I hope whoever is out there reading what I write understands when I say that I’m here to do just that…write. Here and there I may make some spelling & grammar errors or bounce from one ‘time period’ in my life to another. I try to keep some rhyme & reason going on but I’m not here to confine the creative outlet I have with restrictions of what I want to write about or how I want to do it. I don’t want to have to worry about ‘saying’ the right thing or writing to impress…
I have one goal & one goal only & that’s to touch at least one person with my story; showing that mental illness doesn’t have to be the end of the light in your life…and not impress them with what noun I used to describe it’s partner. I found myself getting lost in the ‘technical’ side of writing & forgot WHY I started it in the first place. Don’t get me wrong, I admire beautiful writing & I myself look to better mine in time…as well as on this blog…but I need to just let it come out some days like when I journal…less think, more write. So if you read about 2006 & the next day 2008 please bare with me. It’s how I need to heal and obviously it’s what I needed to write about that day.
My new room of sunshine outside my own room!
Looking back Part 7
So on that note, I want to bring you back to 2008 when I re-entered the hospital in my home city…after the nurse brought me to the ER and I was put into that all too familiar room. Mike, my husband, was notified that I was suicidal & admitted. He was on his way to bring my bags. What could he have thought? We have spoken about those times now & it was very difficult for him. When he showed up…this was all a blur to me…he had my bags with him. He said I was curled up in a ball on the bed…the beds in those rooms are like the ones in your doctor’s office that has that white paper that rips really easy when you sit on it. I remember they had brought me dinner on a tray & that was still sitting there, untouched when Mike came. He said I was stone cold, I didn’t talk & just stared at the ground as lied I there. He couldn’t take it any longer so he left. I remember clearly at the time that I had my bright yellow purse. I loved that purse, and I still have it. It was sitting on the counter…it was the only bit of sunshine left in that room.
In times like these, I turn into someone totally different. My Bipolar was like wild fire burning through my mind…prior to the proper medication and my ECT’s. I was coming up on my 11th treatment. I was so out of tune with myself & all around me. But I had faith that this was going to work for me. I usually start to smoke cigarettes when an extreme episode occurs…to this day Mike & I try to use it as a signal when we need to take caution. When I was in that room I wanted a cigarette. I don’t know what came over me but I just got up, looked out through the plastic formed bubble to see if anyone was there, nobody was so I took off through the double doors and out of the ER. I could get back in because I was wearing a bracelet. For all they knew I went out for a smoke. I walked a few blocks to the store, bought a pack and headed back to the hospital. Goal achieved! I smoked for awhile & then back into my bubble room. A risk I took, yes…but that didn’t play out in my head then. When I think back to that time, I did things that were soooo out of my character…especially when I was threatened with Haldol.
“Some people are important because they make themselves so.
Some people are important because other people make them so.
Other people are important because God makes them so.
They are the people who never brag or boast or know so.”
~ REV. DR. FERNETTE NICHOLS ~
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