The Internship That Took Me Back to My Childhood

 I was interested in psychology since childhood because I wanted to know the reason behind the acts of people who feel pleasure while the person standing in front of them is getting hurt. People who find innocent souls to take out their frustrations and anger on. I always wanted to understand what makes a person become like that.

Recently, I did my internship in the Clinical Psychology Department of Ranchi Institute of Neuro-Psychiatry & Allied Sciences (RINPAS), which was kind of interesting. But I wasn't prepared for the flashbacks of my own past.

For most people, including my family, it's kind of funny. But I never found those stories of mine funny in any way possible because I was the one who suffered and tolerated those feelings in my childhood. Because of everyone—my family, relatives, neighbours, almost every surrounding. Looking back now, I feel the actual problem was the environment and the people, not me. Still, people had the audacity to point out my faults and my supposed lack of abilities.

I used to hesitate to talk about it, and I still do, but not like before. I'm just fed up with people and humans. I don't know... I just feel that even though we are human beings with the ability to understand things theoretically, it doesn't always work practically. It's similar to our education system—the way we are taught and the way we actually apply it in real life.

Exactly two weeks during my internship, on a Sunday, I remembered my childhood which was getting processed for two weeks before Sunday, I guess. During my internship, I observed patients and how the MSE was taken and also conducted them, so it's obvious that I would remember something if it happened to me, and it did. I remembered that a psychologist was taking my Mental Status Examination (MSE). I hadn't answered anything, and the rest of the information was taken from my father.

I've visited that institute many times. Even last year, I was admitted for the surgery and stayed in the ward behind the Pediatrics Ward for a few weeks. Whenever I visit with my parents, they always ask me if I remember anything from those days. Unfortunately, I don't remember much because I was very little. But every time I think about it, my heart feels heavy. I couldn't forget those miserable feelings, even if I forgot most of the memories.

I was getting DU, but my family didn't allow me to study Psychology because they believed it had no scope. Ironically, my very first internship was in the Clinical Psychology Department, even though Psychology isn't even my major.

Life has a strange way of bringing you back to the things you were once forced to leave behind.

Sometimes I feel my life is just as messy as my childhood. But maybe that's also the reason why I keep searching for answers—not only about people, but about myself too :-)