Lindsey Crow

17 November 2016
My Mental Health and Me
This year I was invited to a Halloween party. The costume theme was what scared you
most as a child and I immediately knew I would dress as a sock puppet with yellow yarn hair
and blue button eyes. Not the most common fear in children, but it was one of the worst I had.
How could that be? The doctors say I might have been schizophrenic since I was a child.
When I was put to bed as a little being, the lights would go out and the fear would begin.
I would see a bluish glowing white (with grey tip) sock puppet as described above floating in
front of me. He had a Jamaican accent (which Im guessing I only knew from Disneys The
Little Mermaid) and would throw insults at me. Simple things that now my younger brother
says to me like: You should be dead; the world would be better! and Youre stupid! and a
long list of other childish insults that made me feel horrible. Sometimes, he was accompanied by
his buddy, a ruddy or burgundy colored sock with brown or black button eyes (no yarn hair) and
his accent was dumb. He sounded dumb but his insults still scared me too. There are two other
hallucinations I remember very well from my youth.

I once walked toward the stairs at

nighttime after everyone was asleep and saw a war between skeletons that glowed blue
happening on the steps; they used swords and bows and arrows to fight. I also vividly recall, on
multiple occasions, hearing my mom call me and Id come to see her, only to be told she did not
say anything. I was extremely frightening.

Growing up I knew about my mothers Aunt Eleanor who had schizophrenia and died in
her fifties. I once asked my mother if I had schizophrenia and she simply told me that my
imagination is just overactive. (To be fair, my imagination has always been crazy.)
The hallucinations were not all that I experienced. I was often sad without reason and
would cry while my parents would say there has to be a reason why youre crying! and I knew
there was not. I was afraid to leave my parents side, to leave the house, to fall asleep at night.
These would be the first explained symptoms, they would be labeled as depression and anxiety.
In middle school I began missing weeks at a time. My mom swore it had to do with my
period, but really it was my mental health. My dad figured so long as I was doing well in school,
taking time off was not a problem. While I stayed home, I would have thoughts that I should be
dead, that I should kill myself and everyone would be better off, that I was a terrible daughter
and an awful human being. This led to three attempts at attempting suicide as well as several
bouts of wrist-cutting (though I do not often count myself as someone who self-harmed because
in my case, there are no scars). High school was worse. I slowly gave up on life, assumed I
could be dead any day, debated going to the neighbors to experiment with drugs alongside them.
Junior year came and with it, my first real boyfriend. His name was Joe, he is six
months older than I am, and wowwhat a mistake. The only good thing he did for me, was
one day after I played around with my then thin wrists and a sharp object, he said if I did not
seek help he would break up with me. I was too desperate to lose the first person to take interest
in me, so I obliged and went to the school counselor. To my dismay, she called my parents who
came to the school and took me to the hospital.

My nurse was a Scottish man who I was quite fond of as he was funny and charming in
an odd way. He offered me food and I denied it, he offered me to stay at the hospital and I
denied that though I later regretted it. But that began therapy sessions with the worst therapist of
all: Doctor Jacobi. I picked her because I liked her name but it was not long into the sessions
that I began to hate them. The so-called doctor told me I was the reason why my parents had
trouble and that if I just focused on which condiments to put on the table at dinner time, my mom
and I would not be having issues and my life would be better. I kid you not!
It was the psychiatrist Jean-Beck who told Jacobi to basically fuck off and Jacobi threw a
fit over it, as did my mother. I would go without medications for a year or so. Senior year was
weird. I had lost my mind and looking back I think everyone thought I was crazy. Because,
well, I was. I said very odd things, acted unusual for a human being, and generally was not
normal. It was in my psychology class that I really learned about schizophrenia and applied it to
myself. It resonated with me so well I began considering it outside of school and soon I selfdiagnosed, which I do not advise doing. I began telling people I was schizophrenic and they all
went along with it. Then summer came and I told my dad I wanted to see a doctor again, this
time for depression. It was true, I did have depression.
I began seeing doctors Androphy and Blumberg who I still see to this day. As far as
being a psych patient goes, the experience with them has been wonderful.
This is only the beginning of the story but to keep it short, let me say: I was sentenced to
intensive outpatient therapy twice for about a month at a time.

One time because I was

homicidal and another time for being schizophrenic. More recently, I was inpatient for three
days. It has been a very hard path. Balancing life with it has not been easy.

That boyfriendJoeI absolutely hate him now. It was not so clear when I was with
him, but he was very abusive. He manipulated me, he raped me, he would play smother me
under his pillow and the list goes on. None of this helped my mental health. I see just pictures
of him and I am shaking with fear, glancing around to see he is not following me, trying to
murder me.
November of 2015 marks the last days I spent with him. Thank the Lord I got away. I
found someone who truly loves me and who I love back. Now, things with him are far from
perfect. Disorders cause our relationship to be very up and down, dramatically so. Recently, we
celebrated our one year anniversary. Though the disorders persist, we push onward.
And that is just my personal life.
Work has been hectic for me. My longest job was my first one which lasted only a year
and a half. The rest have been short-lived. I was fairly happy at Schnucks until they fired me
because it just was not a good fit when really they fired me right after I had a panic attack that
I almost recovered from.

Now, I am working with Vocational Rehabilitation and

MERS/Goodwill to get a job. I just interviewed the other day and hopefully I will win the
position. Life finally seems to be turning around.
I do not remember what the point was when I began this little piece. But I have enjoyed
writing it. I now have to take pills daily, something I will have to do all my life. I do not know
if I will be able to have my own children, as I cannot go off my medications but staying on them
could be a risk to the child. That is a matter for later however. For now, I wish to move on to
another topic. I wonder what it will be?

I think I know, I wanted to write about writing and mental illness. Because I have not
been able to write well except when heavily depressed. But now I am tired and do not have
much to say on it, perhaps another time!