"We Can't Kill Your Mother" and Other Stories of Intensive Care
by Lawrence Martin, M.D.
Table of Contents

NOTE: "We Can't Kill Your Mother" and Other Stories of Intensive Care can be downloaded in its entirety as an e-book from 1st Books Library ($4.95). The book can also be ordered in trade paperback format for $13.50. For purchasing the e-book or print versions, please go to 1st Books Library and enter part of the book's title or the author in their search engine. Below are the first few paragraphs of OVERDOSE.

Judy Bilowitz was only 20 when she came to MICU but this was not her first hospital admission. She was diagnosed as a "depressed personality" shortly after puberty. As a teenager she spent two long periods in Weathergill Pavilion, the state's top psychiatric hospital. Judy came from a prosperous family and could afford the best care.

With the aid of expensive tutoring Judy made it through a private girls' prep school, graduating at 19. Unlike most everyone else in her class she did not go to college or take time off for travel. Instead she stayed home with her parents and 15-year-old brother, an out-going and mentally healthy sophomore.

Judy's father owned a scrap metal company and her mother was on the board of several important charities. The parents' financial and social success only heightened the pain of Judy's illness; their older child simply held no promise. She had no interest in college and was too withdrawn to find and keep a job.

Judy also had little interest in boys, nor they in her. Though attractive physically she possessed a slim, well-proportioned body, fair complexion and features that made for a pretty face, with straight brown hair her inattention and blunted affect tended to repel the opposite sex. Boys unaware of her psychiatric illness usually considered her 'screwed up,' or 'weird.'

She was not a virgin. At 15 she became pregnant and had an abortion in her eighth week. She was in Weathergill at the time of conception and the offender was thought to be another patient. Tightened supervision during her second hospital stay, at age 17, prevented another sexual liaison. As far as her parents knew Judy used no birth control.

To the outside world Judy at 20 didn't seem to care much about anything. She was incapable of relating to others and had few identifiable interests. Despite every material advantage there was little to occupy her time. She stared at TV much of the day, sometimes read or pretended to read (all her books had pictures), and occasionally worked in the garden.

She had been under the care of three psychiatrists since puberty. Her current therapist was Dr. Erasmus Cohen, a medical school faculty member in his late 30's and, at the time of Judy's MICU admission, considered the ablest psychiatrist on Memorial's staff.

Dr. Cohen's assessment was that Judy suffered from 'schizo-affective disorder associated with depression,' a form of psychosis usually treated with medication. In Dr. Cohen's best clinical judgment she stood to benefit from Triavil, a combination of the antidepressant amitriptyline (also marketed alone as Elavil) and the antianxiety drug perphenazine.