Letter

He knows me pretty well and he knows about my struggles because while I'm between psychiatrists, I had to talk to him about one of my medications so he had to discuss my symptoms with me. He didn't get uncomfortable about it. He just gave the advice about the medicine.

He's not the reason that I'm trying to get a job there.

I overall just like him as a person. It's not really about anything more than that. I'm still struggling with my feelings for ex-psychiatrist. I cry about ex-pdoc a lot especially before I go to sleep at night.

What if I want to give it to him? There's nothing in there that is bad.

There's nothing wrong or bad about your feelings as they are.

But someone giving a message to another that states "sometimes I want to give up" has a way of putting pressure on that person to do something. It's intrusive. I would be freaked out if I got that letter.

I think, sometimes, the line between a professional relationship and a personal one gets blurred with you, as it does with a lot of people. Try to remember that he is doing his job, nothing more. It's just like going to a department store or restaurant. The clerk or server makes small talk, asks questions, etc, mostly to get an idea of how they can be helpful. But that's it.

When it comes to medical professions, in particular, there are ethical responsibilities that the doc, T, or pharmacist have to follow. They could lose their license otherwise. Developing any kind of relationship outside of his JOB would be unethical and he could lose his job.

I would urge you to work with your T on how to handle the feelings you have/get, and the urges that cause you to try to cross the line between professional and personal. This is not the first time you've had these urges, and it probably won't be the last. Maybe, until you are able to handle the urges on your own, making post like this one (this is what I want to do, good idea? type posts) can help you with reality checking and pausing before acting on the urges.

But a pharmacist doesn't have the same boundaries and prohibitions as it would with a therapist or psychiatrist for example. They just fill the meds for the person which doesn't have the same dynamic as seeing a therapist or a doctor.

But there are still licensed just like a doctor or T. And they have to follow the same ethics.

Basically, he is in a position of authority just like a doctor or T would be. So he has the same responsibilities they do. Either way, the point is tfhe letter is inappropriate ethically and also professionally. He is doing his job. It would be like walking up to a police officer who just wrote you a ticket or helped you after a robbery, and asking them out on a date. It's not appropriate.

I'm an idiot.

I don't think you're an idiot. I think you just want to be accepted and loved, like everybody else wants. For some people, it's more important to feel those things come from someone in an authority position, maybe because of a lack of it growing up. For whatever reason, your need for acceptance and caring with a slightly lower level of impulse control than most makes it where you might want to check in with someone before acting on urges like this one. That doesn't make you an idiot, it makes you normal. It's just,a quirk of yours, and I promise you, there are other people that do it too, maybe just not on PC, or not ready to speak up.

Well, yeah, it is his job to talk to you about the medications. Don't you see that what was in your letter goes beyond that? Telling him you don't know how to go on whether inperson or in a letter could be frightening to someone you don't know that well.

I did a quick google search and the ethics issues seem fuzzy on this, but I'm wondering whether a pharmacist would be obligated to do anything if a client seemed to be hinting at suicidal intentions. Some of the things in the letter could be interpreted that way.

I don't think giving the guy this letter is a good idea, I'm not sure what reaction you're hoping for but I'm afraid you might be disappointed. I think talking to the therapist about this is a good idea.

That's not what I meant about giving up.

If I changed pharmacies, then he wouldn't be my pharmacist anymore.

But, he's an excellent pharmacist so I want to stay there. I like their entire pharmacy staff.

How would you define excellence in pharmacists?

My interactions with pharmacists have all been of the kind where they tell me whether or not they can fill my prescription and if they can't, where else can I go and if they can, what time can I come back to pick it up.

I don't quite know how a pharmacist would have the opportunity to display any sort of excellence beyond doing something along the lines of the above?

I am not dissing your crush on him -- I do have a great deal of sympathy for the phenomenon of having unrequited, intense crushes on people for who I exist merely as a speck on the periphery of their consciousness.

But, at those times, it's helped for me to have someone pull my head out of that fog of lovely, hazy oxycontin-y good feelings and let me know exactly how far from reality, my detailed (and paradoxically, entirely destructive to any hope of a real relationship with anyone at all) fantasies were.

The responses you've been getting on this thread hopefully serve that same function for you.

It sucks to give up on those gooey good feelings, I know -- especially when little else in life seems worth holding on to -- but sooner or later like a sugar rush, it tends to come crashing down. Far better then to slowly inch one's way down oneself.

What if I want him to know that I have a crush on him?

What if you get the opposite response you are hoping for?

I am not sure that telling him you have a crush on him is a good idea if you want to work there at some point.

But, if you want to tell him that, I would do so directly rather than giving him a letter like you described.

If it were me, I would let him know that I had a crush by smiling and flirting when I see him and see what happens. I would take it slow-especially if you want to work there.

Perhaps you might decide which is more important-letting him know you have the crush or successfully applying for a job there. The two might be mutually exclusive.

I don't expect him to reciprocate. I just want him to know what I think.

I'd have to think about which would be more important to me. Thanks for the great post.

I emailed my letter to my therapist and he gave me his input on it. So I'm not going to do anything with the letter. I can't wait to see my therapist on Tuesday.

Thanks for the advice. I appreciate all of you. It really helped me to be able to come on here and talk about it instead of going ahead with that.

You are all 100% correct.

Just to back up what others have said, I am an occupational therapist. OUr rules prohibit much relationship after discharge for 2 years. But companies can add more and this is where I think this may show how restricted healthcare providers can be: when facebook really started catching on I was working for a huge healthcare provider with a national presence. One of the first online education things they made us do was on ethics both healthcare in general and for that company. And with them establishing a facebook friendship with a patient was a HUGE rule violation. I think it was a fire-able offense if I remember right.

Sometimes the rules are extremely strict even when it doesn't seem to matter much from the outside.

Thanks for sharing that.

I feel sad about the situation because if I hadn't gotten my prescriptions from there, then things may have been different. I really care about him a lot and have feelings for him and wish that I could go out to coffee with him. I truly wish that I had never gotten my prescriptions filled there.

He is a great and compassionate heart and I admire him for his dedication to his patients.

I still wish he knew.

I wish I could give him that letter and take a break from there.