An Absence Explained... And I Will Not Be Ashamed About It

During the time from about 6:00pm on Friday, March 8th until 5:00pm on Friday, March 15th... I was nowhere to be found online. Since I'm not huge on Twitter and I don't post a lot here, you might not have noticed the absence. if you are a Facebook friend, well then you might have... since I tend to post a lot and I'm active in a few groups. But with how many people and pages that are on FB, I doubt many noticed I wasn't around. But I wasn't. The reason, I was in the hospital. The St. Vincent’s Behavioral Health Unit to be exact. In layman's terms, I was in the psych ward at the hospital.

Let me back up a bit. I've been seeing my psychiatrist since the beginning of 2011. The day I met him, he wanted to commit me to a hospital. My parents wouldn't let him and it never came up again until earlier this year. At a visit on Tuesday, March 5th with my mom, it was decided. I was going to the hospital. The doctor wanted me to go right then, but we told him we needed think about it and speak it over as a family. Plus, I had plans for that Wednesday I really wanted to try and keep. Thanks to the weather, the plans were cancelled, but the preparing for a hospital stay was in the works. We, as a family, decided Friday once my mom got home from work we were on our way.

Some self inflicted therapy. Photo taken on 3/17,
after I left the hospital.
The fact that they are Xs have a meaning,
but I'll explain that another time. And
this is the only photo you'll be seeing in this post.

When Friday rolled around, I was packed, I was terrified, and I was worried if this was the right thing to do to get on the road to getting better. While it was my parents sending me there on the advice of my doctor, I was also going voluntarily… for the most part. How the rest of the evening went was nothing short of nerve racking, scary, and generally confusing. Dad dropped us off at the door and before he even parked the car and joined us inside, I was in the system with an id bracelet and about to be stripped of everything I had with me. Nothing like a few well placed scratches to get someone's attention. I knew I was going in and I knew I needed to be admitted. I could not be turned away. So I did what I had to do. What I really wanted to do instead of go stay at a hospital. If anything, I'm not stupid. I am aware how the game is played. I needed help and would be damned if I was going to get turned away. If I got turned away... Those scratches would have become cuts and deeper and more deadly.

Within 20 minutes of stepping foot into the hospital I was stripped of all my clothes except my underwear. And they watch you undress... It's a member of the same sex and they try to pretend that aren't, but I've watched enough TV to what a one-way mirror looks like. They even took my hair tie. I wasn't even allowed a ponytail. And you all know how I like my ponytails! My parents took everything home with them, except the outfit I came in with and were basically told they could leave. And I wasn't even out of the ER. So there I was in a Johnny coat (they didn't have scrubs in my size), hospital socks that were 3 sizes to big, and my underwear. Laying in a bed in the hallway. And there I stayed for over 3 hours. With a babysitter, because I wasn't allowed to be left alone. Anytime I even needed to pee I had to have security guard escort me. I felt like a criminal. 

My parents were gone. And with them all I hold dear. See, I went in hopeful about technology. I had my fully charged iPad, iPhone, iPod, and Nintendo 3DS. Plus all the chargers and backup batteries one could need. And I had Dali. All of it... Gone. Not allowed. All taken away with my parents. Even my license was gone. I was just a barcode on a band. I felt inhuman. And the worst was yet to come. 

The reason for having to stay in the ER for 3 hours instead of moving to the psych division, was my heart rate and blood pressure were through the roof. It took a bag of saline and some extra blood pressure meds to get it to a level where I was safe to move. 3 hours... with some very scare numbers. But finally at 9:30pm, I was okay to move... to be escorted by security to what is pretty much the worst place you ever want to be. After having a metal detector waved over me, I was let into this area that had about 9 or 10 square rooms with huge glass doors and floor to ceiling windows. Each room contained a single wooden twin bed, a pillow, a thin blanket, and a set of very thin sheets. And the was it. And behind a locked wall of glass was all the nurses, techs, and equipement. It was the saddest and scariest place I have ever been. And the bathroom, while it did have a door and lock, it contained a single steel bowl... the kind you see on TV in every show that features a prison holding cell. It had no seat... it was just a bowl. And then there was a sink and a open shower in the same space. The middle area contained to couches and a small TV, mounted high on the wall and covered in a plastic case. I was officially a prisoner. I curled up into a ball on my bed and just sat there, crying... crying to the point I gave myself a bloody nose. I thought this was the end. My final resting place. Every second I was there, I wish I made the cuts deeper. I wish life was over.

Finally, a glimmer of hope appeared... the psych doc to do my evaluation. She was the one to determine if I went home or if I got sent upstairs. Thank goodness, there was an upstairs. If I had to spend my entire time in the psych ER, I would have left crazier than when I went in. It didn't take long for her to determine I was headed for the 9th floor, however it took forever for the transfer to happen. Thankfully, I was allowed a phone call and called my mom... though I'm not sure if she understood a word I said through all the hysterical crying. When all was said and done, I got upstairs around 2:30am. Then had to go through this whole long admitting process. By the time it was done, it was 4am. I was allowed to put my fleece pants, bra, and tank top back on... but still no ponytail. Was given my nightly pills and curled up in the bed. Between the migraine, the lack of dinner, and the complete exhaustion, I think I just cried myself to sleep...

The next day, the life of being a patient in a psych ward began. I kept a journal the entire I was at the hospital, and I have much, much more to say about the whole experience. The good, the bad, and the down right crazy. So I plan to write a lot more about the whole experience and the all the aftercare that is being required. But I think that is enough for now. I've been home for a week now, I'd like to say things are instantly better... but they aren't. In fact, some days are worse. I went in with 2 main goals:

• Cut back from 16 pills a day
• Get a proper psychiatric evaluation... find out what is really my diagnosis.  

Niether of those happened. In fact, I'm now on 19 pills a day and I'm nowhere near closer to a diagnosis. So was it all for a nothing... I'm going to say no. I learned a lot of things about myself. Stuff I'm happy to learn and some stuff I'm not so sure I wanted to know. I will share all that at another time.

I do want to make a special note about friends and extended family and their knowledge of the whole events... I texted or emailed the four people that I considered my closest friends letting them know where was I going and that I may or may not have access to the outside world. And I let my Enjoying the Magic staff know I was going to be away for a bit and that my mom and my editor in chief were going to be in charge if they needed something. That was all that was said. It wasn't even until Saturday night that my brother found out and that was because he called to talked to my mother and my dad said " she's at the hospital visiting your sister". By the end of my stay a close friend of the family, my uncle and his girlfriend were all that were told. When I was allowed on FB again I did mention I was in the hospital, but left it at that. I don't believe anyone on my dad's side of the family knows... at least until they read this. At first I was embarrassed about the whole thing. I felt weak and like a failure. And I know why my mom didn't shout it from the rooftops or mass email everyone we know, even family, it was due to a fear that I'll become known as the crazy girl, because in today's society   there is this nasty stigma that comes with the term "mental illness". She didn't want to see me judged or thought of as broken. She wasn't embarrassed about me, she was worried about me... and how it would be taken that I had to go into the hospital in order to save me from myself. 

But I've decided that is society's issue, not mine... and I will not be ashamed that I needed help... that unlike others I took the steps to get help, rather than make that final cut. So I'm not embarrassed I'm telling you all this, I refuse to be. And if just one person reads my story and it causes them to get help rather than end it all... then it will all be worth it.