It’s
just after lunch and we’ve all returned to complete the day’s training. We’re
watching videos for active shooter training and for some reason, I can’t get
enough air—I’m nearly gasping. Trying to remain quiet and inconspicuous, I
inhale deeply and exhale fully, doing everything in my power to control my
breathing, but it’s no use; by the time the video ends, I’m noticed.
“Are
you okay, Aleashia?” Matt asked from the front desk.
“Yeah,
I’m okay.”
“You
sure?”
“Yeah,
I just can’t seem to get enough air. I’ll be fine,” I replied. Apparently, this
was cause for concern, contrary to my own thoughts. Matt immediately put
everyone on break and cleared the room after asking for someone who had been a
medic—as it happens, a guy in my class named Ken was a medic in the Air Force,
so he was the one called upon to talk to me about what was going on.
I
told them all that, yes, I’m on medication and it’s called Ziprasidone. I told
them it’s a bipolar medication; I explained that this kind of thing was far from
frequent and I didn’t understand why it was happening at that moment. Matt and
Ryan made a point of ensuring I knew that if this was a problem, 12-hour shifts
would be out of the question and they could move me to another account—not that
they wanted to do so, but that it was an option. They insisted that I let them
know if the problem persists, and of course I agreed. Hell, I’m not trying to
deny a problem when one exists, I just wasn’t sure this was actually a problem—until
they’d told me to remove my ballistics vest (prior to talking to Ken) and
suddenly I managed to get oxygen enough to stop gasping.
There’s
a woman who works in one of the offices attached to the training room; her name
is Kat and I’ve thought she was super cool from the first time I saw her, if
only because she has a commanding presence and sports a pixie haircut. As it
turns out, she’s just as cool as I imagined; I discovered this after she called
me into her office to talk to her.
“You’re
on Trazodone?” she asked, incredulously, upon hearing the name of my
medication.
“No!”
I responded emphatically, knowing all too well that Trazodone was not a medication I should be messing
with. After all, Randy had been prescribed that particular medication,
previously. Matt echoed the disbelief Kat expressed and I emphatically
corrected them, “No, it’s Ziprasidone,
a bipolar medication.” That was when Kat motioned me into her office.
“Come
on in!” she said, cheerfully. “Swing the door shut, let’s have cocktails.”
“Yay!”
I said joyfully, swinging the door closed as she’d requested and sitting in the
chair opposite her desk.
She
began by telling me that she, too, has bipolar. “Hey!” I said, cheerfully. “Hey,
crazy! How are ya?” she said, just as cheerfully. Grinning, I responded with, “I’m
great! How are you?”
What followed was
a conversation that was nothing short of wonderful and remarkable, to me. She
told me that I am a strong, powerful woman and that she picked me out from day one
as the strongest of the women in my training class and the most capable of
doing well in transit security. As I’d seen her as someone to look up to from
day one, it meant a lot to me to hear such things from her and I felt my chest
fill with happiness at her words.
Just
before she could say her last piece to me, Matt called the break over and I had
to return to my seat, to return to Kat prior to leaving in order to hear her
out. I did so.
“I
want you, every hour, today and for the rest of your life, to smile,” she
began. “If you’re in a place where it’s inappropriate, say it in your head, but
if you’re in a place where you can speak freely, like alone in your car… say, ‘I
am a strong and powerful woman.’ You’ll convince yourself.” I grinned, an
ear-to-ear, shit-eating grin as she said this. “It has to be a real smile,” she
added, “Not one of those fake—” and she demonstrated the forced smile of the
depressed.
I
was so glad I’d heard her out for that moment and she even gave me a hug. It
was a wonderful moment and every hour since being released, I have made a point
to smile and say, “I am a strong, powerful woman.”
No comments:
Post a Comment