My Lifetime of Writing

Chapter VIII: Visions of Two Types I woke up the next morning with a huge headache. I was barely conscious at all. I stumbled out of bed and half slept through breakfast, after which I stayed in a constant state of half-sleep. I could sense God telling me in the back of my mind that things would be okay. I knew inside me this would be over tomorrow, though I couldn’t say how. I also felt as though something wasn’t right about God, but I didn’t know what. I saw His face plastered to a car passing by at breakfast. I don’t know how I knew it was God’s face, especially because I knew I was hallucinating, but it clearly was. Something about it. The few times I’d hallucinated in the past, I had freaked out. Now, however, it was simply something that was happening. I was too dead inside, too wasted, to care about what was happening around me or in my head. I felt like a zombie. No emotions either. I realized at breakfast that I had taken my meds witho...

Chapter VII: Medication I can remember dreading and anticipating my parents’ arrival at once. I ached to see them, to have confirmation that this was not the only world that existed, as it seemed. The high I got off of helping Guy faded rapidly as group ended. I waited painfully, mostly because I was reminded of my parents and had the unquenchable hope that they might take me home, as well as anxiety that they might put me on medication. I was actually heading back to my room when I saw them. It seemed like ages since I’d left them; I’d never missed them more. As they walked toward me, Mom with a smile, there was a spring of hope in my heart. “How are you doing?” Mom asked me with one of those painful smiles mothers give their children when they’re in mental institutions or are in some other great distress. “Mom,” I said, “can you take me home?” We were walking back into the common room. “I’m sorry,” she said. Her lips were a smile; her eyes were pai...

Chapter VI: Ashley in Love We stood and walked out the door and down the hall, turning once at the end of the hall and again at the patient reception desk. We passed through three double doors, and on the way I noticed a door to a really big room that looked like a gym as I passed it by. After the third double door, we turned right into the dining hall. I realized then just how hungry I was, and I was glad to be at lunch. I promised myself then that I would not get kicked out of the lunchroom, and also that I would sort this thing with Ashley, Guy and me out before lunch was over. It would take some doing, but I could do it. I found a particularly good-looking series of sandwiches in the lunch line. Each had meat, sauerkraut, lettuce and something that just looked good. I got two of them, and sat down, my stomach grumbling. My first bite painfully reminded me of what George had told me that morning about the food. He was proven right, again. I was starving, but...

Chapter V: Mrs. Joy As I sat in the corner of the room, staring at the blank white walls, I wondered what I was going to do. I wanted to give up. Problem was, I had given up- last night- and now things were still going on. I couldn’t commit suicide; there was no practical way. I couldn’t take a break; these damn counselors saw to that with every five minutes I breathed. I couldn’t go to sleep; that would lead to being back in here, and I was so worked up now I knew there was no way I’d fall asleep. Two times in quiet time. On my first day. That sucked. Why was I getting in trouble just as many times as Guy? I hadn’t killed anybody. Did our backgrounds make a difference- or our personalities? I wondered because he was angry, volatile; I was depressed, though perhaps also volatile. I didn’t think John or Roy liked me. I could swear they held something against me- I just wasn’t sure what. What disturbed me was the fact that none of the other counselors had l...

Interlude to Brotherhood of Charles I  Well... even copying and pasting it is hard not to notice the likenesses between what I wrote then and what happened to me several years before.  My brain is too "manic" to read much right now-- funny, never was back when I wrote this, or at any point beforehand in my entire life... like many another bipolar victim, I exhibited no signs of being bipolar (by peers' understanding-- the Gov and those it gives things too for one reason or another *always* see its point of view more often than they should)... until I had been on psych meds for *years.*  Schizophrenia, I was told, was not the right diagnosis-- after years of having been told mental illness was a lifetime diagnosis, I was told "sometimes mental illness changes."  There is no end to their lies.  I pray you read a little truth in these words I can no longer read, that I wrote so long ago. 

Chapter IV: Morning Group The common room was large, with a TV in one corner, some shelves at the right end with board games and a telephone, and many nice blue or red chairs scattered across the room. On the far end from the doorway and the adjacent wall to our left, there were windows. I could see the outside, and wished I could go there. We pulled up some chairs and sat in a circle; I sat next to George. I was facing the TV, with the doorway back to the teenager ward to my left. Amy, Roy and someone I didn’t know were all there. “First of all, let’s go around and say our names, our hobbies, how old we are and what we’re here for, if you’re comfortable with that,” said Amy. “I’ll start, and we’ll move counterclockwise.” She cleared her throat. “My name is Amy,” she said, “and I like writing poetry, drawing, riding horses and going to church. And I’m not comfortable saying how old I am.” Ashley laughed first, and then the rest of us joined in. “And I’m...