2006 - Vol. 3, Issue 2

For the third night in a row sleep eludes me, and for the first time in my life I almost succumb to my murderous impulses. The cacophony of grunts and moans coming from the senior unit of the Pavilion, coupled with the fusillade of translucent silver bullets plummeting from the stormy night sky nearly brings me to the edge of complete hysteria.

I am not insane. It's just very hard to get any shut–eye when it sounds as if your roommate is dying in a bed only six feet away.

"Uh, UH–UH, Uh, UH–UH–UH." The interminable staccato of uncontrollable moaning would almost be bearable if I had better earplugs than the two rolled–up pieces of toilet paper that are presently shoved so far into my head that I am risking permanent damage to my eardrums. But then there is the smell.

Apparently, this bed–wetting psycho also has trouble controlling his bowel movements, and just as I was finally getting used to the redolent odors of stale urine! Don't get me wrong. I can put up with some terrible odors, including the smoke of PCP, crack, heroin, even some ghetto schwag. But even under two sheets and a blanket I feel as if I am going to vomit, and it would be the first time since my arrival at Columbia Hospital's mental health wing that the catharsis would not simply be from opiate withdrawal.

"Uh. UH–UH. Uh. UH–UH–UH." The noises are getting even more unbearable.

I creep silently out of bed, pillow in hand, ready to smother this pathetic little creature, but just as I am about to suffocate him the rank smell overtakes me. I empty my entire dinner of grilled cheese sandwiches and Lorna Doone rehab cookies in a single projectile vomit that covers all of his face and neck. I run out of the room, screaming, "The end is near. The end is near. I've seen the face of the Devil, smelt his wrath!"

I start pulling the sheets off of everyone's beds, throwing women and men old enough to be my grandparents to the floor, until I am finally subdued by a pair of 200–pound orderlies. I keep kicking and screaming the same paranoid schizophrenic chant until I feel the quick sting of a hypodermic syringe in my left thigh. Then the darkness finally takes me. Thank God for the darkness. Thank God for Ativan and Thorazine.

Light. Tugging and pulling me from the darkness, ripping into my subconscious and extracting my very essence. The scintillate sub–tropic rays of a Florida morning, black hole for tourists and half–naked beachgoers, silent killer of vampires and other creatures of the night. My mouth is a cotton desert. My nose is clogged with half dried blood and snot, and my swollen lips are dripping saliva from both sides. I guess I shouldn't have challenged a security guard twice my size. But why do I always have these clutch realizations after the fact? I guess I can only plead the hindsight bias as my defense, rationalization, excuse — whatever you want to call it.

Both my arms are strapped to my bed, along with my feet; I feel like a Junky Christ on a cross, except I won't die of suffocation or even from loss of blood. No three days in hell followed by an eternity of bliss for me. I'll be lucky if it's just a week in this hell of withdrawal. And after that? I'd really like to say I could walk out at the end of this week a completely changed man. But denial sure is one hell of a long river, and I imagine it will flow for the rest of my life.

My whole body feels brittle, but I don't think even a B12 injection, mixed with liquid coral calcium and boron, would do me any good. My arms are so heavy I couldn't lift them even if they weren't restrained. I'm not capable of that effort right now. But I can be a very capable boy. Take off the restraints, flash a bag in my face, and I think I just might be able to muster the strength to snatch it out of your hands. Especially since last night's shot is starting to wear off. I wonder what I'd have to do to get another?

But it doesn't matter, because once again, all I care about is that smell!

I wonder if I'm hallucinating because everywhere they take me in this hospital reeks of feces. Last night wasn't really that bad, now that I've a firm basis for comparison. Last night there was a rumor of excrement, just enough to agitate an already fragile mind. But, with the introduction of Hilda into my room, I'm suddenly in a feces factory. Hilda is the star of the production line. She is an eighty–year–old baker of Poo–Fly–Pie, which is nowhere near as tasty (or pleasant smelling) as the Amish variety of a similar name. And she is making sure that her product is applied on every surface.

"Get me out of this shit–hole," I demand, pun intended.

"If you knew how to behave like an adult, you wouldn't be there in the first place," informs the assistant nurse from outside the clear glass door to the quiet room. The quiet room, also known as the "time–out" room, has padded walls on all sides, except for the double–framed plexiglass windows. It was designed to be a safe room for patients who might hurt themselves or others; now it seems more like a quarantine zone for victims of the excrement attack.

Outside, the nurses and aids are suiting up in what looks like biological contamination suits. The attire includes two pairs of rubber gloves (latex standard issue), a face mask that looks like the ones so popular after the SARS epidemic, eye goggles, and two emergency examination robes. Their shoes are covered with plastic grocery bags (not hospital issue, but effective nonetheless).

Inside, I'm choking on excess saliva, still breathing through my mouth, thanking the powers that be for my partially clogged nose. Hilda's continuing to spread her toilet treasures all over the walls and windows, and I'm just praying that I don't get hit in the crossfire. And if you truly need to hit some kind of rock bottom before you can make radical changes in your life, I'm praying that this is that bottom.