You know when you have those lightbulb moments? I had one last November that was not a shining one. I had officially hit rock bottom in my life. I hope I never go lower than I did then. My friend had to bring me to the emergency room because I went on a hunger strike because I was so depressed. I realized I needed help and that my mother couldn’t keep watching whatever it was I was doing. It wasn’t just that I wasn’t eating; I was barely functioning. I was awaiting a bed in a psych ward when I realized that what had happened to me. The aha! Moment happened was their feeble attempts to make me eat in the setting that I was in that made me realize i had really hit rock bottom. I was in a padded room, with a camera on me, with a window into the room, in an electric bed with no cord so it was stuck in one position, and 15 minute bed checks.They gave me pudding and soup to eat with a paper spoon and then wondered why I wouldn’t eat. I felt the risk of spilling the hot soup(Luke warm at best) outweighed the risk of wearing the soup with the paper spoon and attempt to eat with it. They would not give me any utensils or any straws. They gave me menus that I half heartedly filled out knowing they would not give me any utensils, so I would ask for things that required utensils. Every meal tray they gave me with paper utensils, I continued to refuse to eat. I had no will to live. At this point, I had eaten one meal in 5 or so days, and had sips of water with pills. I was waiting for a psych bed for suicidal ideation and depression. I was later diagnosed with a major depressive disorder, due to the fallout of my marriage.
How had I fallen so far? Heartbreak does many things to us for me it made me nearly unable to function. I went through the motions. I could do nothing without crying. I could not sleep. The man I love declared me not for him and had me leave our marital home. I cried not just for the last I felt from him but for the loss of the family we had blended together, the cat we had added to give us the perfect anagram, the home we had made together, the gardens we had put so many hours in year after year. I wasn’t spending time out in the yard and making our yard grow beautiful flowers because I had no intent of staying there; I was doing it to make our house a home. Our (my) trusty cat was often found out in the yard following me and languishing while I tended to the needs of the flowers; watering, pruning, weeding, planting, harvesting. It wasn’t just my life there that was getting uprooted, it was my job being affected, my child’s home being ruined, every ounce of security I had was being shaken up.
Unfortunately for me, me at my worst is better than some people at their best. It had been over a week since I’d been asked to leave our house. In that short time, I’d been back once. I’m not sure, but I think that it really made a profound impact to my mental state. My husband had removed every picture of me in the house. We had collages on the stairs, which he had taken down and refilled already. The walls in the living room were empty, as well as the study. It was as if he was just trying to erase me from his life. Even now months later, this brings gut wrenching sobs from me to think about. Still, I yearn for him. A broken heart is a mystery to the most solid of minds. My mind is nowhere near solid, because my heart is louder than my mind. This is the man who said he would take care of me forever. Carry me upstairs when I was tired. Suddenly had to get my face gone. He said it was because it made the child still at home sad. I’m not so sure.
When I arrived at the emergency room that day, my friend drove me to not to the closest room, but to a tertiary care center. I couldn’t go to where I worked. I was very despondent. I had barely eaten or drank for 5 days, let alone the 10 days since I hadn’t been home. my heart rate was in the 150’s and my blood pressure was lowish. I was to no surprise crying. I had been trying to get an outpatient bed for 3 days, but nowhere would take me because our mental health system is broken. I had been treated for a MS flare the previous week, which was likely just stress brought on from everything. I had double vision in one eye and was having trouble walking.
They brought me in, took all my belongings and had me change into a gown with no strings. They had me sit in a chair in the hallway across from the nurses station for 2 hours waiting. Depressed or not, I am not stupid and I am alert and oriented. I have never felt so ostracized in my whole life. Put the crazy person in the chair in front of everyone. It’s obvious too, because the gowns are different colors than the rest. No one told me anything. What was really going on was I was waiting for a bed to open up in the psych hall, where I would spend 2 days waiting for somewhere to go. I sat in that chair and I cried silently to myself. Big tears streaming down my face, into my mask. I refused tissues, because the mask soaked it all up.
Never in a million years did I ever think I would end up on a psych ward, or waiting for a a psych stay somewhere. Never did I think heartbreak could do this to someone. I mean, I had seen it happen to people, but I always thought there must be something else wrong with them. Little did I know, that when you really love someone, it can really break you in a million pieces when they crush your world. I was crazy for letting all those feelings in he poked at me about. Telling me I had walls up, that I wasn’t emotional enough. Here it was. On display for the world to see. Except I didn’t know what I did. I didn’t know what happened to my marriage. I still really don’t. I’ve pieced things together. I still, no matter what anyone tells me, blame myself. I’m trying not to. It comes fleetingly where I don’t, but then it comes back in waves. It comes back to, I didn’t see. I wasn’t good enough. I didn’t…
I still love him. That’s why it has to be my fault. It shows I’m the broken one. After all this. I still love him. And you don’t know even know the half of it.
Never had a white picket fence 