Broken Thoughts
Part Three
By Kristen
kdarganin@hotmail.com

DISCLAIMER: I don't own the characters of "ER" this is for fun, not profit.

NOTE: Any mistakes are on purpose, this is a different style for me.

I'm reposting this since I'm done with the last part. This is for any catching up that is needed.

The Journals of Peter Benton
May 20th

I talked to Dr. Pierson today. I kind of grilled him about the post traumatic thing. I've heard about that before, came across my share of psyche cases during my regular rotation. I can't do that...you're not a "psyche" case. You're Carter, you don't suffer from mental illness or....I don't know. I guessed you would be fine, that you would come out of your ...what do you call what you went through?

An ordeal? An attack? I don't think words could express what you have gone through and to tell you the truth I never stopped to think about it.

I was your doctor; I treated you, fixed you, and looked after every detail of your care that I could when you were in the hospital. I agonized over your treatment and over your recovery. I annoyed the nurses, the staff and ruffled a few feathers. But I never really sat down to think about all the wounds. I stayed within my shell and made sure all of your physical injuries were properly treated. You know that I followed your case more than any other. But, I missed so many things.

Dr. Pierson said that the post thing occurs normally within the first three months of a traumatic event. You were in the hospital for the first month and I didn't notice shit. Sure you looked depressed even haggard, but you were recovering from major surgery. I see that all the time, of course never in a friend, but it just doesn't register. I worried about you Carter, but I never did anything about it and after time I...just didn't notice. I was busy, just too damned occupied to notice you falling apart before all of us.

You will never know what it was like for me when Dr. Pierson explained to me what you were.... what you are going through. It was like someone was kicking me with each symptom. Stuff I saw or things that I was told later that you did. He said the first stage or symptom was something called intrusion. The person suffers painful emotions associated with the event or has flashbacks.

So what were those flashbacks, Carter? How did you hide those from us? You were experiencing severe and intense feelings and you just swept them under the rug. Kept them from view. You were sliding into the abyss and did not ask for help. I should be so angry with you man, but I didn't notice. I was too pre-occupied with Cleo, had my own life to enjoy. Not much joy in yours. Did you stay in your room all alone in the dark as you envisioned Paul stabbing you over and over again? Or was it Lucy that you couldn't get out of your mind?

You must have been so scared. No wonder you wanted to return to work so soon. Work was the only place you could hide from the pain. It caused you so much pain to have come back so soon. I mean you winced every time someone came near you without warning. Then every time you winced it must have hurt like hell. I told you to take it easy and you never did. After a while you were better and you were moving around easier. I know why now. I am a doctor I should have done it would have taken you longer to heal, .....Screw it. I know why.

So, then if this wasn't bad enough your doctor told me that you also exhibit avoidance. The disorder makes you avoid emotional ties with family and friends. That you would suffer diminished feelings and the inability to resolve painful emotions. That you would cope by functioning through routine situations. You sure carried out this one to a T. What was your routine? Let's see go to bed, lay there for hours, get up then what, stay up? When did you take the pills? What was it like swallowing something that you knew you shouldn't take? You knew it! Didn't you feel something? When did you start hiding, sneaking around? What was it like looking over your shoulder? You knew that it wasn't right!

Damn it Carter the minute you started taking double doses of painmeds was the minute you should have know that something wasn't right. When did this become routine? John Carter, drug addict. John Carter, shaking in a corner because he was too afraid to show his pain. Peter Benton too stupid to see the slightest problem!

I started yelling at Dr. Pierson. Telling him that you must have been in really bad shape to be taking those kind of risks. That your back was really bad, that I might have missed something during surgery or that your nerves could be damaged or your that you caused damage somewhere by overdoing it. Then he stopped my tirade as I started working myself up, raising my voice. Defending you...defending me. He said, "Dr. Benton its called hyperarousal". Like that would solve everything.

I was still pissed though. Like his one word answer suddenly explained it all way. He let me vent then, calmly as if to a child or a ..funny as if to a parent what it meant. This symptom was irritability or explosive outbursts of emotions. Sadness or anger. He asked if you ever had trouble remembering current events or difficulty concentrating. I told him, "I don't know". He looked at me kind of weird. I asked him what was up with the look. He told me that he assumed that we were really close. Yea, well I told him it was complicated, that no we...I was a colleague.. that. Then I finally sat down and told him yea, we are close. You just didn't know it most of the time.

He kind of looked at me up and down. I was impatient and told him to go on. He was a bit startled and explained that most people who underwent what you did suffered from insomnia. Must have explained why you looked like hell sometimes. The hardest part was him telling me how you would attempt to rid yourself of your loneliness or your pain by abusing medication or alcohol. I started to get irate again told him you were not an alcoholic. He cut me off, told me he knew you weren't. He was just explaining the different kinds of things patients turn to for relief.

Then it hit me. Hell I might as well have told you to pop as many pills as possible. Romano took away by prescription privileges and gave them to you. I was so steamed. We're you over medicating then, maybe with the script? Did this give you the idea, was this the temptation. Did my screw up with Cleo provide you with the lighting bolt? How tempting was it Carter? Did you work a really long shift, covering too many patients. Bending over, running around, reaching for something. Did one day all the pain take its toll and you saw some relief in front of your face.

Did you stare at it for a while contemplating it, because inside deep in your heart it was screaming at you not to do it? That little voice whispering in your ear that it was wrong. All the while your body was suffering. All alone with the guilt, the emotions, and the pain. No where to turn, but in a little bottle or in a needle. Except you knew it would be short lived, all it would do would buy you some time. Until when? Your next shift? Couldn't you see yourself in the mirror, that you were slowly slipping away?

No, you couldn't. Because I couldn't and neither could anybody else. You were so lost, drifting in a sea full of other people needing help. We're so used to fixing others, seeing people for a minute and sending them on their way. Suffering is our profession. Its something that we have to get used to, in order to do our jobs. So, in the middle of all the static normalcy of human suffering, we other ignored yours or never really saw it. Because you were Carter. It didn't even occur that it could touch us. That it could touch you. I won't let it have you.

The Journals of John Truman Carter
May 21st 2000 1:00 p.m. 

This was Benton's last day here. He shouldn't have stayed as long as he did, but I guess he felt some obligation to be here. That's three days vacation time I'll owe him somewhere down the road. You know the one with the many exits and turn offs. The road I'm on is so uncertain right now. All the assurance that I'll be accepted with open arms after my foray here is something that I can' count on. But, maybe...just maybe I'll try to take that chance. But that's neither here nor there right now.

I still haven't talked to him. I'm kind of glad. I wasn't in much shape to speak to him earlier. I know he talked to both my doctors. Yea, I get to have two. One for my mind and one for my back. I gave them permission to disclose anything he wanted to know. If it wasn't for him I wouldn't be here. Hmm, want an ironic statement. True and untrue in many ways. I'm the reason I'm here, but at the same time if he hadn't forced me in that van, I wouldn't be here either.

I am having one of my "break" periods. Since there is not much to do here I went over to one of the basketball courts. Of course I wasn't really in the mood for a game of hoops, then again for some reason there wasn't anybody around. So here I am again, isolating myself from others. There's nothing wrong with me not wanting to talk to a bunch of strangers about my problem. All of these people couldn't possibly know what kind of hell I've been through. Most of them couldn't take the stress on the job or have had personal problems and have turned to various substances.

Hello, I was stabbed in the back, TWICE, at work! At the place that I have felt the most at home. I was left for dead, to lay on the cold tile and if that wasn't enough my only remaining memories were going to be that of my friend and student dying in front of my eyes. A student for whom I did not have the patience to instruct or deal with and whom I left alone with a mentally deranged man. No doctor I don't have a problem with guilt, honest.

Is it so far fetched that I would be left to my own devices after all the initial concern for my health was over with? I survived, everyone at work was concerned and all I ever wanted were for things to go back to normal. Only problem was that physically I wasn't up to par or up to the kinds of tolls at work that are required of me. So, yes to all who will listen I started taking larger does of my pain meds! Let's not forget that I was stabbed in the back, but all the surgery was performed by opening me up from my abdomen. How about this, let's imagine at your typical job that you have to work overtime every day. That would be exhausting. Now imagine that anytime you have to reach, bend, turn around, stretch or move around quickly that a thousands sharp needles all at the same time get shoved into your back, then ride down into your leg. Then if that wasn't enough, your gut at the same time feels as if there was someone pushing a fork out of it from the inside. Now tell me if you knew there was something you could do about would you?

There was this song playing on the radio right before I left to come out here. The words...they were...interesting ..they were

I hurt myself today,
To see if I still feel,
I focus on the pain,
The only thing that's real,
The needle tears a hole,
The old familiar sting,
Try to kill it all away,
But I remember everything 

That's me. That's my problem, not so much the physical pain, I mean that really bothers me, impedes my function. My ability to get away. I don't really focus on the pain; maybe I let it remind me of all that I have done. All that I didn't do that night. I just want it all to go away. But the song's right, ....I remember everything. As much as I try to avoid it or distance my self or keep myself busy. I will always have every horrible second of that night imprinted in my head. The noise, the visions, the horror of that night never leaves me be. It haunts me at all hours, stealing my sleep, invading my dreams. I...I don't necessarily relive that night, it just pops up in one way or another during the day. I can go without it sometimes a day or so, but there is always something to remind me of it.

There were some more lines. I just really got caught up in the beginning. The man's voice was so haunting. He said it slowly enunciating every symbol, as if you were meant to memorize and recite at some other time. The end really got to me, though.

"What have I become?
My sweetest friend,
Everyone I know,
Goes away in the end,
You can have it all,
My empire of dirt,
I will let you down,
I will make you hurt,
If I could start again,
A million miles away,
I would keep myself,
I would find a way.

What have I become? ...... I don't now. I keep asking myself that. Have I changed? What has the accident...no the attack done to me. Will I become this hardened person,...no I don't think so. I still want to help people, I still care. It hasn't changed my view of the world. I'm a bit more cautious around certain patients. Paranoid, ..maybe. I'm scared. Really..I am. I've always let others down,... displeased them I some way. Being an over achiever never got me anywhere. It was expected. Nothing more.

If I could start again. Oh boy...if I could. There would be so much I would change. But, I can't think about that. Not now, ..it won't get me anywhere. Maybe I wanted to just find a way to ...what to just keep going? Like the song said, I would find a way. I guess now....well it was the wrong way.

Wow, I'm really depressed. I mean I've never noticed it before. Is it me who's depressed... the post traumatic thing? What's the real me? I just want to find myself again. Be Carter, you know the one who didn't screw up all the time. The one that did his job, was happy. I just want to be a doctor. I just want to help people....I..

God, crying alone. Hmm, that's going to look really good. Maybe I'll come to this later.