We're crazy

If van dwelling is a sign of craziness, then count me nuts.

I'm currently working for an emergency psychiatric service and in handover a few weeks ago it came out that one of our patients was living in a van. She actually owned a number of houses, but chose to live in the campervan instead of a house. Psych is an area of health that I am intensely interested in, mainly because it is so often discriminated against. Patients and staff of mental health services are looked down upon by staff of physical health services. There has been a concerted effort to reduce this discrimination, and it has changed but there is still such a long way to go. I could rant (Pod boy style) for hours about the discrimination that exists, the subversive ways that it is revealed and the fact that all too often medical staff don't consider the mental impact of live on their patients. I could also wax lyrical (wow, so many cliches today!) about the autonomy, freedom, impact, affirmation, guidance, hollisticism and encouragement that psych services offer.

However, today I am considering the pervasive judgements that ordinary people make about each other ALL. THE. TIME.

In an area where so much discrimination exists against my patients and my co workers I tend to expect that judgement and discrimination will be something that happens infrequently amongst the people I work with. As nurses we are taught to analyse our own values, norms and judgements all the time so that we're critically considering why and how we are thinking about other people and our environments. I have found myself becoming far less judgemental of people in the three years it's taken me to complete my BN (which I have now officially finished...I got my last assignment mark back last week!!!).

When it was said that this particular woman lived in a van there were a number of comments along the lines of "oh, well...that explains it" and "hmmmm" and *wide eyed shock* "people do that!?". There was a definite air that anyone who lived in a van must be psychiatrically unwell. I sat listening to them all discussing this woman, and her lifestyle and I said nothing...I wish I had said that I too intended to live in a van full time in a few months. But I just couldn't.

While I no longer pass my immediate (generalised) judgements onto people: I'm not saying I don't judge, just that I am aware of when I do and try not to let my judgements affect how I am thinking about a person, I am aware that most people do so I feel unable to blatantly tell people about the pod. I've read a number of blogs from vandwellers who have said that they don't tell anyone about their lifestyle unless they trust them. A lot of them also said that no one needed to know how they were living as it doesn't change anything. I want to be able to talk about the pod and not care.

I don't feel like much negatively changes for me when I'm in the pod. The only negative difference I do notice is that I don't know where we'll be sleeping which sometimes unsettles me, and I don't know where I'll be bathrooming during the night. In terms of my interactions with people during the day nothing is changed by my living in the pod. I still get dressed, I still apply makeup when necessary (I'm a pro at not poking myself in the eye whilst driving) and unless people knew I was vandwelling they would be totally unaware.

The discrimination and judgement against vandwelling will hopefully change over the next few years, I'm probably totally naive thinking this but it could happen! If it doesn't change I hope I get ok with pod living enough to tell people about it.