Things that make me happy.

The hospital I work for has several contracts with the local mental health care services.  This allows me to see and try to help many people in crisis.   Evaluating patients who are having mental health issues is something you learn in medical school but as with most difficult things, you don't really learn it until you do it a couple of hundred times.  Even after this,  I am still often surprised and amazed at the experiences that I have each time I walk into work.  I know you want a surprising or amazing story right now but, alas, that old HIPPA looms ever present and unless I want to go to jail or be fired, I better stay with my own thoughts and feelings. 

One of the text book questions that medical students are taught to ask to assess for severe depression is "Is there anything in your life that makes you happy?"  As I was taught in my psychiatry rotation, profoundly depressed people are unable to find joy or happiness in their lives.  I was thinking this morning in the shower as I blearily got up at 6:30 for another long day at work and asked myself this question as a reality check.  (Kinda of like the self breast exam that you'all should be doing in the shower each morning, only for mental health!!)

So,  here was some of the things that have made me happy recently (not in any order):  

1. Playing golf with Vicki and winning a game against Steph and Marylyn
   
2. Watching BYU slaughter UCLA
3. Morning boat rides on Lake Powell
4. Watching Skye on the trail
   
5. Naps
   
6. Dinner with Denice
   
7. Personal scapbooks made by your sister
   
8. Birthday parties on the houseboat
   
9. Skye wanting to sleep on my lap
   
10. Dry Canyon
    
11. New hiking shoes
    
12. Weekend visits to Illinois

Have you asked yourself this question lately? (You don't have to be in the shower to do it)