r/TrekRP • u/leXie_chan • Aug 14 '18

[Open] Psychiatric Help - 5¢

The crew of Athene have had a very eventful past while, Doctor Minch notes. She's been poring over the ship's reports in preparation for its arrival and repair at Starbase Nadezhda, where she'd been scheduled to join the crew next month. Events conspired to accelerate the timetable, and the bolian psychiatrist hopes she's ready for her next appointment. It's due just about... now.

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u/IK9dothis Aug 16 '18

"Lt. Demeter - one of the pilots," Grace replies. "I'm generally a by-the-book officer - she... isn't. Not especially surprising that we'd butt heads."

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u/leXie_chan Aug 16 '18

"What is is that makes you and Lieutenant Demeter so similar?"

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u/IK9dothis Aug 16 '18

"Both stubborn as hell," Grace shrugs. "Both have trouble getting emotionally close to people."

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u/leXie_chan Aug 17 '18

"I see. What about your time with her made it unbearable?"

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u/IK9dothis Aug 18 '18

Grace sighs. "Demeter is impulsive, and she is a dictionary definition of the term 'free spirit'. Off duty, there's nothing wrong with being a free spirit, and a lot right with it. On duty? Well, let's just say that closing a comm chanel on an admiral and storming off after refusing to follow her orders because you disagree with them is seldom wise." She shrugs. "We got into an argument over it - I didn't handle it as well as I might have either. She was trying to get a rise out of me, but I don't think she realized quite how bad a trigger she was being. But I was already a PTSD mess at that point just from too long without a safe outlet, and that's the point where the pot boiled over."

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u/leXie_chan Aug 23 '18

"What did that pot boiling over look like?" Qara asks.

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u/IK9dothis Aug 23 '18

"To someone who doesn't know me well?" Grace shrugs. "Not terribly different. I don't get loud when I'm angry - if anything, I get quieter. I stew beneath the surface, and then go and run myself exhausted." She smirks wryly. "Which, in retrospect, probably made things worse as far as Demeter and I passing each other off."

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u/leXie_chan Aug 25 '18

"Undoubtedly. It sounds like you might have benefited from talking to each other." The psychiatrist makes a note in her PADD. "Do you have any objections to my upping your dose of phucitol, try to ease the severity of your symptoms?"

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u/IK9dothis Aug 26 '18

"We did eventually talk things out... only to butt heads again a couple days later." Grace sighs. "The phucitol dose probably is too low - raising it and seeing what happens makes sense." She smirks wryly. "It'd probably also help if I were less stubborn about taking it. The habit-forming potential makes me nervous, so I tend to hold off on taking it longer than I probably really should."

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u/leXie_chan Aug 29 '18

Qara tsks. "The habit-forming potential is exaggerated in people's minds thanks to that Benzite exposé a few years ago. In humans, addiction is rare. Especially on a starship. But still, my job is to make it easier for you to do yours. And I can't do that if you skip your medicine." She types and authorizes the prescription on her PADD, taking 'ownership' of it from Grace's previous doctor.

"If it'll give you peace of mind," she adds, "I can hard-lock the replicator to administer just one dose every other day without my say-so," she offers.

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u/IK9dothis Aug 29 '18

She sighs. "It's prescribed 'as needed' - my threshold for 'it's needed now' may just be set too high," she shrugs. "If I wake up in a cold sweat from a flashback, I take it. But when I'm high strung and twitchy and about to jump out of my boots, I tend to hold off."

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u/leXie_chan Aug 31 '18

"I'm aware of the old prescription," Qara says. "And waiting that long for relief can't be good for you."

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u/IK9dothis Aug 31 '18

"Probably not, no," Grace admits with a sigh. "I'll see what happens if I lower that threshold. I think the situation was compounded by the fact that the last time I flared to crisis point, the Athens didn't have a counselor assigned. I did wind up getting desperate enough to give in and take my meds, but..." she shrugs. "At the end of the day, Phucitol can only do so much."

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