Trial by Fire: A Psychotic Mental Health Story — Part 1

Do you remember when you were 25? Have you reached that age yet? People say that your 20s is where you find yourself. They usually don’t mean “in the hospital”.

Everyone has a crutch. Something that gets you through the bad times. No matter how things look on paper, we’ve all got bad times. My crutch? It was nothing too rough, just an emulation of Snoop Dogg mixed with some Adderall to keep my spirits up.

I left my high-paying corporate job. Why did I do that? Well, because it couldn’t keep my spirits up. The dull drudgery of an endless life of office work, staring out the window and watching the world pass you by….

Nothing they teach you in school quite prepares you for it. Liberty becomes a mockery for the upstanding corporate citizen.

Break the golden handcuffs, leave, walk away — get a small apartment, read some books, be alone with your thoughts. You’ll think of something.

Isolation has its downsides though. Social routine upholds sanity more than people realize.

Isolation, drugs, books.

Isolation, drugs, books, sounds.

Isolation, drugs, books, sounds, words.

Isolation, drugs, books, sounds, words, being watched.

And so, madness descended upon me like the night descends upon the earth.

The first sure sign that I was losing my sanity was the concerned comments and looks coming from friends and family. It’s not the normal level of concerned. There’s more fear in it. More urgency.

People tried to help in all kinds of hopeless ways. For what it’s worth, I’m glad they tried.

My next stop was the hospital.

When you show up at the hospital, you’re evaluated and processed like any other product. Depending on what boxes are checked, you will be sorted into either “voluntary” or “involuntary”, and assigned a bed.

I checked some interesting boxes. The next day I was handcuffed and taken to a psychiatric facility under police escort.

At the psychiatric facility, they keep your phone and anything else you come with. You lose all contact with the outside world other than the people who visit you. I didn’t appreciate it at the time, but when I look back I realize that these people are heroes to me.

You’re assigned medication and told that if you do not take it voluntarily, you will take it involuntarily. I took the pills they gave me, and added some Ambien. I needed the sleep.

You do group therapy, healthy living workshops, and get to hang out with a brand new set of crazy friends. Nobody knows how long you’ll be here or, if they do, they’re not sharing. I made sure to participate fully, and to act as non-crazy as possible.

What would you feel in these circumstances?

I remember feeling mix of comfort and fear. Comfort because this prison seems safer than the world that I was so recently in. Fear because it’s still a prison, and no one is letting me leave or telling me how long I’ll be here for.

Maybe this is my life now?

You assimilate. Adjust. Endure. Hope?

The day you’ve been waiting for finally comes. You get most of your stuff back. You’re sent on a bus into town.

You have fewer rights than before, but at least you’re no longer in captivity.

Oh — also, you’re still insane. The healing starts in Part 2.

To be continued.

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