by M. Billiter
Wounded cries rose from my throat. The cries of a mother for her child when he’s lost and she can’t find him. I just wanted to get to him, hold him and make him better. Society may not ever understand my child, but I would.
“Can I see him?”
His face revealed his answer before he did. “It’s best if Branson has this time to focus on his recovery and getting back on track with his medication.”
“You said it’d just be a few days. It’s been three already.”
He nodded. “Branson hasn’t fully recovered. Trevor is still trying to function for him.”
“He has a split personality? Like Sybil?”
“No, he doesn’t have dissociative identity disorder. Schizophrenia and dissociative identity disorder, or DID, are often confused. However, schizophrenia and DID are two entirely different disorders.” Dr. Cordova must have sensed I needed more information because he continued. “There are various aspects that make up a person’s identity. With DID, each of these aspects is separated so profoundly from the others that they appear to have multiple personalities. DID isn’t a thought disorder, but schizophrenia is. I understand how it’s easy to confuse the two.”
“But I still don’t understand.” If my tone didn’t convince him, my words would. “By its very name, schizophrenia means ‘split mind.’ Isn’t a split mind an apt description for multiple personality disorder or DID?”
Dr. Cordova’s face never seemed to falter from neutral. “The mind splitting that the name ‘schizophrenia’ refers to has nothing to do with personality splitting. It refers to the fractures in cognitive functioning. To simplify it, think of schizophrenia as a thought disorder,” he said, and it started to make more sense. But I still had more questions than answers.
“Okay, then explain Trevor. If he isn’t a separate personality, then what is he?” By that point, Dr. Cordova knew I was nothing if not persistent. I wouldn’t leave his office until I understood, or at the very least had a better handle on my son’s mental illness. Or thought disorder.
“Unlike a separate personality, schizophrenia is the breaking or splitting of the mind’s capacity to function. Trevor is a form of protection. He’s a delusion, a form of his psychosis that allowed Branson to function,” he said.
“So Trevor isn’t some alternate personality?” I asked.
“Not at all. Trevor is a delusion, and even though this delusion felt real to Branson, delusions are irrational and they aren’t real. It’s important to understand, Tara, that during a psychotic break, it’s harder for Branson to distinguish actual reality from this altered reality that his brain tells him exists. Often people with schizophrenia—or in Branson’s case, schizoaffective disorder, to take into account the depressive component of his illness—will go off their treatment protocol because a hallucination may tell them to do so, which—”
“Is that what happened to Branson? Trevor told him to go off his meds and he did?”
“Yes, but with the right dosage of medication and therapy, the delusions dissipate.”
Medicine, dosage, delusions. My mind was in overdrive. Nothing made sense anymore. “Do you think the schizophrenia or schizoaffective disorder or whatever could have come on because he was being bullied, and that’s why Trevor showed up?” My son was in a wing of the hospital somewhere in this maze, and I just wanted to get to him.
“I know he wasn’t being bullied by this girl. I know that now,” I admitted. “But I wondered if maybe he just hit his saturation point with this Jesse kid.”
I wiped my nose on the back of my hand. Dr. Cordova handed me a box of tissues, and I grabbed one to blow my nose.
“That’s what they called it with me when I was in a domestic situation. I hit my 'saturation point.' And he was being bullied at the track meeting.” I raised my shoulders “Maybe he just hit his breaking point and that’s why he got violent. That’s why Trevor appeared.”
Dr. Cordova didn’t have Branson’s file on his lap or a legal pad. A pen wasn’t at the ready. Everything about this session was different. As the silence dragged between us, I filled it with more rambling.
“Granted, this kid drew first blood, but maybe his schizophrenia, it just seemed like it became a coping mechanism, you know? From what he experienced in our home and then with this kid at track.”
Dr. Cordova waited until I was finished with my farfetched explanation for Trevor and my son’s mental illness. But in the last three minutes, I had used the word "schizophrenia" without a bittersweet taste lingering in my mouth like I had to puke. Progress took many different forms.
“Just so you know,” he said gently, “it’s unlikely that bullying can cause schizophrenia. It’s more possible that a person is predisposed to that direction anyway, and the bullying just kind of added to it. There’s really no data to show a connection unless there’s massive head trauma.” He paused. “Did Branson ever experience any head trauma during your marriage to his father?”
“No.”
“Did he ever work with anyone on the bullying issue?”
I shook my head. “I don’t know how much bullying he actually experienced.”
The doctor looked at me.
“I just discovered that Branson’s English journal, the one I’ve been reading… well, nothing he wrote was actually true.”
Dr. Cordova slowly nodded. “When a person loses contact with external reality, it usually takes the form of hallucinations, delusions, or disordered thinking. It makes perfect sense that Branson’s journal wasn’t an accurate account of his activities.”
I was sinking fast. “Please, let me see him.” My entire body trembled. “Just let me see my son.”
“He’s not in any condition to see you.” He was not going to waver on the issue. “My goal is to get him ready to come home for a few days.”
“A few days?” I shook my head. I could no longer hear that my son wasn’t okay and that I couldn’t take him home with me. “No, that’s my baby. You can’t take him away from me.”
“Tara, what Branson needs is to be in a longer-term treatment center where he can deal with some of the residual anger he has and get back to a stronger functioning level. If he comes home now, or even in a few days, but doesn’t continue the treatment, he'll have another break and the drop will be even greater.”
I leaned forward and cried. “I just never knew.” I sobbed. “I had no idea. I want my son back. Please bring him back to me.”
“I’m trying.”
35
Branson
“That’s funny.” I began to laugh and couldn’t seem to stop.
“What’s so funny?”
I turned around in my chair and saw Dr. Cordova enter the room. I whipped my head back around and realized no one was there.
“Who were you talking to?” he asked.
I shrugged and pretended like it didn’t happen.
“Branson?” Dr. Cordova pulled up a chair beside mine.
The sun was full and bright in the Wyoming sky, and I was stuck inside. Worse, the sun was melting what was left of the first good snowfall of the season. Ski season. I just need to be outside.
“Who were you talking to?” he repeated.
I moved my gaze from the sun to the people on the sidewalk below my window. Everyone was hurrying somewhere, but the slushy pavement was slowing them down.
“No one.” I watched a woman grab her son by the arm and scold him for doing something. Probably just being a boy.
“When I came in, you were laughing and said, ‘That’s funny.’”
I nodded.
“Was it Trevor?” Dr. Cordova tried to make eye contact with me, but I dodged his stare.
“Yup.” I exhaled.
“He’s still around?”
“Apparently.” I gripped my hands into one fist.
“Did you see him?”
I paused. “No. I think I was just talking to him.”
“Okay, well that’s progress.”
I nodded.
“We’re still working on finding the right dosage.”
“It’s just upsetting,” I said, breaking the silence, breaking the hold Trevor had on me. “The only person I could talk to isn’t even here. He’s gone. He wasn’t even real. Fuck. What now?”
“That's a valid question,” Dr. Cordova replied. “Trevor is a symptom of your illness. Once we have your illness under control again, the feeling of loss won’t be as significant.”
I looked at the doctor carefully. He seemed to know his shit.
“So let’s talk about Jesse and what happened at the track meet.” Dr. Cordova flipped a page in his notepad.
I don’t know what he does with all his notes, but the guy sure takes a lot of them. “I wanted to hurt him because he was choking me, trying to prove to everyone that he was the strongest.”
Dr. Cordova nodded. “From what your brother's said, he’s also bullied you before.”
“Yeah, the guy’s a major prick.”
“And the voices?”
“They got really strong that day.”
“Stronger than before?”
“Stronger than I’ve ever heard them.”
“What do you remember the voices saying?”
“'Kill him,' or something like that. They were really mad at Jesse. If I’m really angry, I’ll start to distinguish sounds.”
“And when you distinguish sounds, what do you hear?”
“Them just telling me to do things. It sounds like my self-conscious, like I’m talking to myself, but I know I’m not.”
“How do you know you’re not?”
“Just kind of a feeling, because I know I wouldn’t harm someone.”
“But you did. You choked someone until he passed out.”
“Well the kid fucking deserved it,” I snapped back.
“Maybe so,” Dr. Cordova said. “He’s got his own history with bullying, but what you did….”
“I don’t see it as wrong.”
“Let me ask you something, Branson. Why don’t you see choking someone as wrong?”
“Because I didn’t choke him. Trevor did.”
“Trevor isn’t real.”
I looked out the window at the sun beginning to drop in the sky. “I know Trevor isn’t real. But….”
“But what, Branson?”
I gripped the chair and leaned forward. “I don’t like to think I could hurt someone like that. Not even some douchebag like Jesse. It scares the fuck out of me that I could do that, okay?” I sat back in my chair.
“You have an illness.”
“An illness doesn’t make it right. And I’ve always been able to keep it in check before. I’ve never had to worry about it before.”
“Worry about what?”
“The voices and stuff. You know, I’ve had it for so long I’ve just kind of got used to it. But then the voices became more distinguished.”
“Like how?”
“One day I was just sitting in class. I was in anatomy and the static got louder, and then it started to clear up.”
“And that was unusual?”
“Yeah. Before, it was always a bunch of people mumbling. It wasn’t clear. And usually I couldn’t hear the static when I was in a classroom or around a lot of people.”
Dr. Cordova nodded and wrote something on his notepad. “When the static cleared up, what did you hear?”
“Uh, just telling me to hurt people. Like anyone I saw, anyone who pissed me off. It ranges. The static would suddenly get louder and would give me direction on how to do it, how to hurt them. It started to get bad when I started to want to do it. When I felt compelled to do it.”
“How would you stop yourself from acting on it?” Dr. Cordova wasn’t taking notes anymore.
“I would just, uh… I don’t know. I just didn’t.” I paused. “Actually, that’s when I called my mom and told her I was hearing voices. I felt like she would be a good person to talk to because she wouldn’t freak out.”
Dr. Cordova slightly smiled. Not like a shit-eating grin, more of a “you did the right thing” kind of smile that a guy gives another guy.
I thought of my mom, but then I had to push her out of my head. I missed her and my twin brother, but I couldn’t think of them or I’d never make it through this hellhole.
“That’s when your mom got you in to see the counselor at school?”
I shook my head. “Blacking out at high school and punching the bathroom wall got me in to see Clive, who got me to that lady doctor I saw once who put me on Paxil. And then after I talked to her, I must've freaked her out because I never saw her again.”
Dr. Cordova chuckled. “You didn’t freak her out, but she did make a referral.”
I rolled my eyes. “Whatever. I’m here now.” I looked back out the window. A school bus was dropping kids off. It was mid-November, and the snow berm on the side of the road hadn’t reached the heights it would by the end of winter. When Aaron and I used to ride the bus, we loved jumping off the steps and onto the berms. We’d come home wet and full of dirty snow. Made our mom mad, but we didn’t care—it was fun as hell.
“With your illness, symptoms range and can manifest quickly. Your symptoms escalated from fugue states and static and shadow people to Trevor.”
I grimaced. “Actually….”
“Was there something else?”
I nodded. “There was this one animal hallucination.” I looked at him. “I guess that’s what it would be called, a hallucination.”
The doctor quickly licked his thumb and turned a page in his notepad. “I don’t remember anything about an animal.”
“Yeah, it was fucking trippy. I heard something coming down the stairs, and then I saw this little dark thing on all fours charging toward my chair where I was sitting playing video games. It scared the shit out of me.” My heart rate increased just remembering it. “I realized it wasn’t there and continued playing video games, but it freaked me out.”
“This animal, did it appear before Trevor did?”
I nodded. “Yeah, like weeks, maybe a month or so? It was bad.”
“Did you tell anyone?”
I shook my head.
“It’s important to your future emotional health to share these things with your therapist or psychiatrist. It’s as important as keeping on task with your medication,” he said.
“That’s why I told you.”
He nodded. “And that’s good. I don’t care how mentally healthy or smart someone is, with this illness, staying on top of the symptoms and medication is the only way to manage it.”
All the fight in me left then. It was no longer a death sentence. He was extending me a hand to pull me out of the hole.
36
Branson
“Hey, thanks for picking me up.” I looked at my twin brother and smiled. I wasn’t sure what a better sight was: him or the snow-covered mountain behind him.
“Yup, no problem.” He grabbed my duffel bag. “Mom wanted to, but I told her I’d make less fuss.”
I laughed. “Well, thanks.”
“So you’re home for how long?” Aaron said.
“Long enough to get my skis into that powder.” I nodded toward Casper Mountain.
“For sure.” Aaron opened the trunk to our car and dropped my bag inside. “So seriously, you’re home for a while, right?”
“A week furlough before I'm shipped off.”
“That sounds like you're heading to basic training.”
I laughed as I climbed into the passenger seat. “Kind of is, bro, only for the mentally insane.”
Aaron strapped on his seat belt. Actually, we did it in unison. We usually always did everything in tandem. I missed that in the hospital. I missed laughing at the same Vines and YouTube videos. I missed seeing him in the hallways in high school. As much as I hated high school, I missed my brother.
He caught me staring at him and he grinned.
“Why the hell do they need you back again?” he asked. “Wasn’
t a week long enough?”
“I guess some mental cases are tougher than others.”
He turned out of the hospital parking garage and onto Second Street. I rolled down the window and let the cold November air hit me in the face.
“What are they gonna do? They already know you’re crazy,” he said.
“Just intense counseling to deal with some past anger issues that'll help make the shadow people and static stop. Or,” I said, hearing Dr. Cordova in my head and thankfully no one else, “keep them from reappearing, at least.”
“Well, that’s not too bad.” Aaron turned onto Wyoming Boulevard and headed toward our neighborhood. “How long will you be gone?”
I stared at the snow berms along the side of the road that looked like they had doubled in size. Seven days and so much seemed like it had changed.
“Branson?”
“Sorry. It’s a twenty-eight-day treatment center.”
“Twenty-eight days? Dude, you’ll miss Christmas.”
I shook my head. “No, actually I’ll be home just in time for Santa.”
“Well that’s cool. So what about school? And the Navy?”
“I’m going to take the GED.” I turned away from the window and lightly punched Aaron in the forearm. “And what the hell do you mean about the Navy? You’re the one who told Mom the Navy doesn’t want basket cases.”
“What?” His hazel eyes widened. “I never said that.”
“Bullshit.” I always knew when Aaron was lying. His eyes gave him away, and his voice got high-pitched like a little girl. “Carson told me when Mom brought her to the hospital. I was worried about telling you that Mom had to cancel my congressional interviews. Carson said she heard you talk to Mom when I started getting letters from the Navy. That’s when she told me you said the Navy doesn’t take kids who are basket cases.”
Aaron started laughing. “Okay, maybe I said something like that.”
I chuckled.
“But come on, bro, you had just blacked out at school and come to with bloody knuckles. You were crazy to think the navy would take you.”