Mama Bear

Shayne had a psychotic break again.  I could feel it building and tried to get in front of it, but as usual it was difficult to get immediate services. The way the system works is that treatment happens when patients are a danger to themselves or others, and preventive measures are not a thing.  Shayne didn’t help the situation because he wasn’t being consistent with his meds. He was well enough that he decided that he wasn’t really schizophrenic after all.  And he is a runner, both the kind that can move down a trail at a good clip for hours and the kind that makes a break for situations that are uncomfortable.  So when he perceives a threat, he runs away.

The key is to getting the help before the fight or flight kicks in.  I got him to the hospital at the beginning stages, so he was ready to run, but he also still trusted me.  It was like leading a wary, gun shy thousand pound horse with just a halter and a lead, if a horse like that spooks and bolts,  there probably isn’t going to be a damn thing you can do and you might just get injured in the process.  When Shayne got to the hospital room in the ER, I was asked to put my stuff in a locker and I stepped away from Shayne’s side.  I put down the reins.  He was quiet for one minute then started screaming that he was in an oven and bolted.  Big, burly security guards poured from all sides and engulfed my son.  He screamed that they were killing him and he pleaded with God to save him.  It took seven men to hold my 135 pound son in that hallway.  They got him down on the ground and held his cheek against the linoleum.  I leaned against the doorway watching, no tears, no emotions.  Numbness is where I go.  It’s my survival strategy.

This is the part of the story where I skip what happens next–no one needs to have those images in their heads and I don’t need to relive them in writing.  When I was able to be by my son’s side again, he was strapped to a bed and sweaty and trembling and he didn’t recognize me.  I touched his forehead and he closed his eyes, and said, “Are you my mom?  Am I Shayne?”  I sat close to him until I thought he was into his drug induced coma, but when I moved from the bed, his eyes sprang open.  So I sat down with him again and stayed next to him for hours.  He didn’t sleep, but he calmed down and the restraints were removed.  Three years ago, I would have stayed all night, not let him out of my sight.  But I know now, that I have to get sleep if I can, I have to trust that medical people can do their jobs and keep him safe.  I went home after midnight.  I should have known that I was keeping Shayne on that bed, because after I left he tried to run again and again, and I returned a few hours later, he was strapped to the bed again.  The facility in Pueblo decided Shayne was too acute for their services, so he was transported to Denver.  If I had known where he was headed, I would have fought like hell to keep him in Pueblo, but instead I held his hand like he was six and walked him down to the transport car outside. He pinkie swore that he wouldn’t run away.  We’re big on pinkie swears.  I thought he’d be okay.

The mental health ward at Denver Health was a scene from fifty years ago.  It was dirty; the tables were sticky.  There was a green substance smeared on the glass in front of the nurses station.  The furniture was hard and molded out of plastic and smeared in paint and dried food.  There was one tiny plastic drawer thing of broken crayons and ripped coloring pages from a kid’s coloring book.  There was no exercise equipment or anything to do but watch a giant screen TV.  There were several staff members, but they were all kind of congregated together, except for one nurse who was obviously attached to a man. She followed a foot behind him all around the word.  She was a tiny slip of a girl, and he was well muscled and powerful, it was easy to see who had the control in that situation.  There was no privacy and no area where I could visit with Shayne without other patients invading our space.  One woman followed us around from table to table to couch, asking an endless amount of questions and drooling on us.  No one redirected her or made her stop touching Shayne.  I have been in psych words before, and this is not how they have to be.  Shayne was still groggy from all the drugs he had been given to bring him out of psychosis, but there is no way he is going to heal in that environment.  I am so tired of incompetency in mental health care.  It brings mama bear out of hibernation.