Depression and Agitation

 I shut down.  I was on a high in New Orleans, not sleeping, talking fast, driving faster, but with every high comes a low.  The appearance of Chris was met with silence, my own and the voices.  I only went to work and came home and went to bed.  At work I was zombic.  My students noticed it and I felt like my life was not mine anymore.   My life belonged to everything happening to me.  I was simply a passive observer.  With my depression came agitation. The target was my biggest ally and down to this very day, I am so sorry for that.  

My sister and I had just gotten my stuff out of storage before my time in NOLA.  Picture the scene.  There are boxes everywhere.  We were in the kitchen, so there was a great deal of glass around us.  Those days are fuzzy.  The doctors thought I was bipolar so I was on Is Seroquel.  I am not a psychiatrist so I don’t know all the details of the drug.  I only know what I experienced.  I was groggy and tired.  Looking the drug up now, it says it is even used to treat insomnia. I was taking that in the morning. It made me slow down but did nothing for the voices and hallucinations. 

As we stood in the kitchen looking at the vast amount of stuff surrounding us, my sister said something that offended me.  Remember, I was medicated at the time so I can’t recall everything.  I went berserk! I started screaming and throwing things.  The poor wine glasses on the counter were now on the floor. My sister left the room and I was left with my crazy.  I sat in the glass, took a piece, and tried to slit my wrist.  I was too weak, thank God. 

“Kill yourself”. 

I looked over and a little girl with creamy skin, rosy cheeks, Shirley Temple curls, and patent leather Mary Janes was scowling at me.  She was an oxymoron.  She looked sweet but the words coming out of her mouth were completely bitter and cruel. To be so cute, she looked so evil.  I dropped the glass. 

“What did you say?” I asked.  In the beginning, I rarely engaged the hallucinations. However, I was still heated from earlier and I wanted answers.

“Kill yourself, just do it!” She commanded. 

Surprisingly, her command made me snap out of it.  I didn’t really want to die, I just hated my life. I was too sick to change it though. I stood up slowly, keeping one eye on the girl.  I grabbed a broom and started sweeping, avoiding the stove area where the girl planted her feet. I reached down to grab the dustpan and when I looked up, she was gone.  I never learned her name, she wasn’t as nice as Chris, who told me his name. I called her Cissy, don’t ask me why. 

Cissy was a wake-up call.  If I wasn’t going to kill myself I had to make my life livable. This is a lesson I’m still learning, almost six years later.  For example, I’m terrible with organization and I am studying it and am doing things bird by bird. It’s a process.  When I feel that the job is unsurmountable, like that mountain we need to climb, I get paralyzed. However, taking it little by little bits of help.  My life is not back to normal, I don’t even know what normal means. But I can vividly remember Cissy’s piercing glare while she commands that I kill myself. 

I did not go to my sister.  I do not think it was pride, but remorse.  I wanted to give her space.  I started unpacking the kitchen.  I looked up and hours passed.  The kitchen was unpacked and then I cleaned it.  I put the china in the china cabinet.  Then I looked down and saw the kitchen table. I put it together and cleaned the whole house.  It was 3am and I wasn’t tired.  

Why, hello mania.