So, first of all, I am not sick or injured. But on Friday I went to the hospital to see if I could get my prescriptions in Japan rather than having Mom smuggle them in for me. It turned out to be a weird experience.
One thing I've noticed is that Kochi has a lot of small hospitals rather than a few very large ones. I feel like I see hospitals everywhere I go. I didn't know a thing about any of them, so I relied on my supervisor to find one for me. She got a referral to a doctor at a hospital near my neighborhood. Since I don't have my insurance card yet, she had to first take me to some sort of office to get a letter stating that I do indeed have insurance. After that we headed to the hospital.
After parking the car, we walked through what felt like a labyrinth of exterior corridors until we found an entrance to the hospital. From there we wound our way through several hallways to get to the front desk area. Along the way, I saw a few patients shuffling along like zombies. There was one person sort of crouched down in the hallway near the entrance to what I think was a physical therapy room. The people we passed seemed very strange; I think that perhaps this hospital dealt with mental disorders as well as physical ailments. The building was clean and well lit, but it felt creepy.
When we got to the front desk, my supervisor started working on checking me in. I was standing around watching what she was doing when I heard someone call out to me in English. It was a man who looked to be in his 30's. He came over and started talking to me, which I thought was extremely strange and rather inappropriate given that we were two strangers in a medical setting. He didn't know much English, so he more or less said hello, introduced himself, and asked my name. There was something odd about him, but I don't know exactly what it was. After he left and my supervisor and I had taken a seat in the waiting room, I told her that I thought the man's behavior was strange. She agreed and told me that I had responded well by being polite and calm. Honestly, he creeped me the fuck out. I cannot begin to describe how uneasy he made me feel.
By that point, I was feeling rather uncomfortable. The hospital felt strange and I was worried about getting my medications. It has been challenging to send them through the mail; at that point in time, the first package Mom tried to send me was long overdue. It seemed that Customs wasn't letting it through. I needed to get ahold of more of my prescriptions, and I thought that maybe I would have to get them from a Japanese doctor. I didn't really like sharing my medical history with my supervisor, but she was the person in the best position to help me. All in all, it was a somewhat stressful situation.
After waiting a little while, my supervisor and I were called into the examination room. The doctor spoke some English, which helped, though my supervisor still needed to translate a lot for us. I showed him my prescriptions and he seemed very startled when he saw one of them. He remarked that it was very important, and I agreed. I explained what I was using each medicine for, and his expression changed. He laughed and told me that one of them was normally used to treat schizophrenia. I guess that's why he thought it was important. So I assured him that I did not have schizophrenia, and described how I was using the medication. He seemed very confused by one of the medications and had to look it up online. It turns out that the main antidepressant I take is not manufactured or prescribed in Japan. I wasn't going to be able to get it.
At this point I was starting to get freaked out. Trying to change antidepressants or stop taking them in the middle of a stressful situation is not a good idea. The doctor did not seem to have any solutions for me; because I don't have any symptoms at the current time, he seemed to think that it was not an immediate concern. I explained a few times that the purpose of taking the medicine was to prevent depression, and that I had been taking it for a long time, but he didn't offer any alternatives. I was getting more and more worried, and I started crying. Augh! I tend to cry pretty easily, but it was especially embarrassing in front of my supervisor. What's more, HER supervisor had also arrived. He was the one who referred my supervisor to this particular doctor, and I guess he wanted to make sure things were going well. I don't entirely know why he was there. In any case, I was crying in front of two of the most important people in my office, and Japanese culture does not look favorably on emotional outbursts. Fortunately, no one seemed particularly uncomfortable; they just kept reassuring me that things would be okay.
In the end, the doctor wasn't able to do anything for me. The consensus was that Mom would have to keep sending me my prescriptions, but without declaring them. I told my supervisor that we had been trying to avoid sending my prescriptions illicitly, but her response was something along the lines of, "You shouldn't worry about that. It's not like you're sending cocaine." The people working for the JET Program are obligated to tell us to do things the official way, but apparently the people at the Board of Education can tell me how I should actually do things. Which is good to know.
Overall, it was a strange, uncomfortable and not very productive experience. The doctor I spoke with was very kind and friendly, but couldn't help me, though he seemed to want to. I'm hoping I won't have to go back to the hospital again; it's a creepy place.
To my relief, today I received two packages with my medication in them. One of them is the one that should have arrived weeks ago. I guess Customs let it through after all. It won't be necessary for me to get my medication through Japanese channels, which is fortunate, since I can't.
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