there. The door began to shut again, but once more, it stopped just as it was about to close and reopened. It did this one more time as I gripped the handle on the wall inside the elevator. I am terribly claustrophobic and the thought of being trapped in an elevator scares the shit out of me. Finally the door closed all the way and it began to move. It made a dinging noise as it arrived on the second floor and the door opened.

I stepped off the elevator and looked around. I saw the sign pointing towards 2 North and I walked in that direction, through a set of doors to a unit with a very large desk in the middle and hallways on both sides leading to many doors. There was a woman standing on the same side of the desk as me fiddling with some Christmas decorations. I stood there for a minute unsure if I was in the right place. Finally I took a step toward the woman and said, "Hello," to her. She turned and smiled at me. "Are you here to see Dr. Emelianova?" she asked. I said yes and expressed relief that I was in the right place. She took the sheet of paper with the blue card attached to it and motioned towards a small doorway with a sign that said Waiting Room on it. "You can have a seat," she said.

I went into the waiting room and looked around. There were about ten chairs in the small room. There was also a massive flat screen television attached to the wall. I was surprised that the room was so small. I took a seat in one of the comfier looking chairs and I kind of settled in. I was used to waiting around for doctors. I took out my phone to update my twitter.

Not long after I sat down a woman appeared through the doorway. She said hello to me and introduced herself as Dr. Emelianova. I shook her hand and stood up. She asked me to follow her to her office and I did. She led me quickly down the hall to her office. Her office wasn't far, but she walked so fast that I lagged behind.

The appointment went well. I like the doctor. She's easy to talk to. She took asked me about my history of depression and we went all through it. She took a lot of notes. We didn't get to finish everything in the allotted time so we booked another appointment for next week. I'm looking forward to it and I'm looking forward to getting better.