“Need”
I need it. I want it. I want to feel at peace, my soul at rest. I don’t want this pus-filled anger to gnaw at me night and day, my rage just a hollow tomb that I enclose myself in day and night … It’s so lonely when you don’t even know yourself. I’m empty. I’m weak. I just want to be filled with good feelings and happiness. None of this hatred, this contempt that has been rotting away at my belly for years. How can I cure myself? How can I find a way to get that cancer out of me? I want gentle rain to wash the fear and loathing out of me. I want the rage and resentment to be lifted. How can I be at peace? I want it. I need it. Need. Need …
“Fucking Rotters”
Why is he saying those things? Why does such blasphemy cross an educated man’s lips? I have a heart, I have a soul, I can love, I do love. I am loved. He makes me feel worthless, like an unfeeling, unwanted soulless fuck, and none of it is true. Within five minutes of shaking my hand, he’s assessed that I’m nothing, that I will only amount to nothing, and that I am a weak shell of a human being. Does he believe those words? Does he truly think that’s me? Well, I don’t. Fuck him. He doesn’t know me from Adam. Who is he to pass down such judgments, to inflict such stinging words on one who he does not know? He’s superior to me and I cannot tell him he’s wrong, tell him to go fuck himself, and I just sit, dumbly nodding and confirm all his cruel assumptions. Fucking bastard. He doesn’t know me, and he doesn’t care to either. I can love. I love many. And I can make people feel loved. I am worth something. I am a good person. I don’t think anybody has made me feel that shitty in a really long time. It’s cruel, unfair, and untrue, all his accusations, all his false truths, none of it is real. I have a soul and a heart, and I know how to use them. He made me feel so low, so useless and pitiful. Is that why I’m here? To be broken down, to be told I’m nothing, that I never will be anything? Yeah, that sounds good, let’s go and get berated by some true professionals, and what can I do? Nothing, that’s what, because his word might as well be God’s word. Who’ll believe me? If he says I’m fucked for life, shit, I’m fucked for life. He’s a PROFESSIONAL. Fucking rotter. He doesn’t know. He sits in his office and reads the reports and makes people feel worthless, makes us feel like shit. Maybe it makes HIM feel good. Maybe he’s the one with no heart and no soul and he doesn’t give a fuck who he hurts. Well, I have feelings and it sucks to get shit upon.
“Indecisions”
What’s happening? Where am I going? I sit in the silence of my cell. It’s so quiet, it hurts me. My eardrums throb and ache, begging for sound, for the sweet comfort to be found in another human voice. Anger bubbles up and recedes as fast as it appeared. Confusion is the only thing present to constantly keep me company, confusion and agitation rotting my mind. Slowly driving me mad. Where will this road end, where will it take me to? What is happening? I just don’t know. Maybe I don’t want to know, maybe the answer is just as hellish as the indecision, the dark uninformed abyss that I am floating in right this minute. I watched the sun rise this morning. I watched it cast its healing light on the birds as they chirped and the trees as they shivered in the morning breeze. A deer appeared from within the woods, and it slowly chewed the dew-moistened grass before me. This sight, this vision, if you will, moved me indescribably. I was filled with a peace, a peace that I wanted to soothe my very soul. But it didn’t. I still ache.
“Tired”
I’m so tired of being held down, of being held back. I feel like a hamster running in my little mill, expending all my energy, but going nowhere. I’m sick and tired of the fight, of the battle, of kicking and screaming at every last turn. But they won’t stop provoking me. They won’t stop easing me with freedom and love because they like to see me fight. They like my rage to explode because they know I can’t win, and I will never ever be able to defeat them because they are too strong. They humiliate me and break me down at every turn, making me angry and hurt. But they don’t care and I’m getting there too. Nothing can stop me now ’cause I don’t care anymore. I’m going crazy in this place, it’s driving me to my end. I can’t stand it anymore. They dehumanize me because they want to see me squirm, they want to see me cry. Fucking bastards. I’d kill them all if I could. Fuck them. I’ll never give in. Never.
“Finally”
Truth has exploded within me to own my shit, to do it, to be the very best I can be. No more lies, no more shit. No more fucking up. I’m finally going to Walk the Walk! I feel so light, the burden of my secrets lifted from my chest, my truth and desire echoing in my head. I’m going to really do it, truly honestly do my very, very best. I know I can do it, and I’m scared shitless but the joy overpowers the rest of me, it has finally taken control and I know I can truly, honestly do it. All I need is to be true, to be real, to actually do all I’ve been saying I want to do. I’ve always fucked up, no matter what the consequences. Now I want to be honest and good, despite the consequences. I feel it in my heart, I’m coming back. No matter who pisses on me, who’s angry. I don’t give a fuck. I’m doing this for me, so I can get better and feel good about myself. NOTHING WILL STAND IN MY WAY. Nothing but my ego and my sneakiness that is. I truly honestly do not care anymore what people say or think, but I am going to do it. My dreams will finally come to light, and I can see what they really are, who I really am. This might be tough, but fuck it. I finally am ready to walk the line that my words have painted, the line of truth and happiness and goodness and self-respect and love. I want it, I want it, with every inch of my being, with my every pore. Every breath I take feels different. I was more honest in the last twenty minutes than I have been in the last six months! I am there, I have reached the first step and I am ready to bite my lip and close my eyes and run the rest of the way up. I can do it!!!
“Forget That Shit”
This is so stupid and fucked up. I try to do it. I fucking try to get honest and be all I can be and I get attacked. Verbal assault coming from all sides. Just as I try to let down my soul and build up my courage, I get shot at from all sides. Put back in my cage, ranted and screamed at, telling me I’m a liar, that I don’t know what’s right, and who’s wrong. All I tried to do is get honest and see what it got me? Fuck that shit. I get nothing but pain. Being berated is not my idea of a first reward for a first step. I feel so alone, so homesick. Why is this? I’m just alienated, and no one gives a shit. They want to keep me in the dark. I’m less trouble that way. Fair and square, right? It’s not worth it, all my efforts are in vain. I’ve been left broken and insane, cut off from the world. I miss my family, miss my girl. They all think that I’m sick. They’re full of crap. Fuck that shit!
They promised me at the hospital that they would do everything to help Nick get better, treatment, therapy, medication. But he sounded more depressed every time I talked to him, and eventually he just folded up the show and stopped talking to anyone. He couldn’t follow their rules, they weren’t doing anything for him, and all he wanted was to come home. He stopped cooperating with them entirely, and their solution to that was to fill him with Thorazine, put him in the “quiet room,” and let him sleep most of the time.
Nick at sixteen with, left to right, Maxx, Vanessa, Sam, Zara, and Victoria (photo credit 1.21)
Sam and Nick
I figured it out when every time I called him, they said he was “having a nap.” How many “naps” can you take in a day’s time? I would call back four or five times a day, and he was always sleeping. Once again, I felt I had betrayed him. We had tried something that not only hadn’t helped him, but had made him worse. And they still hadn’t tried the new medications.
The counselors urged us to leave him there. Julie, Nick’s doctor, and I talked it over, and came to a decision rapidly. Once again, the experience had been disappointing, and Dr. Seifried agreed that there was no point having him there any longer. It wasn’t helping. It was aggravating the situation. It was time to bring him home, no matter what condition he was in, or how bad it got. And from my perspective, he
didn’t belong in a hospital, knocked out on Thorazine, far from his family and his home. He belonged with us. We would take care of him. I called him again that afternoon and demanded they wake him up. He sounded groggy when he came to the phone, but he had no problem understanding what I told him.
“You’re coming home, sweetheart.” There were tears in my eyes as I said it.
“I am?” I could almost see him smile as I said the words. “When?”
“Tomorrow.”
Nicky let out a scream of glee. And he sounded saner than he had in weeks. He had been there for thirty-nine days. Wasted days, most of them spent in the “quiet room,” because they didn’t know what else to do with him. Like caging a beautiful, injured bird. I just hoped that his broken wings had healed enough for him to be able to fly again. He’d had a very tough seven weeks. Poor Nicky.
They got one more shot at him before he left. He apparently lit a cigarette again the morning he was supposed to leave. He managed not to set the wall or the carpet on fire this time. He did no damage at all, but he had broken the rules. They called Julie at the hotel, and told her he wouldn’t be able to come home for another day. He would have to spend time in the quiet room for a day to atone for breaking the rules, which was understandable, but annoyed us. We were anxious to get him home.
She called me, furious, and I added my voice to hers. I called the hospital and told them to have his bag packed in an hour. They spluttered at first, but I think they knew I meant what I said. They weren’t going to stop us now. They had done nothing for him except lock him up, like a car in a garage. We’d had enough of it. And now, my son was coming home, and nothing was going to stop him.
They put him in the quiet room while he waited for Julie to arrive. They made their point right up till the very last hour, but he didn’t care anymore. He knew help was on the way. The nightmare was over.
“I fucked up again”
Oh well, last minute mistakes. At least I still get to go home. I shake with excitement, with anticipation for what will come. I can’t wait to get on that plane. It’s just a pain to sit here in the quiet room until I leave. I hate this place and I can’t wait to leave. I’m not in the mood to miss it right now. I want out. They’re all so concerned with telling me that I’m going to fail, that I can’t do it, that my relapse has already begun. Well fuck them. I know me better than anyone else does and I know I can do it. I wish people had faith in me and didn’t read into things so hard. I smoked in the bathroom because I needed a cigarette, not because I secretly want to stay here, or because I’m a fucking pyro. I need to go home. I need normalcy. I need balance. I need my life back.
It was all we wanted for him too. And all we could hope for.
13
A new home for Nicky
Nick came up to be with us in Napa when he got home on the twenty-ninth of July, and for once, he was actually happy to be there. After five and a half weeks in the hospital, even Napa looked good to him. He seemed edgy to us, and anxious, and not as well as he had been when he left, but he sounded better than he had on the phone. I think he was shaken by the experience. He still seemed far from well to me.
He played with his band a few times, and got tired of Napa eventually, so we let him go to Julie for a few days. But she called me in a panic shortly after he’d arrived. He had tricked her, and run away. It was a first for him, not counting the time he sat on the park bench laughing at us, eating doughnuts when he didn’t want to change his sneakers. But this was for real, he was older, and he was sicker. He was sufficiently unbalanced these days that his disappearance was a real concern to us. Not to mention the fact that he hadn’t taken his medication with him, naturally, and we knew he would be in bad shape soon.
Trying to fight back panic, I called a police lieutenant I knew, and Julie called all his friends, trying to figure out where he’d gone. This was literally the only time he’d run away, and it was difficult to imagine where he’d gone to.
He had been out of the hospital for exactly two and a half weeks, and he was obviously still confused, and behaving strangely. But within hours, Julie had figured out where he was. He was with a girl he knew. We sent two policemen over, and her parents tried to pretend he wasn’t there. I called them then and explained the situation to them. There was no way to handle it except to tell them that he was sick. And two minutes later, they let the policemen in. And there was Nick.
I called Nick’s psychiatrist, and we talked about what to do. It was obvious that Nick was still in bad shape, and he suggested we put him in a small hospital where he put patients sometimes, in the East Bay. It wasn’t a fancy research facility, but he’d be comfortable and safe, and the doctor would see him every day. It broke my heart to lock him up again, but if he was going to start running away, we had a much bigger problem on our hands than we’d ever had before. It was dangerous for him to just disappear, and even more so to have him miss his medication.
John and I drove into San Francisco and picked him up, and quietly drove him to the East Bay. He didn’t ask where we were taking him. I think he was too scared. He called friends from the phone in the car, and tried to be nonchalant about it. Julie met us at the hospital, and Nick’s doctor was there. It was a small, clean, well-kept place that looked like a nice hotel. Nick didn’t even argue with us this time, or ask how long he would stay. I cried when I filled out the forms for him, and went upstairs to kiss him goodbye. He wouldn’t look me in the eye, and he looked defeated when he turned away. It broke my heart to see what was happening to him. Clearly, what we were doing wasn’t helping him, and the medication wasn’t strong enough, but what other options did we have than to put him in the hospital again? Particularly if he was going to run away.
The only thing I felt good about was the hospital itself. It was immaculate, and the staff was nice. He had a decent, comfortable room and there was a swimming pool he could use. I felt in my heart that he would be safe and well cared for there. I particularly liked the nurses and the doctors, they all seemed like exceptionally nice, caring people.
But as we drove back to Napa, I had a heavy heart. It was hard to imagine him ever being all right again. And as the summer came to an end, Nick only got worse. I was driving down from Napa to see him two or three times a week. It took me two and a half or three hours each way in heavy traffic and deadly heat. I would bring him pizza or ribs, and we’d sit together in a locked room. But he was angry at me. Very angry. He shouted at me, threw a chair at the wall, he never touched me, or aimed anything at me, but every time I saw him now he was in a rage. He was like a caged animal with nowhere to go. He was not only losing his grip on his sanity, he had lost both control and hope. It was painful to imagine his future at that point.
And after listening to how much he hated me for two hours, I would drive back to Napa for another three hours. The round trip and visit took all day. And as always with Nick, it took me away from the other kids, and that summer I began to see it was taking a toll on the rest of the family. And worrying about Nick, I was beginning to drag badly. I was exhausted and disheartened. It was hard to be optimistic about him. In retrospect, with a whole spectrum of years to choose from, I think the end of that particular summer, when he was sixteen, was the most depressing of all. Psychiatrically, he was the most disturbed he’d ever been, or ever was later. And as he raged, and cursed, and threatened and accused when I saw him, it seemed inconceivable that he would ever lead a normal life again. I was beginning to fear he would be hospitalized forever, and for a long time there was no glimmer of hope whatsoever.
The trips to visit him seemed endless, the outlook bleak, and my marriage to John was at low ebb as well. I think we were both discouraged by how little hope we saw for Nick, and perhaps as people do when they feel helpless, right or wrong, we either blamed ourselves or each other. I was constantly involved in talking to the hospital, Julie, or the doctors, visiting him several times a week, upset about not being able to spend more time with the other kids,
and getting no results for Nick. And perhaps John felt that I was too often absent or distracted. I’m not sure what he felt, we didn’t talk much about it. All we knew was that we weren’t happy. The past few years had been anything but easy, with tabloids, unauthorized biographies, dealing with and worrying about Nick, as well as the ordinary strains of any marriage. And just as a bonus, a local radio talk show had begun making disparaging remarks about me. It was just one more thing to make me sad, and to add to my sorrows.
Labor Day came and went. The kids went back to school, and I continued visiting Nicky. At least by late September Nick’s spirits had lifted a little, and he was less aggressive than before.
He had been doing his homework in the hospital, and was caught up. But in spite of being solidly on the Prozac again, and somewhat happier, he still seemed shaky to me. After six weeks in the hospital this time, he came home on October first, and with the exception of two weeks in August between hospitals, he had essentially been hospitalized for three and a half months, one hell of a long time. It was obvious that his condition had deteriorated over the past several months, and taking care of him was now a full-time job. He was easily upset, explosive, anxious, withdrawn, and frequently angry at me. It made life at our house a living hell. Not only for me and John, but also for the kids, and even for Nicky himself. He had worsened considerably and I realized that if this was the way our life was going to be, the other children were going to be sacrificed to him. There was no way to have a peaceful night anymore, a quiet hour, a relaxed dinner, or even an easy five minutes with Nick in the house now. His volume had been turned up way too high, and seemed to be getting louder.
His Bright Light Page 18