Quiet Room - Lori Schiller [93]
This time, though, the journals meant much more to me. In my journals I could tell myself all the scary things I could tell no one else. I could use the journals to keep a record of how I felt from day to day, or even from hour to hour and bring some order to the chaos of my mind.
On May 10, 1988, I began my first journal with a scream of pain and rage:
May 10, 1988—I feel like I'd rather kill myself than fight it out here … I have come to terms that I'll never lead a normal life again. I'm a crippled loser with no future. I hate everybody. It's everyone's fault that I'm sick and I'm not going to pound my head against the wall blaming myself all the time for my illness.
May 11, 8:10 A.M.—Everyone hates me. I'm ignored, made fun of, despised by all — patients and staff. I have no one to talk to except Dr. Fischer & even she is getting sick of me.
May 11, 6:05 P.M.—I am feeling very paranoid, very afraid of people especially the staff. I feel that they want to hurt me bad because I am an evil person. The voices give me headaches sometimes.
May 11, 7:55 P.M.—Please dear God take me. I feel bad again. I wish for relief Oh boy, I can't breathe.
May 14—They started in on me in the night, and now they're bothering me a lot. They say I have to die, that I must die, and that I'm a worthless piece of shit. I'm scared again. It was really quiet and then they exploded. It's hell. HELL!!!
And then one sunny spring afternoon I ran away.
I had been doing pretty well, actually. I had been allowed to go off the locked ward to visit the library with a group of other patients. When the Voices started urging me to run, I tried to get the attention of the group leader to let her know I needed help.
I guess she didn't understand what I was saying. Or didn't realize that when I started punching the air that I was fighting off the Voices. Or that when I began yelling “Get the fuck out of here!” I was yelling at the Voices—and that I was echoing their commands to me.
I was getting more agitated by the second. The Voices were shouting, egging me on. I couldn't stop them. They took control … and I bolted.
Running felt good. For so long I had wanted to run as fast as I could. I didn't know where I was running to but I did know where I was running from. The hospital is laid out in campus-like buildings on fifty acres. I headed through one of the parking lots and out toward the back hospital driveway. I headed away from the main hospital gate that opened out onto the busy Blooming-dale Road. Instead, I headed for the back entrance at the south side of the complex.
When I got off the hospital grounds, I suddenly had no idea where I was. It wasn't a route I normally followed; besides, it had been so long since I had been out on my own. My heart was pounding and I could barely hear the screaming Voices over the sound of my own panting. Still, the sun was strong and the day warm. That seemed like encouragement.
I was wearingjeans and my blue and white shirt. My suspenders were hanging down by my sides. I had been given back my shoes for the trip to the library, so I was wearing my white high-tops. I just decided to keep walking with no plan in mind, feeling more and more confused and uncertain. “What the hell do I do now?” I began to think. The landscape was unfamiliar. I couldn't find my way. I didn't know what my next step would be. I walked and walked.
Finally I came to a church I vaguely recognized. Maybe we had passed it driving when I was younger, or had gone by it without paying it much notice when my parents came to take me out on pass. Our Lady of Sorrows Church—a particularly fitting name, I thought. At least it was a place to sit down. I walked in and dropped down into a pew.
The Voices were quieter now. I had a chance to think. What were my options? I could think of three, and I pondered each one: I could return to the hospital and turn myself in. I could walk to the nearest overpass and throw myself off. Or I could walk home and beg Mom and Dad to let me stay there with them. I didn't