A day in the life of a psych patient

(I'm thinking of having this picture framed. My half wet hair, lack of makeup, reclining pose, and the clashing scrubs and pillow scream to be blown up on a canvas - hahaha!)

On a Friday night in August, I felt the oppressive waves of sadness and grief - from my clinical depression - weighing in on me. (If you have never experienced those feelings, just imagine feeling like your heart is literally about to rip in two and heaven seems impossibly far away.) It's no wonder that suicidal thoughts are often part of depression. The pain seems to never end, and in my case, the knowledge that it would pass was not much comfort because I knew it would come again days, weeks, or months later. In my brain, normal thoughts were twisted into hopeless feelings - "It is better that my family live without me, because all depression does is cause them pain," "I will never feel well again," etc.

A friend came by late Friday night and cheered me up. I felt happy after her visit, and the storms in my brain had calmed. However, when I awoke Saturday morning, they were back. I would sit in a room and wonder how I could use objects to end my life. At that point, I realized that I needed serious help. I called a mental health center and described my situation, and they scheduled me to come in at 2 that afternoon. But in the meantime, my thoughts were focused on "suicidal ideation," as they call it, and I recognized I needed help sooner.

My husband got me into the car and we headed off to the ER. Once at the hospital, I was sent through triage pretty quickly, and not long after that given a room in the ER. This wasn't any ordinary room, though. It had glass doors for complete visibility from the outside. There was a bed, and a chair. Every door and cabinet was locked. I didn't even have a trash can.

The nurse who took me back instructed me to change into the lovely green scrubs - JUST green scrubs. I couldn't wear ANYTHING else. She also explained that the color of the scrubs indicated I was in for mental health reasons and that if I tried to get away, large men would restrain me in handcuffs and return me to the room. That alone caused me to question my choice to go to the hospital!

Then I got to sit in that room - the most boring room possible - while a nurse, doctor, and social worker popped in occasionally for assessments. I was fortunate enough to be given a blanket, and I rested most of the day. If I had to use the restroom, I had to walk down a hall in the ER, and I felt every set of staff eyes on me when I headed there. I felt like the guy in the commercial with the flashing arrow over his head. "See me? I'm in because I'm a nut case!"

After I was assessed by the social worker, she recommended that I be admitted to the hospital to stay until I was feeling better. The one problem was that there were no rooms in the regular psych ward, the ER psych ward, or even the other mental health center. There wasn't anything available. So they left me in the barren room with my husband, until something opened up - which could be hours or days later.

I had not felt like eating that morning, but the nurse finally got me to order a lunch. She even ordered it "stat" - which meant that I gave it to her at 11:30 am and my lunch wandered in around 2:15 pm. Because of my diagnosis, my meals came on a "secure tray" - a paper pulp tray. I half expected to have to eat with my fingers, but I was lucky enough to get a fork.

Then came the waiting game. The phlebotomist came in to get a blood sample, and let me know with his awkward humor that he would "keep his eyes open this time." I slept. Once in a while the social worker would come back to update us. Eventually we got some playing cards and started a game of gin rummy.

As the afternoon wore on, I was running out of patience. Being in the main ER was no fun. I was mostly out of my suicidal fog, and decided that if there wasn't a room for me that night, I'd rather go home. Amazingly, after I explained my feelings to the social worker, a room opened up within ten or fifteen minutes. A while later - because I'm on hospital time - I finally got moved into the "red pod." I was now an officially half-admitted hospital patient.

Part two continues soon...