Louhans (France) (AFP)
"Me, hospitalized? But no, it's the others who are hospitalized!": In a clinic dedicated to the burn-out of health personnel, we try to convince caregivers exhausted by the Covid that they too have the right to be sick.
All Virginie * remembers is that her 19-year-old daughter called the fire department after finding her "completely paralyzed" at home.
"I don't know what happened. It seems that I did things that were dangerous for myself and for others," the 48-year-old nurse told AFP.
Led to psychiatric emergencies, he is told: "you must be hospitalized".
"I replied: Me? But no. It's the others who are hospitalized!"
It was only after the threat of forced hospitalization that Virginie finally agreed to join the Le Gouz clinic in Louhans (Saône-et-Loire), which claims to be the only one in France exclusively dedicated to the burn-out of caregivers.
Virginie put an end to long months of denial which almost cost her her life.
Employed in a psychiatric nursing home, she contracted Covid-19 in early October.
At the end of seven days, his boss calls him: "You have to go to work", she tells him.
"But I was in pieces," recalls Virginie.
For months already, burnout had set in "insidiously", as she now realizes.
"There were always new demands. We were even asked more if we wanted to come back to work when we were off. It was: We have to."
The Covid-19 will be the straw that broke the camel's back.
"We left work in the evening wondering which Covid patient was going to leave first. The resident died, we packed him up and it was over. It was violent", cowardly Virginie, remembering having seen "nine dead in two days".
Exhausted, frustrated at not being able to do "properly" a job she "loves", she leads a "life that was unlike anything".
"I didn't wash anymore. I didn't go out anymore. I didn't do housework anymore ...".
- The poorest caregivers -
But we must hold on.
In the morning, Virginie swallows tramadol (an opioid).
In the evening, vodka or whiskey ...
To her attending physician who asks her how she is, she "lies".
"I did not dare to talk about it. We are ashamed. A sick leave made me feel very guilty: I was overloading my colleagues with work and I could no longer help the patients".
When, finally, the door to her room at the Le Gouz clinic closes on her, she will still have trouble getting to the other side of the disease: "It's very hard for the ego. The caregiver must be infallible".
"Being sick is a failure when you are a caregiver," confirms Julie *, 35, in Le Gouz for suicidal tendencies.
The young psychiatric dietician also "resisted" a lot.
"I didn't want to admit, for me and my patients."
"Accepting that one can be an alcoholic, that one can want to die, that is not part of the pedigree of the caregiver", confirms Agnès Oelsner, psychiatrist of the establishment.
"The caregivers push to the limits, like this general practitioner who does not know how to say no to a patient when it is 9 pm or this nurse who remains, after his hours, to help his replacement", lists the doctor.
The Covid is thus "only the icing on the cake of suffering at work", she warns.
"50% of general practitioners have or have had a burnout, against 7% of the population. For nursing assistants, it is a third. Before the Covid!", Underlines Dr. Oelsner.
However, the proportion of "caregivers who do not seek treatment is largely the majority".
"The caregivers are the least well looked after. It's like the shoemakers", summarizes Virginie.
Thus, even if Virginie is now delighted to be "better", it is for her peers that she is afraid: "I have colleagues in the same situation and even more serious, and who continue with alcohol. or the drugs. I've seen them come drunk at work. But they'll do like me: deny it. "
lv / ag / cbn
* First names have been changed to respect anonymity
© 2021 AFP