Introduction
Content Warning: depression, self-harm, suicidal ideation, alcohol abuse, and references to child physical abuse.
Welcome!
May is Mental Health Awareness Month, so apropos of that, today’s post will be about my mental health journey.
Suffering in Silence
I was six years old when I had my first hallucination. I was in the hospital for an unrelated allergic reaction to Penicillin and Dilantin and the doctors switched me to another antiseizure that caused me to think a giant spider had captured me in its web and was trying to kill me.
In my frenzy to get away, I shredded my bedding.
Afterward, they prescribed me carbamazepine, which I’ve been on for 30-plus years. However, from then on, I saw things that weren’t there, off to my left. These hallucinations would come and go, playing like channels flipping on a TV. I told no one about them because I had enough issues going, such as being bullied at school and my parents constantly beating me every time I acted out, without being crazy.
Kid me wasn’t the brightest and all this added to the displaced anger I had over the life-changing side effects of the allergic reaction I mentioned above (namely, being rendered effectively mute and having a breathing tube that made me the target of kids’ teasing).
So, I bottled everything up inside until it got too much for me.
I was 9 years old the first time I thought of killing myself. I was in the hospital, as I always was in those days, and had to have my blood drawn again. Taking the crude metal blank they used to stab your fingers in those days, I planned to silt my wrists.
However, the tech took it from me when she realized I had it and that was the end of that.
As I progressed to middle school, the bullying intensified, and I thought of killing myself often. Then the summer I turned 13, I had my first major depressive episode and lost interest in everything. My parents thought this was hilarious and laughed about it, so I stopped telling them anything about my problems.
It was also around this time I was struggling with my sexuality, which compounded things. I internalized everything and only allowed myself to express anger, often breaking things or getting into fights with my siblings, all of which earned me a beating from my parents’ thick brown leather belt.
It Gets Better . . .Kind of
At 19, I went off to college, started dating and hooking up with guys and the occasional girl, experimented with weed and alcohol, but my anger issues and other problems were still there. At one point, my depression got so bad I rarely left my dorm and failed most of my classes. Then at 20, I moved on my own and started using sex and alcohol to self-medicate myself and started cutting myself. I made a half-assed attempt to get help from one of my university’s therapists, but I wasn’t ready. So, I spent the first half of my twenties getting white girl wasted every weekend and hooking up to feel like I was normal and loved.
Psych Ward, Ho
Then the year I turned 26, I had a psychotic break.
It began with a personality change; I went from shy and quiet to a literal frat boy. And the hallucinations I once ignored, became all-encompassing. I believed I was the Antichrist and that all the conspiracy theories about the Illuminati, the 13 bloodlines and 500 families who ruled the world, were true and I was one of these higher dimensional demons.
I wound up in one facility for a week before being released and then wound up in another for several months after the police found me in only my underwear walking along Woodward Ave. After tasering me, they took me to St. Joseph Mercy Oakland hospital near my house.
The doctors diagnosed me with paranoid schizophrenia and prescribed me antipsychotics, which helped with my hallucinations and delusions of grandeur to the point I could function.
At the end of my stay, they sent me to outpatient therapy, but because I had aged out of my father’s insurance plan and exhausted COBRA insurance, I couldn’t afford either my meds or therapy (Note this wass pre-ACA).
The Lost Five Years
I spent the next five years in a daze, not knowing what was real and could barely function. I’d go weeks without bathing, stopped caring for myself in general, and became a shut in, rarely going out or socializing in person or online. It was so bad at one point I stopped paying my bills and my heat was shut off during winter and my pipes burst because it was so cold.
I would have continued living like this had I not sought help.
A Light at The End of the Tunnel
As I approached 30, I realized I hadn’t accomplished anything I’d set out to do, and this triggered a quarter life. Slowly, I cleaned up my life, sought therapy and help from a psychiatrist, got on and stayed on meds for depression and schizophrenia, and pieced my life back together.
I haven’t had another psychotic break in the 8 years since I started seeing my psychiatrist. But I have had several episodes of depression over the years, and there were a few times I thought of killing myself, but a few adjustments of my meds helped sort me out.
My life isn’t perfect by any means, but I’m doing much better now compared to back in my twenties.
My hope is that by hearing my story it helps you.
If you or someone you know is struggling with mental health issues, know help is available. If you’re in the USA contact, the national suicide prevent lifeline at 1-800-273-8255 or TEXT GO to 741741 to reach a trained Crisis Counselor through Crisis Text Line, a global not-for-profit organization. Free, 24/7, confidential. Help is also available at afsp.org or TEXT TALK to 741714.
IF you’re LGBTQ+ and in crisis, contact thetrevorproject.org for more resources geared toward you.
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