Hospital Stay

My yoga mat was carefully placed in the middle of the doorway, halfway into the hall and half into my room at the hospital – floor 7, general adult. The first time I admitted myself into a psychiatric hospital it was with the encouragement of Isaac after I spent the night on his couch because I was too afraid to be alone with myself and much too afraid to go home. The second time, something inside of me made me go and I’m still not quite sure what exactly that something was.

I had broken up with my girlfriend of two years two months prior. Things had been rough for a while and neither of us had been particularly happy at that point so it should have been an easy break up but after two years of being together, living together, and being so intertwined with one another’s daily lives – I guess things rarely are. She had just moved out and I was finally alone for what felt like the first time in ages.

The truth is, I don’t mind being alone. I prefer it, actually. I can plan my story, unpack my feelings, peel off my clothes and be unapologetically myself without worrying about disturbing another soul. It’s the moment I had been praying for – looking to the sky begging for God, the Universe, whatever was out there to give me my space back to myself because I was ready to finally lean into rediscovering myself. Part of me thinks I should feel bad saying it but – I was EXCITED!

Have you ever been so excited for something you make yourself nervous, scared even? I work around a bit of a problem with impulse control as it is. That was easier to manage with someone around 24/7, always wanting to know what I was doing. It becomes a bit more difficult when that over-accountability vanishes overnight. I spiraled and – I spiraled fast.

I couldn’t figure out how to go back to focusing on myself. I had spent so much time focusing on my partner and trying to diffuse disagreements between her and my son that I had been constantly putting myself on the backburner and now I looked like that burner that you have piled 10 pots high because you need to use the stove but are too damn depressed to do the dishes. I was overflowing and I couldn’t handle what I felt as quickly as it was coming out. I would ricochet between excitement, fear, anger, and a deep numbing depression so quickly that I’m wondering if my chronic neck and back pain isn’t just a case of whiplash.

I was asked how I knew, two days before taking myself to the hospital, that I needed to go. “If you had that much time to prepare, was it really that necessary, that urgent?” Awareness. When a doctor predicts how much longer a heart broken college student’s mother has to live with her untreatable stage 4 colon cancer, just because he knows she’s a ticking time bomb doesn’t mean that he can diffuse her.

Sometimes it’s more frustrating to know yourself really well but not ever know what you’re supposed to do with yourself. The thing is though, I feel like I know my patterns a lot more than I actually know myself – I’m still getting to know her, rediscovering. I saw the pattern though, and I was nearing the end of the page. There wasn’t much time before I ran over, fell off the edge, use whatever metaphor you want but I was there.

The waiting room went much quicker this time than the first but that’s the only part that got easier. General adult. Last time I was on the Anxiety and Depression floor – I had been hoping for the same. As I spiral, I crave consistency, something to grab onto and pull myself back to the surface. It wasn’t consistent, though, it was chaos.

I woke to toilets overflowing the halls as patients screamed and fell asleep to heavy tables being flipped onto the ground and windows being punched. Maniacal laughter before flipping a med cart was followed by sirens and security storming the floor. Arguments with doctors, shouting about rape, all woven in with moments of sitting around the table having meals as a happy “family”. I would compare it to growing up in a house full of anger and testosterone and unhealed trauma mixed in with a lot of love and good intentions – but I’m always more worried about how my words might make someone feel than about calling things for how they are – except now.

Amongst the chaos of the hall and the common room, I found comfort in the eyes of my next costar. His gaze intense, challenging me not to look away. I had spotted him the moment I stepped foot onto the unit and my fixation was immediate. When they tell you that there’s such a thing as being in the right place at the right time, there’s also such a thing as putting yourself in that place at that time. He became the only reason I’d leave my room and enter the chaos – I couldn’t build tension without being around him.

He started coming to me to walk the halls and talk, to ask for my opinion on things, advice. Eye contact. “Mami”. Head gesture down the hall. We’d walk. The end of the hall was the only place it seemed anyone could talk without being over heard. They watched you less at the end of the hall.

I’d be back into a corner, a few inches of space between us and his arm up against the wall blocking my only way out – but I wasn’t trying to escape. “Let me see”, he’d repeat as he slowly turned his head to different angles and looked into my eyes. I wasn’t sure what he was looking for but I couldn’t help but giggle as he tried to find it. All at once he would nod, confirming that it was found before turning and walking straight back to his room – sometimes pausing halfway there to turn back for one more glance. Each time I knew if I followed and walked past, I’d catch a glimpse of him doing a headstand against his wall trying to calm any want.

The tension was great but I didn’t feel at home until I was laying on that perfectly placed yoga mat in the middle of my doorway – conveniently right next to his. He was the only reason I agree to do yoga instead of shutting myself in my room, after all. On our backs, head turned towards one another, he reached his hand out and gently brushes my cheek as he smiled. “It’s like a movie, isn’t it?” – there it was, confirming my suspicions that he saw things a little bit differently too. He’s one of those people that the world is a little more vivid to – so much, it makes you question just how real it is.

Another one of those wisdoms that I’ve caught wind of as I’m taking this journey to embracing my true self is that when you ask for your people, you may be surprised at where you find them. Each time, I’m more and more surprised at where I find them but they are always worth the wait.