In June of 2002 my father was diagnosed with brain cancer. The tumor in his frontal lobe nearly killed him. It also significantly changed his personality. After two rounds of chemo the tumor disappeared. My dad returned back to normal. Well almost back to normal. He was left with the strange persistent delusion that he was in Maine. We took him to the window of his hospital room and pointed out to some of the familiar landmarks on the horizon.
Drawing of my father in the hospital - 2002
“What’s that” I asked, pointing to St. Francis Hospital in the distance.
“It looks like St. Franics Hospital” he answered.
“Which is where?” I asked.
“In Pittsburgh” He looked back at me.
“Great so where are we?” I shot back triumphantly.
He paused for a moment and then said “In Maine, UPMC (University of Pittsburgh Medical) system built a replica of it so that it could pay it’s workers lower salaries.”
On this last point he had the full support of the hospital staff who thought that this accurately described something that UPMC would do to its workers.
Seven years later my dad has just been diagnosed with a different cancer. We are back on the 7th floor ofShadyside hospital, or 7 Main, as the unit is called. I always maintained that his hearing that he was on 7 Main caused my dad to think that he was in Maine. My father who has spent his life working with Schizophrenics who have fixed delusional systems disagrees. He claims that the delusion was related to a visit he made to Maine several months before the cancer. Either way he held on to the Maine delusion for about two weeks and reluctantly dropped a day after he was transported from the hospital to a rehab facility.
Today we are sitting in a hospital room on 7 main. My father and I are working on adapting his treatment for Schizophrenia to help people with Traumatic Brain Injury. We have spent much of the morning asking the question, “what should people with traumatic brain injury know about their brains?” Its strange to look out the window and see St. Francis Hospital in the distance and think about how far we have come only to end up a few doors down the hall.
The view from the window on 7 Main.
