When I arrived in Charlotte, I went to my first recovery meeting in a giant pink church. I called it the Mary Kay church. The group was small and I don’t remember much about what was discussed. After the meeting one of the guys came up to me and gave me his number. He told me to call him if I needed any help. Not having any friends or anything, I decided to get in touch with him later on.
We clicked, and he began taking me to different meetings in town and introducing me to people. He was a musician working odd jobs to get by. He had a Bachelors degree in marketing, but his last job was delivering flowers. I think he had been sober close to a year when we met. I worked with some other people on the 12 steps , but things didn’t work out. Eventually my friend agreed to sponsor me and take me through it.
Reading through the literature and working through the steps, certain things began to click. I knew I had a problem that was beyond my control, but I wasn’t too keen on the spiritual aspect. I still had issues from my upbringing, the voices were still in my head, and there were still shadows crawling around my room every night. I was also very head strong and dim witted, so he had his hands full with me. Fortunately my sponsor told me to stay away from religion for now and just go through the steps. I did what I had to do, but nothing more. I made an inventory, I talked about it with him and I made a half assed attempt at making amends to all the people I hurt, but it was more of me just saying I’m sorry than anything.
Night after night I was on my father’s computer trolling chat sites and surfing porn. I couldn’t sleep at night and I had to keep my mind occupied. I did listen to my sponsor once and went to the mental health center to see about medications and treatment. They tried me on a multitude of medications. Occasionally I would check myself into their emergency department for observation when things got to be too much.
The biggest mistake at this point was getting into a relationship with someone in recovery when I was only a few months in. Needless to say my focus shifted. Now I had someone to spend time with night after night, to get me out of my house and not focused on what was wrong with me. Surprisingly, the relationship didn’t last. At this point we had both been staying at a lady in the program’s house. Two false pregnancies later, I realized what kind of person my girlfriend was, and I took a dark road from there.
I was able to get my own computer and I was still living in this woman’s basement. I spent my time on chat sites and downloading MP3’s. I stopped going to meetings because there was too much drama related to the ex. I became severely depressed and longed for physical relations, so I started meeting with random men so there was no expectations or judgement. There was a lot of sickness in me, and I was headed for trouble. One night I was so distraught over what had happened, that I decided to curse my ex. I took a choker she had left behind, and I cut myself, putting my blood on it. Then I held the choker over a candle flame to burn, while saying something to the effect that I wanted her to feel the pain I felt. The next day she was in a car accident and had cracked her sternum. She was feeling the heartache for sure.
With the guilt of what I had done and constant depression, I didn’t know what to do. I just wanted to sleep and not wake up at this point. I sent an email to my ex and my parent’s stating as much. I proceeded to take all of the medications I had at the time. My father was at the computer when the email went through and he immediately dialed 911. The police and fire department were at the door before the pills ever kicked in. They took me to the hospital where I received charcoal treatment and observation for the overdose. I was none too pleased. If there was a god, why wouldn’t he just let me die. It would be easier for everyone.
I was pretty out of it since they gave me things to calm me down and make me more compliant. Next thing I knew, I was in the nut ward of the hospital unable to leave. They switched up my medications and started talking to me about what happened. I gave the usual explanation, that I just wanted to sleep, I wasn’t trying to kill myself. Eventually they had to let me go. I was forced to return to my parent’s house because the lady I was staying with didn’t want her son to be exposed to my mess. I couldn’t blame her for that.
To be continued…
Evolving Psychosis 