I have what many people consider an unusual job. To some, it seems ideal and to others it is too terrible to even imagine. I have no office outside the home and no co-workers that I see daily. The way this job is supposed to work, Catherine assigns me "cases" at the beginning of the month and then we schedule them together. We have to work the schedule around so that I am available to be in court for either a probable cause hearing or a trial basically on a moments notice. On a day when I'm scheduled to do an evaluation, I get up (usually very early) and am on the road to some prison anywhere from 200 miles away to 800 miles away. The longer trips require me to drive to a hotel near the prison the night before. On the day of the evaluation, I'm at some prison by about 8:30. I then review all the "master" records on that inmate and all the medical records on that inmate. Then, I interview the inmate in a highly structured interview session. If the inmate decides to interview with me, this interview process usually takes about 4 hours.

Inmates are not required to participate in the interview and every now and again one refuses. Once the interview is completed, I return home and complete the actuarials and the PCL-R, integrate the interview with the file materials which had been provided to me prior to the interview and write a "staffing". I then contact one or more of the psychologists with whom I work and we "staff" the case. Once the case is staffed, we decide whether or not we will refer to case to the Attorney General and State's Attorney for civil commitment.

If we decide to refer the case, there's a bunch of paperwork that I need to fax to Catherine (the administrative assistant and my rudder). She informs the Attorney General and the State's Attorney that we have decided to refer a case and a report will be coming. I get busy writing a very long and rather complex report. Once the Attorney General and States Attorney receives that report, they then must decide whether or not they want to go forward and file on the case. If they file, we will need to do a probable cause hearing within 72 hours of the time they filed. At the time of any probable cause hearing, I'll be required to testify. Within a a few months, the cases are supposed to go to trial. At that time, there will also be another expert for the state that testifies, an expert for the defense that testifies and me.

It's difficult work requiring very significant expertise in the field. There are strict standards and criteria that must be met on these cases. There are strict timelines and deadlines. It is sometimes adversarial and it is very stressful for all concerned. It can be very lonely work. Remember, there is no office and no colleague I see every day. There's no going out for a coffee break with a colleague and there is no stopping for happy hour after work.

As it turns out this week, I was driving to an evaluation Thursday. Catherine called and there was an emergency. I'll be driving to another evaluation on New Years Eve, coming home to do all the work-up and doing the staffing on New Years Day because the deadline for going to court is the first week of January. That means I'll spend New Years Eve and New Years doing the evaluation and the first day or two of the New Year writing a very long complicated report and getting ready for court testimony. In the two years I've had this job one of the things I've learned is that all the emergencies happen on Thursday or Friday so that I'm invariably hunched over my keyboard on weekends and important holidays. Never fails.

But, I love this job. It's honorable, hard work that utilizes my skills and demands that I continue to gain new skills routinely. The research expands exponentially. There is always reading and studying that needs to be done. Sometimes, it's lonely work and I miss a coffee break with colleages. At the same time, one of the things I love most about the job is the autonomy and the independence.

I hated being tied to a 7:30 to 4:00 job where I saw the same people every day and was expected to do the same mind deadening tasks every day---day after day after day. Now, every day is new and every day presents new challenges-----sometimes those challenges are none to pleasant, but they are new challenges. Catherine (pictured above) is the rudder in my life. She keeps the boat floating in the correct direction and I value her greatly.