Crazy

by Amy Reed

  Love,

  Connor

  Day 5

  The good news is I’m not pregnant. The bad news is I’m still here.

  There’s a short nurse named Mandy, and she’s my favorite. She calls me “sweetie,” and when she asks me how I’m feeling it’s like she actually wants to know. I thought maybe I was her favorite, maybe I was her pet or something because of all the attention she was giving me, but then I noticed her name next to mine on the white board by the nurse’s office, so I guess it’s just her job to pay special attention to me.

  She wraps the blood-pressure belt around my arm, squeezes the ball until it holds on tight. Then it deflates and she looks like she’s concentrating, and she could either be counting my heartbeats under her breath or whispering a magical incantation. I’ve never known how these things work, what the numbers mean, “something over something,” then a nod, like I’m expected to know how to speak medicine.

  She asks me if I have a boyfriend. I tell her no, but I’m thinking of you. I try the words out in my head. “Connor. Boyfriend.” And then I look around at the white walls, see Jerry the psychotic shuffling around in his pajamas, watch Mandy write something down on my charts, my life reduced to doctors’ scribbles in a file, and I say the words under my breath, my own incantation. “Connor. Boyfriend.” And then my heart splits open and I’m tearing at the blood-pressure thing, I’m ripping apart the Velcro, my hospital socks go flying, I want everything off, everything they’ve put on me. And I’m tugging at the bracelet, the plastic paper that doesn’t break, the thing with the secret code that brands me as belonging to them. But it won’t come off, and I start running and the floor is cold without the socks, and they catch me, of course they catch me, I don’t even get halfway down the hall, and Jerry’s just standing there looking at me like I’m crazy.

  This is normal behavior in here. All that happens is the doctor asks me how I’m feeling. He’s always asking me how I’m feeling. I keep telling him I feel better, but I don’t think he believes me. It’s like I’m giving him the wrong answer, like he wants me to tell him I’m falling apart, I’m hearing voices, I think I have wings and plan to fly out of here at four-thirty. No one believes me that I don’t want to die. They can’t believe it could be that simple, that it was all just a big mistake, that someone can want to die for a few days, make a half-assed attempt, then change their mind. Or maybe I’m just lying to myself that it’s that easy. Maybe I’m forgetting. Maybe I’m not as well as I think I am. Is it even possible for me to know?

  The doctor wonders why I don’t talk in group, so I tell him. It’s not because I’m depressed. It’s not because I’m manic. It’s not because I’m up or down—it’s because I’m no place at all. Medicine has erased all that, and now I’m left with this fuzzy mildew in its place. I don’t want to die and I don’t want to run around in circles, but I also can’t think straight and I’m exhausted all the time. Is this a fair trade? Am I okay with the fact that my thoughts and feelings seem so far away and out of focus?

  The doctor says it sounds like the medication is working. I ask him if this is how I’m supposed to feel. He says, “Let us try a lower dosage.” I want to tell him there is no “us” here. There is just me and my hijacked brain and the wreckage I’ve left behind. There is just me trapped in this place with no art and no you, while he gets to leave every night to go home to his family and wake up sane.

  From: condorboy

  To: yikes!izzy

  Date: Tuesday, March 20—10:30 PM

  Subject: surprise!

  Dear Isabel,

  Guess what . . .

  I’M COMING TO VISIT ON THURSDAY!

  I’M COMING TO VISIT ON THURSDAY!

  I’M COMING TO VISIT ON THURSDAY!

  Can you see anything out of your window? Sometimes I look out at Seattle and pretend one of the buildings is where you are. I pick a random window and stare at it and pretend I’m looking into your eyes.

  Also . . .

  I’M COMING TO VISIT ON THURSDAY!

  Love,

  Connor

  Day 6

  Some people in here don’t think I should go to college next year. At least not Reed. This nervous, frog-eyed woman named Jill says it’s too much stress, I should stay home, maybe take a couple classes at the community college if I feel up to it, get ten hours of sleep every night, and wear a gas mask when I go outside. Jill’s a hypochondriac and is scared of everything, including water, so I’m not taking advice from her anytime soon.

  But I do wonder about it. What if I’m at school and I go manic and think I can fly and jump off the roof, or what if I get depressed and lock myself in my room and nobody notices until they can smell the stench of my decaying body? I feel fine now, but they’re always warning us about getting too confident, “hubris,” as Jeff the bipolar history professor likes to call it. It’s like they’re trying to make us scared of everything. They say people with bipolar disorder need to be vigilant about keeping track of their moods. Every day I’m supposed to record how I feel in a journal, even several times a day, then report my findings to my outpatient doctor. But it seems like anything could be considered a sign of impending doom; anything can trigger an episode—stress, too much caffeine, not enough sleep, lack of a consistent schedule, arguments with loved ones, loss of a pet, a loud noise, too many donuts, clowns, roller-skating. Maybe not the last few, but you see what I mean. If I start feeling irritable or horny or craving chocolate, I must sound the alert. If I lose my appetite, I should call 911. If I have a headache, I need to check myself in to the hospital. While everyone else is going to be busy worrying about their grades or if some boy likes them, I’m going to be obsessing about every little mood so I don’t lose my mind.

  I’m not sure what I’m doing in this journal, in these notes to you. I’m not sure what you want to hear, or what I want to be telling you. Maybe I’m supposed to be reflecting about my life, figuring out what went wrong, dissecting everything very rationally and coming up with theories and plans and all that logical stuff. Or maybe I’m supposed to just feel my way to sanity, open up and talk about my childhood and my mother and my brother and my fears until they lose all their juice. Maybe all I need is a good old-fashioned cry, and I can catch my tears with this paper and mail it to you. I could do all the exercises in this Cognitive Behavioral Therapy workbook. I could turn them in to you like homework. And the gold stars will pile up—the new tools, the coping mechanisms, the rules to live by. I could lay everything out, draw you an annotated map of my psyche. I could narrate my road to sanity like a nature documentary, English accent and all, very authoritative.

  But no. You must be tired of the Isabel Show by now. And this dramatic plot twist, so contrived. Now is what happens behind the scenes, the real work, the construction and bookkeeping and all that boring stuff. I will do what they tell me. I will take my medications as prescribed. I will go to outpatient therapy three days a week. And then they’ll give me back to the world one piece at a time. I’ll earn my way back in. Little by little, I’ll start to convince people I’m sturdy. And it won’t be a show, it’ll just be me, and that will have to be enough.

  I wonder what it’ll take for you to believe me. What do I have to do to convince you I’m solid, that you don’t have to tiptoe around me with a net, waiting to catch the falling pieces? Connor, you can stop holding your breath now. You can stop losing yourself to keep me standing.

  I saw you that day in the ambulance. Maybe you assumed I was out of my mind and wouldn’t remember, but I do. I saw the exact same face I remember from the summer. Even through your fear, I saw everything I always loved, and for that second I felt like I was in the world again.

  I try not to wonder what you saw. Certainly not the girl you remember. I think about all the almost-plans we made in the last few months, how close we came to meeting again. But I would always sabotage things, wouldn’t I? It was always me canceling our plans. I realize now I was doing it on purpose. I think I
was scared of disappointing you. I was scared of you realizing I’m not who you want me to be. Part of me thought you’d keep loving me only if I could keep you at a distance. Your memories of me are part trees and part ocean and part magic, and I don’t know if I will ever be that girl again. She was the best version of me. Connor, I’m so afraid of you being disappointed. I’m someone else now, someone I’m afraid you won’t be able to love.

  Mom says you’re coming to visit on Thursday. I’m terrified. I don’t want you to see me in here, in this context. For a second I thought of asking her to tell you not to come. The doctor says I can probably go home on Tuesday or Wednesday, so it wouldn’t be too much to wait until I get out in a few days. I built up a whole list of excuses and explanations in my head. But it felt wrong. It’s the kind of thing I’ve been doing my whole life—making excuses, running away from things—but somehow now it feels wrong. So I asked myself what I’m so afraid of. Am I scared of you seeing me in here? Am I scared of you knowing exactly who I am? God, I’m so tired of running and hiding from everything.

  Then I remembered that there’s nothing I want more than to see you right now, and I’m not going to let fear take that away from me.

  From: condorboy

  To: yikes!izzy

  Date: Wednesday, March 21—8:25 PM

  Subject: beautiful

  Dear Isabel,

  The sunset tonight was the red-orange of jellyfish poison, the clouds like tentacles hanging down and stinging the sea.

  I don’t think I’m going to be able to sleep tonight.

  Love,

  Connor

  Day 7

  I keep trying to understand why I did what I did. I try to look back on the moments, the days, the weeks before I took the pills. I try to remember what was going through my head. The weird thing is, I don’t know that I was even really thinking about death. I wasn’t thinking about forever or funerals or being gone for good. I wasn’t thinking about anything in a long-term or permanent way. The only thing that existed was what I was feeling in those short moments. All I can remember thinking was that I wanted a way out. In that moment when I picked up the bottle of pills, I needed relief more than I ever needed anything in my life. I hurt so badly that I was willing to do anything to stop it, and nothing I could think of seemed like it would work. Not drugs, not sex, not running away, not anything. The pain was inside me, and it felt like it was never going to leave, so the only way to kill it was to kill me too.

  And it all seems so temporary when I look back on it. That’s something they say a lot in here: ”Suicide is a permanent solution to a temporary problem.” Most people roll their eyes at the saying, but it scares me every time I hear it.

  And now it’s only a week later, only a handful of days since I was so convinced that I wanted to die, and already I can’t imagine ever feeling that hopeless. I guess a big part of it is the medication starting to work. And maybe part of it is that it’s also just easier to feel better in a place like this. As crazy as it is, at least it’s a break from the outside and full of people who want to help me. The only thing I really have to think about is getting better. Maybe everything will change when I go back home, back to school, back to my same old life. But I don’t think so. At least I hope not. And that’s really the important thing, isn’t it? Hope.

  God, this place has turned me into a cheeseball. Oh well.

  I think of all the people who weren’t as lucky as me—the people whose suicide attempts were successful. They could be alive now and feeling better. They could be trying to work through the things that cause them pain. They could find people to help them. All the people who need medication, who need therapy, the people haunted by horrible memories, the kids getting bullied, the ones who feel so alone—there are solutions for all of them. But I know that sometimes it seems easier to give up than to risk hoping that things can change. Sometimes a person can be so consumed with pain that they can’t see solutions anywhere. But the solutions are there. I know they are. Help and hope are everywhere. I just hope people find them. I hope they at least try looking before they decide to give up.

  Connor, I have so much to say to you. So many sorrys. But maybe before those, there is just thank you. Thank you for loving me. Thank you for saving my life.

  I’m looking out the window and the sunset is something gorgeous. There are about a billion different shades of orange, more than I thought possible. I think I can see the cherry blossoms starting to bloom, and do you know how happy that makes me? There’s a street by my house that’s lined with cherry blossom trees, and every spring when they’re in full bloom, the petals float around and fall to the ground and it’s like a warm, pink snowstorm.

  I can see your island, Connor. I can see Bainbridge. Maybe you’re looking at the same sunset right now. Maybe you’re looking at this hospital, looking at me, and don’t even know it.

  You’re supposed to be here in eleven minutes. Eleven excruciating minutes. I don’t know if I’m going to survive that long.

  I can’t stop looking at the clock on the wall. I considered running. I could make a break for the door when one of the nurses punches in the code. This keeps striking me as a reasonable option, but then I visualize it in fast-motion slapstick, with some kind of ridiculous circus music playing, and all the patients are all lined up in the background doing choreographed kicks. Yes, this is where my mind goes, even when I’m medicated.

  What am I going to do for eleven whole minutes? What’s the best way to appear not crazy? Probably not chewing your nails while sitting on a bed in a psych ward.

  “Isabel, honey.” It is Mandy’s voice. I look over to the door. “You have a visitor.”

  And here you are. Eleven minutes early.

  I thought I would hear you coming. I thought I’d at least have a chance to stand up and put on a smile and try to glamour us out of these surroundings. But you snuck up on me. I don’t know how you did it, but you caught me unguarded, and I try to imagine your first impression, I try to remember what I was doing the moment before now, and I’m pretty sure I wasn’t picking my nose or talking to myself or anything too embarrassing, but I have no idea what my face looks like when nobody’s looking.

  And now here you are, standing in the doorway with a bouquet of bright flowers, and you have a smile on your face that makes me think I know exactly what you looked like as a little boy. And I’m trying not to cry, I really am, I’m holding my breath and trying to keep my smile, but the flowers you’re holding are the brightest things I’ve seen in days, and I think I see a mustard stain on your shirt, the yellow smudge like a sunshine above the forest scene of your ironic “Washington Wonderland” T-shirt. And of all things, that’s what makes me lose it. The mustard stain on your silly shirt. That’s what flips the switch and starts the tears flowing, that’s what opens me up, and something inside me lets go. I don’t know what it is but it feels like flying, and somehow I make it into your arms and feel you warm and solid. You are real, you are actually real. All this time, I’m not sure I really believed it, but here you are in my arms, here you are in my room in the psych ward, and you are not running away.

  I make the rain for your silly T-shirt, I water the trees in your Washington Wonderland. I hold your head in my hands and try to memorize the shape with my fingers, I put my face in your neck and take in the smell of you. I breathe in and let you fill me with calm. I breathe out and look you in the eye.

  “Hi,” you say.

  “Hi,” I say.

  “Nice place,” you say with a grin.

  “Mustard,” I say, pointing out the stain for you.

  “I was saving it for later,” you say. “Hungry?”

  “Not so much.”

  We’re standing in the doorway with our arms around each other. Mandy has disappeared. I’m looking at you and I start to giggle.

  “What’s so funny?” you say, and you are laughing too.

  “How’s this for a first date?”

  “Perfect,” you
say.

  “Very romantic,” I agree.

  “I brought flowers.”

  “Such a gentleman.”

  We separate, and I feel suddenly shy. I think I see you blushing. You hold out the flowers and I take them—vibrant oranges and reds and yellows, exotic flowers I don’t know the names of, all of them unique and beautiful and a little bit wild.

  “No carnations?” I joke.

  “I asked the guy to do all carnations,” you say. “But unfortunately they were out. Seems everyone else in the world already got carnations.”

  “Damn,” I say.

  “Yeah, damn,” you say. You smile. “I guess we’ll have to do something a little different.”

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  I would like to express my gratitude to the book Living with Someone Who’s Living with Bipolar Disorder by Chelsea Lowe and Bruce M. Cohen, MD, PhD (Jossey-Bass, 2010). This book was invaluable to my understanding of what it’s like to love someone with bipolar disorder.

  As always, thanks to my agent, Amy Tipton, and editor, Anica Mrose Rissi, for your smarts, sass, and support. Thanks also to everyone at Simon Pulse for believing in my little books and working so hard for them.

  Thanks to my pal Rachel B.—for having quite possibly the best smile in the whole world, and for your wisdom and generosity.

  Thanks to Nana Twumasi, my friend and Virgo twin—for your superior editorial instincts and attention to detail. You continue to prove that Virgos really are better than everyone else.