Detour from Normal (33 page)

Matthew had reached a point where he could really appreciate what I was going through for him. I think it was an eye-opener to have a stranger care for and sacrifice so much for him out of the goodness of his heart. He asked his brother if he could bring a cell phone to call the nurse and give me some relief. It sounded like a great plan but never happened. The only thing that did happen was that Jose gave him a bell, the kind that sits on a hotel's front desk—you hit the button on top and it goes "ding." The problem was that it was no louder than his frail voice, so it was no help. The only thing that changed was instead of "nurse... nurse...nurse...," now I woke up to "ding...ding...ding..."

I made a decision after that to really hunker down, to give everything I had to Matthew with whatever time I had left at Gracewood. I
would get him graham crackers and drinks, get up at all hours of the night and fetch a nurse for him, eat with him, and be his friend. I would be a perfect angel to him. There would be no reward in it for me; I would probably never see him again after I was released. There would be no happy ending to look forward to; it was just the right thing to do. I wanted to show Matthew how good a person could be. I wanted to continue to push him toward physical therapy so he could get better and perhaps be that good person—that angel—to someone else.

I didn't know if Matthew had ever conceived of such a thing, but here was a chance to open his eyes to it, and I was going to plant that seed in his mind. Here was an opportunity to give him purpose in life and a means of escape from being a burden and rotting in a forgotten bed in the furthest reaches of a darkened room in a psych ward. Over the next few days, I rearranged my life for Matthew.

Chapter 28

COMING OFF ADRENALINE

June 3, 2011: I will always remember that date. I'll remember it because it was the beginning of the end of my mania. Every day at 5:00 a.m. at Gracewood, the "techs," as I called them, made their morning rounds, measuring people's temperatures, taking their pulse rates and blood pressure. For me, that was one of the crudest things because if I was asleep, that was the end of it. After that I could only toss and turn in my bed, or take my pillow out to the main area and hope to find an open sofa. That was often a good change of pace because there was rarely anyone snoring out there. I had to deal with the lights, but most of those were usually turned off. The downside was that the vinyl sofas left a lot to be desired as beds. They were too short, too firm, and rounded. If I did manage to fall asleep, there was a good chance I was going to roll off at some point. The really cruel part of being awakened was that it was only two hours until breakfast. In addition to being awake, I spent that time hungry.

June 3 started no differently than any other day. The door cracked open, and I instinctively hung my arm out for the cuff and opened my mouth for the thermometer. I always watched the machines when they took my blood pressure and heart rate, ever since Desert Hope. I made
a mental note of any significant change. My normal blood pressure was 120/70. When I was in Desert Hope, it was like that all the time. But after surgery it began to climb as the adrenaline took over my body. Now my normal was around 155/85 at rest at 5:00 a.m. No one seemed to think anything of it even though I pointed it out to several professionals. Today things were different. I did a double take when I saw 140/80 on the machine. It didn't mean anything in itself, but over the next few days, the downward trend was hard to deny; the adrenaline (at least that was my assumption) was leaving my system. My blood pressure was returning to normal. The ride was ending, and my body would soon be my own again.

I didn't immediately feel any different. I think it took some time for my body to accept that this change was real, but soon I began to feel the difference. The biggest change was the chatter in my mind. When my brain started coming back on after the mania, it was like a quiet, empty classroom suddenly filling with noisy students or like a freeway going from no traffic to morning rush hour. My clear, focused mind with its crisp memories began to change quickly as it widened to its old self again. There was so much competition for bandwidth that everything bogged down. It became more difficult to memorize and recall things. My jazzed-up senses fell back one by one. I couldn't see or process things quickly anymore. I could no longer sense people's shields and other characteristics as I once could. Everyone seemed to have turned into a cardboard standup. They became flat, and I could only see what was on their paper surface. I missed being manic. I felt like half a person. Even though my mania was subsiding, I still had a big hurdle to jump through before I'd reach the end of my journey: court.

Chapter 29

TAKING THE STAND

A few days after arriving at Gracewood, my psychiatrist pulled me aside and attempted to convince me to take some medication. Considering my bad track record with medications, I refused. This chapter steps back in time to revisit that conversation, then details the aftermath of my decision: having to take the stand in court to defend myself.

The Grievance

On May 29, Dr. Davis tracked me down and asked if I would come with him. He took me to his office, a place I hadn't been since I first arrived and was interviewed by him.

"How are you doing today?" he asked.

"Fine."

"Is everything going OK? Are you having any problems? Have you been feeling all right?"

"I'm doing OK."

Dr. Davis took a seat behind his cluttered desk and directed me to a chair across from him. I obliged him and made myself comfortable.

"The reason I've asked you to my office is that I would like you to start taking lithium, or more specifically, lithium carbonate. It's a mood stabilizer. I use it myself."

"Why do I need to take lithium?"

"Well, I'd like to give you something to prevent something."

That was exactly what he said—nothing more or less. I was very dissatisfied with Dr. Davis's ambiguous response. It didn't sound like a valid reason to take lithium, or any other drug for that matter. "Dr. Davis, my whole life I've avoided drugs, prescription or not. I've never smoked anything, I've never tried any illegal drug, and I rarely even drink. It's not for religious reasons or anything, I just believe that I only get one body with which to live out my life, and I choose not to abuse it. On top of that, I've had a lot of complications from medications lately. As a matter of fact, the only medication I trust is Ativan, and I only take that sparingly. If lithium was something that came in an over-the-counter multivitamin, I'd be glad to take it, but it doesn't. You haven't given me a good enough reason why I need to take it, so I don't wish to."

"I understand that, but you really should give it a try. It works very well for me."

"I'm sorry, Dr. Davis, I don't want to take it," I said adamantly.

"OK," he said with frustration in his voice.

That was the end of our private discussion. The next day I received written notice that I was to appear in court. In Gracewood, everyone had the right to refuse their medications, but if they did, they risked a court order forcing them to take them. A typical scenario went like this: first, we'd receive notice that a court date would be assigned for a hearing (the notice I had just received); second, we'd wait up to ten days before we received an actual court date; and third, we'd wait up to ten more days
for our actual appearance in court. After the appearance, if we were court-ordered to take medication, Gracewood would monitor us for a time to make sure the medication was effective.

By refusing to take lithium, I had potentially added twenty-five days or more to my stay. That didn't faze me. It was a small sacrifice to protect my body. Fortunately, I received my notice of a court date in only a few days, on May 31. The actual hearing was about a week after that, on June 7. I don't know for certain if I would have been released more quickly if I had agreed to take the medication, but I was dead set against taking any without good reason. I wanted to fight being forced to take unwarranted medication more than I wanted to get out. The next day, after receiving the initial notification, Dr. Davis passed by me near the nurses' station.

"Have you changed your mind yet?" he asked with a smirk.

If I had been a different type of person, I would have decked him. Instead I just said, "No."

When I received notification of my court date, I also received a brochure from the Maricopa County Public Defender's office with the name of my public defender for my case. In addition I received a copy of the petition that had landed me in Gracewood as well as two psychological profiles written by Dr. Davis and another psychiatrist, Dr. Borova. Both documents borrowed heavily from the petition from the crisis team that had originally forced me into the PDC and Gracewood. It seemed that the psychiatrists could only see me through the eyes of the crisis counselor.

What I read was shocking. The petition from the crisis counselor included such comments as "He physically assaulted his wife"; "He lay in the street in a fetal position"; "He ran around the neighborhood late
at night ringing doorbells and hiding behind bushes"; "He purchased a dream car, then went out and attempted to purchase another." I noticed in particular two boxes that were checked: "Patient is a danger to himself and "Patient is a danger to others." In addition there was another statement that stood out: "Persistently or acutely disabled." Those were the reasons I was in Gracewood, a place for people who were a danger to themselves and others.

The problem with the statements in the petition was this: they were lies. Unbeknownst to my family and me, the crisis counselor had taken bits of truth and distorted them to make me look both insane and dangerous in order to ensure that I'd be placed in a maximum-security facility, which I would be unable to leave. I was crushed. I couldn't believe what I was reading. I'd never had anyone make such claims against me before. To make matters worse, according to the paperwork, my wife and my older brother were going to be witnesses against me in court. I called my public defender immediately and made an appointment. He agreed to meet with me at Gracewood on the morning of June 6.

The Preparation

The evening before my attorney arrived, I collected my court documents, some blank paper, and two stubby pencils from the plastic cubby by my bed. Then I asked Jose if I could borrow a roll-around cart and a chair so I could sit and review my legal documents in private. He got me the cart and chair, and I asked if I could place them in the hall outside my room where it was quiet. "No problem," he said. I thanked him, sat down, and got to work. Moments later the charge nurse, a very strict
black woman with close-cut hair and a permanent scowl, came walking back. She crossed her arms and looked at me sternly.

"It's against regulations to have that table and chair back here. You'll have to put them back," she said.

"But I'm reviewing my court documents," I pleaded, pointing to the small stack of papers that lay in front of me.

"You can work at a table in the main area."

"It's too noisy out there. My case is on the seventh. My attorney is coming by tomorrow to talk to me about it, and I need a quiet area where I can review the documents and take notes."

"I'm sorry, it's against rules."

"Could I use one of the quiet rooms?"

She turned and looked at the empty room that had to be less than six feet away. "Well, OK, but you can't have the chair. You can take the cart in."

I thanked her as she turned and took the chair away. I rolled the cart into the quiet room and up against the steel-framed bed. I sat cross legged on the mattress and pulled the cart in front of me. As I waded through the documents, I circled or underlined things I thought were important and wrote questions for the attorney on the blank sheets.

As I worked it occurred to me that I'd seen plenty of other patients go to court, but I'd never seen anyone studying their paperwork before. I was probably one of the few with high enough function to be able to do so. After an hour and a half, I was finished, ready for my attorney.