Tales from the Mental Hospital

About a year later, I was once again admitted into Summit. The following incident would lead to them asking that I never returned. It was early on a Tuesday morning. It was late November, and it was extremely cold. So cold, in fact, that the MHA responsible for watching us on our smoke break wouldn’t leave the wing lobby, which generally wouldn't be a problem, because the courtyard was fully encircled by the building.

I was in my usual spot, right near the employee entrance/maintenance door, which was set back a bit and offered some shelter from the wind. I leaned back against the door and felt it move. I couldn't believe it, the door wasn't locked. Apparently, the last person to use it hadn't slammed it, so the lock didn’t engage. So, in my infinite underly medicated and completely bored with being hospitalized wisdom, I decided to go for a walk. I pushed the door open and stood on the other side of it for a minute to see what would happen. Nothing. The MHA didn't see me. So, I casually strolled down to the end of the driveway and waited.

Still, no one came. At that point I figured "hey fuck it, I'll walk to the train station and get the hell out of here. So, I'm now walking through downtown Summit looking for the train station, when I hear my name called. I turned around to see 4 MHA's rapidly approaching. At that point I realized the jig was up, and realized there was no way I could outrun all four of them, so I just kept walking until they finally caught up with me.

Of course, being that I was not happy at the prospect of being locked up for Thanksgiving, I resolved that I would not make it easy for them to bring me back. Once they caught up to me and grabbed hold of me, I just relaxed my legs, and basically made them carry/drag me all the way back to the hospital. Once they got me back to the rear entrance, something inside me kicked in and I decided that I would no longer make things easy for them. I put my feet against the door frame, determined not to go back in.

I fought them the best I could, but it was no use at all. I was rather quickly overpowered and dragged inside. A smart person would have just given up at that point, but at the time I was by no means a smart person. I started pulling and struggling to get these guys off me. This only made the situation worse, as I was forced down onto the floor of the wing so the nurse could come and administer the ever popular needle of Ativan into my ass cheek. I continued to try and fight, until a rather large fellow named Abdullah decided the best way to keep me down would to be to use his knee to pin my head to the rug.

After the needle, I continued my struggling, cursing and screaming until the drug kicked in. Once it started to take effect, I began to calm down, and Abdullah took his knee off of my head and helped the others drag me into “the quiet room". The quiet room in Summit was a small room behind the nurse's station, with nothing but a mattress on the floor. I spent about 4 hours in there, sleeping off the Ativan. When I awoke, I was allowed out of the quiet room, but put on 1 on 1.

1 on 1 is the most annoying thing you could possibly be punished with, in my opinion. For the next 24 hours, wherever I went, I had someone with me. Going to the bathroom? Leave the door open. Time for dinner? You have an MHA sitting next to you at the table. Time for lights out? Guess who's in the doorway of your room watching you sleep. Once my 1 on 1 time was over, the rest of my stay was pretty much quiet, and I was discharged about a week or so later. Abdullah was henceforth known among the MHA's as "Abdullah the Butcher", after some professional wrestler or something.