Doctor's Consult, I Didn't Want to Cry

"You're all I have," I say, pleading, opening up my hands to him. "[Regular Stanford psychiatrist] has run out of ideas and was going to refer me to the Depression Clinic." 

He sat across from me, unmoved. Or if he was moved, he was smart enough to bury his emotions under years of practice and discipline. He could not survive being pulled into every patient's whirlwind of problems and troubles. He had to stand back and watch the misery continue unabated, if that's what happens when the pills failed.

And sometimes the system breaked us. We humans who were too frail of mind and emotion. We get caught up and damaged. Who is accountable for us? Who will say, yes I will take care of you until you are well and good. Who?