Notes From a Psychotic Breakdown
A week in hell
--
This story was originally written in May of 2019. It was not the last or my latest psychotic break but one of the few times I had the presence of mind to document it. Tread carefully and read at your own risk.I’m not well. I don’t even know if I’ll be able to finish this tonight, but I have to try. I have to try to make sense of the thoughts and feelings swirling around in my head.
My mind is in chaos. Voices are gibbering at the edges of where my subconscious meets the stuff I form to make sense of the things that are happening right now. I hardly know what I’m writing, but I’m going to continue pounding on the keyboard with my index fingers until something like sense starts to print itself on the page.
About a week ago, I knew something was very wrong. The signals in my brain were all mixed up. It was more than the panic and anxiety that had filled me every day since my episode last month. It was something dark at the fringes, and instead of running scared to my bed, I took to Facebook. I decided that I wasn’t going to let another chance for me to document the insanity of my episodes go by without doing something.
May 21, 2019, at 9:01 am
I was going to do my usual thing and complain because my brain is shit and I can’t go any amount of time without spiraling down, but I realized that whining only makes things worse.
I am trying to write. It’s all I want to do. Sometimes I can get out a paragraph, but most of the time it’s a word or two. This will be the most I’ve been able to get out today.
I don’t want to give in to despair, but it’s hard to keep a positive attitude when I’m trying my best, but I keep getting poked with the shitty end of the stick.
I know I’m farther along than most people who have the same diagnosis. Many people I know with an illness this severe are so heavily medicated, that they can’t get out of bed.
I fight the voices, the anxiety, the panic, the depression, and the random racing thoughts. I fight it every minute of every day. I stuck my middle finger in the face of the doctors who told me I would end up institutionalized.
I have a family and a life, but I’m barely holding it together.
Thanks for listening. I didn’t want to turn this into a rant, but I’m sick and tired. I can’t control my mind. All I want to do is work to support my family and have some measure of happiness and fulfillment.
I’ll keep battling, but I’m weary.
I’d been fighting for a few days and felt like giving up. I knew this was the beginning of something too difficult to explain. I was depressed because I wanted to write, but the words wouldn’t come. They were stuck in the darkness, and no amount of coaxing would bring them out.
I felt myself slip farther down, but I was unable to stop it. The next few days would find me drowning, coming up for air, and vomiting on Facebook, before descending into the depths again.
May 21, 2019, at 5:20 pm
All I feel is pain.
I can’t tell the passage of time. The clock says 5, but it means little. The noise and voices and hate boiled and bubbled until the noise was so painful I thought I might pass out. There was an explosion in my head, and I could feel myself dying. Fires still burn. Every little noise is a hot knife being twisted in my brain. The feel of the sheets on my skin is like someone pouring scalding water over me. The pain is so intense that I am struggling to hold down the contents of my stomach.
I feel I may die. I don’t know if the visions in my head or my heart beating out of my chest will kill me first.
I don’t know what to do.
I wasn’t suicidal, but I felt like at any moment I might just die. I was sweating, and my heart was beating furiously. During those moments, I don’t know how I kept it together, but I did. I grabbed on to whatever I could and kept treading.
It was a minute-by-minute thing, and there were moments when I didn’t think I could go on. I did. I made it one minute, then another. Then it was hours.
May 21, 2019, at 6:21 pm
Worry. Flora is worried. I can tell. She shouldn’t have to deal with this. She should be taking care of herself and the 7-month-old baby in her stomach. Instead, she’s worried if I’m suicidal. She doesn’t know if she should leave me alone.
I’m trying to hold it together. Every time the dog barks, it feels like 30 people screaming in my head. I have my earbuds in, but nothing is playing. I can only stand the music for a short time until I hear the messages, and it just adds to my confusion.
Nothing feels real. I’m floating, and only the noise is holding me above water.
Stop. Just stop…
After I took my evening medication, I started to calm down a bit. But it was only enough to make my situation all the more unbearable to withstand.
May 21, 2019, at 9:00 pm
My nighttime medication took some of the edge off, but I’m concerned that it is not working as it should. My episodes are becoming more frequent and getting more intense. I’m worried that not only are the voices getting louder, but my anxiety is taking over my life. I also am having a hard time processing reality. Things are very confusing. Are my pills not working or are the words the doctors said all those years ago coming true? They said it would get worse.
I worry too much I know, but the voices still tell me I don’t worry enough. Screw them. I have a life, and nothing will take it away. I’ve scared my family enough for now.
I will sleep tonight and write about it tomorrow. I will continue fighting like I always do.
Goodnight.
I did sleep for a few hours before Zoey woke me because she had a toothache. I gave her some medicine but was left to the mercy of my mind. Some of the worst times in this episode happened as I was lying in bed that night, unable to sleep.
May 22, 2019, at 4:30 am
I slept until Zoey woke me. She has a toothache. I gave her medicine, but now I’m alone with the voices and the noise. This headache has been with me the whole time, but the pain is keeping me grounded in reality. I’m having a hard time figuring out what is real and what’s not. I can’t separate my own voice from the others.
Anxiety is horrible. I can’t deal with how sensitive I am to everything. Even the sound of the crickets outside is echoing painfully in my head. My skin is irritated where my back is touching the sheets. This sucks.
Depression is crushing me with its cold, black hand. I’m trying to reach out to others and not let it consume me, but I find it hard to explain everything that is happening to me. I find it hard to speak, but writing does help, even if I have to type on my phone with shaking hands.
I slept again for a short time before waking with a terrible migraine. I had a lot on my mind, and I spent some quiet moments talking to Flora before I took to Facebook again.
May 22, 2019, at 9:00 am
With a new day, I have another chance to move past this episode. Flora and I were talking quietly as Zoey slept. She asked if I thought I was pushing myself too hard. I didn’t want to answer because I don’t want to admit that I can’t work. I don’t want to admit that I don’t have the chance to be financially successful. I don’t want to admit that I can’t push myself too hard anymore because I’m sick.
All I want to do is write. I want to be able to use the talent I have been developing to make life more comfortable for my family. I want to give them everything they ever dreamed of. I can give them love. That’s free. But I want to give them what only money can buy. Is that selfish? Is it selfish to want to be well enough to have the chance to make my family happier?
Frankly, I am sick to death of being sick. I am 50 years old, and I have been dealing with shit for far too long. I destroyed my first marriage. I almost destroyed my three boys, but they were smarter than me. They moved on and did what they had to do. They didn’t let the difficult childhood I gave them ruin their life.
The boys were smart, and I am happy for the men they turned out to be.
But as hard as I try to think positive, I can’t change the fact that I’m schizophrenic. I’m riddled with anxiety. I’m depressed. I can’t be normal, and I never will be. When I say normal, I don’t mean society’s version of normalcy. I mean a healthy person who isn’t sick.
I’ll never be that guy.
Now I’m getting to the place where I’m complaining. I hate being a whiner. I don’t want pity. I don’t want to feel sorry for myself. I own this shit. I am what I am. And I’m not complaining because I want everyone to feel sorry for me.
I want to rage against the unfairness of it all, but the fact is some people have it much worse than I do. Back when I was in a mental hospital for the first time, I met a young woman named Keri. She was horribly schizophrenic. Paranoid. She wouldn’t feed herself because she was afraid she was being poisoned. She had a feeding tube, which she pulled out all the time. She was under constant supervision. She had been in hospitals her whole life and would be for as long as she lived.
That could have been me, but it wasn’t. I had periods in my life that she would have considered normal. I’ve been lucky enough to have two families in my life. After I screwed up the first one, I was given the chance for another. And even though I almost lost that one too, many times, I still have people who love me.
I almost succeeded in ending it all, but I lived. I had jobs and careers, I had family and kids. I had chances at happiness where other people didn’t.
I shouldn’t complain, but I want more. I want more for the woman who put all her faith in me even when she was scared. Flora didn’t know what she was getting into when I showed up here 8 years ago. Her family struggles to understand what I go through.
I want more for them. I want more for me.
Is it too much to ask?
My thinking was cluttered, and it took my wife to set me straight about what she wanted from me in life.
May 22, 2019, at 10:12 am
Flora proves to me every day that she loves me. She needs me. She is upset that I feel I have to give things to her. This is what she said:
“…just because you can’t be like the other men out there, doesn’t mean you are any less of a man.”
Flora never made demands. She is happy with what I can provide. We are not poor, just broke. She wants me, not a new iPhone or BMW. She wants me to know we are in this together. If I can’t work, she will. Whatever happens, we will have gone through it together.
How can I ask for anything more?
I spent another day fighting and another night tossing and turning. My migraine only got worse as the days passed.
May 23, 2019, at 7:19 am
I didn’t think it could get worse, but it did. I’m losing the ability to turn my thoughts into words and phrases. I’m trying to ground myself, but this migraine is making reality seem far away.
I’m losing my grip. I’m alive.
I thought if I could get out of bed and get outside for some sun, I would feel better. We needed to run a few errands, so I loaded us up and took off for the day. It would turn out to be one of the scariest and most painful days I’ve ever had, but I was better for having done it.
May 23, 2019, at 5:10 pm
We left the house today to take care of a few things that we’ve been putting off. I had a migraine bad enough to make me cry. Thankfully even though there was nausea, I didn’t throw up. We spent some time in the mall, even though the noise and the people were causing me extreme stress. I panicked the whole time, but I can happily say, I was brave enough to get through.
I feel a little better for having done it. My headache is still there, but I don’t feel like crying anymore. My head has cleared a bit, and I’ve even started replying to comments and posts. I don’t know if this break will last into the night, but I like it.
I’m going to see my new doctor on Saturday morning. I have a feeling something will have to be changed with my antipsychotic, and I am going to take everyone’s advice and ask to be put on Sertraline for my anxiety and depression. I don’t know what else the doctor will suggest.
I hope she won’t suggest that I be hospitalized, because I don’t think I need it this time. I feel it’s healthier for me to be with my family, dealing with this together.
Wish me luck!
More time passed. I waited for the time when I could see the doctor. I went about my business and tried to be as active as possible. My headache decreased to a manageable level until I woke this morning with a hopeful heart.
May 25, 2019, at 6:30 am
It’s Saturday morning, 6:30 am. First, coffee. Then, Flora is seen by her OB. Every two weeks now that it’s getting close to the due date. At 10:30, I see my new doctor. I’ve never met her. I only know that she is one of the few psychiatrists on this island.
I will hope for the best.
I’ve been in this position in the past many times. I’ve been so mentally sick that doctors felt the need to medicate every bit of creativity out of me. They don’t know what else to do with me. Most have never seen a case as serious that still was walking around living a normal life. Most people with hallucinations can’t mix with the public. Most people who panic have trouble going to crowded places.
I do, but I have a measure of control. I’ve learned not to be “crazy.” Otherwise, people will treat you like patient zero.
I only hope that I don’t get medicated into a stupor. I just want to write. I don’t want to be a walking bag of skin again.
Been there done that.
But the day was not a good one. I didn’t get to see the doctor, and it left me feeling depressed and unmotivated.
May 25, 2019, at 3:00 pm
As usual, when you are dealing with the mental health system, no matter where you are in the world, shit happens. Before my wife had her appointment, we went to sign up for my 10:30 visit with the doctor. Guess what? No doctor today! They set clinic hours then pull the rug out.
Good thing I’m not suicidal.
I’ve come to expect this in my years trying to connect with psych doctors. It’s especially bad here in the Philippines because they are stretched so thin. We tried texting other doctors, but no one is available. So I’m SOL until next Saturday. That is unless the doctor cancels. It could be longer.
I’m dead if I ever have a crisis.
I’m disappointed, but there is nothing I can do. It’s a good thing I’ve leveled off today. Yes, there is the anxiety and the depression, but the noise and voices in my head are quieter. They are there but at the fringes.
I’m going to try to write today. I’ve thought about telling the story of the last week, maybe using my Facebook posts as flashbacks. I’d like to do this while it’s all fresh in my mind, but my focus is terrible.
I’m going to try anyway.
I didn’t end up writing anything else today until I sat to write this. I was feeling so demoralized, and the noise in my head was still at a level where I couldn’t focus long enough to get a thought out.
I spent the day with Flora in bed watching Z-Nation on Netflix and resting my brain with a little mindless entertainment.
Here I am, typing the last of my thoughts with the last bit of energy and focus I have left.
I am hopeful that this will not stretch into another week. I feel good that I was able to get this down on a document, even though most of it was copied/pasted from Facebook.
I told my story, and it was the only thing I really wanted to accomplish today.
I’ve had many episodes since then and many are like this one. I often have trouble writing and expressing myself. Thankfully, this past year these events don’t happen as often or with the same fierceness. Thankfully, most times I can manage to live my life with only depression and anxiety. At least it’s not voices. The damn voices.Thank you for reading.
