That’s the “measurement, calculation, or location used as a basis for comparison” that I don’t really recall much learning about in school but I’m finding out is at the underpinning of all we can do in occupational therapy, or at least in this acute setting.  It’s a bit heart-wrenching, but then again, we can’t keep you forever and give false hope either.  Basically, if someone comes in only at a level of functioning of living at home with supervision, we’re not going to expect or sometimes even believe that person will leave being able to do more than that.  Our efforts are to try as much as possible to get the person to how they came in, right before the incident that brought them into the hospital occurred. 

So in essence, there’s this one guy who used to be very smart.  Reading his history, part of it reminded me of Andrew Eng, and that’s all I can say I think without compromising his confidential information.  He used to be so smart, but in the past years he has decompensated immensely.  His demeanor and motivation level reminds me of myself, hit very close to home for me.  His “baseline” now is thus not when he was working a few years earlier but as he is now, having to live at home with his parents (like me!).  So in the privacy of the small interview room, yesterday I shared that as a matter of fact I was diagnosed recently with MDD and social phobia.  That I knew it was hard (although I don’t and won’t ever know or understand his personal ramifications), and I was here to help if he would just give me something, anything.  “That’s the thing!  I don’t have any plans when I get home.”  I hear ya, brother, I hear ya.  His dad (an atheist) believes that when you die, you die, the end.  His mother is Catholic.  I wanted to ask if he personally knew Jesus, but then I chickened out.  I wasn’t sure what my boundaries were and where I personally stood.  I feel I am only a smidgen less lost than he is right now.  I reverted to the safer route, asking him about community resources.  A step towards getting better.   Made a list.  Maybe seeing what his church offered….