Girl, Interrupted

The head day nurse, Valerie, is described as a fair, lean 30-year-old who generally connected well with the patients. Kaysen notes that she was strict and consistent, and unlike some of the nurses, was not afraid of the patients, which earns her their respect. The patients were required to see a ward doctor, resident doctor and therapist in separate appointments once per day. Kaysen characterizes her therapy as unhelpful since the professionals used medical jargon to make everyday patient activities sound suspicious and did not try to relate to their patients. Kaysen shares that resident doctors generally served the ward for six months and left either exhausted or embittered from their experience, since the patients often manipulated them. The therapists, and sometimes the residents, prescribed a medley of medications to patients, such as Thorazine, Stelazine, and Valium. Kaysen feels that it was the staff, not the patients, who became more reliant on the patients taking these pills, as it made patient behavior more manageable.

Kaysen and the other patients dreaded the mid-afternoon, when power shifted from Valerie to another nurse named Mrs. McWeeney, who Kaysen considers “an undisguised prison matron” (83).