Mental Episodes
In the planning of this manuscript "Breaking the chains", I would wish to let the reader conclude what is real and what is unreal. I can promise though that there will be passages that are so shocking that you, the reader, will find them hard to believe and would find it easier to choose make believe, or should I say madness. I am happy to let you decide or choose for yourselves. I have been searching for a safe therapeutic way to exorcise the experiences from the pain deep inside my subconscious. I now believe my physical and mental pain, treated by prescribed morphine medication, is caused by these deep experiences and I need to find this safe outlet to enhance my general well-being. My faith in myself and my God is being challenged. There is no easy comfort for me in these difficult dark days. Though I am comforted I have found friends who are helping me find a safe voice with careful planning and expression.
Kay Reed February 2013
MADNESS
I have been where madness reigns.
I became a part of it.
And I was it.
The acute ward opened up a deep precipice and I had no resilience. I tumbled into that precipice of Satan’s blackened home of flames for eternity. There was no way out with Satan’s blood in my veins and I believed I was carrying his young in my detached womb.
Autumn 2004
Why I considered recalling episodes was mainly to help others come to terms with theirs. I cannot remember the order I experienced these episodes but I believe they may be valuable in helping others still struggling mentally; they are not alone and this may be a source of comfort to them. Patients find it difficult to regain well-being and self esteem. Patients living alone or caring for families all struggle. Monitoring medication is a big problem. I am lucky, I have a nurse and my husband supervises all medication for my complex health difficulties, including bi polar.
Care in the Community is very complex and very expensive. Also I have been told beds are cut and staff. Mental illness should be treated as a priority in the National Health Service. Suicide is on everyone’s lips and topical in local newspapers. The link between homelessness and suicide should never be overlooked and lately ex- armed servicemen. Because many issues are being swept away in hiding it is becoming a large drain on resource and lives are at risk here. Poverty and loneliness must never be ignored. Recreational drugs are so easily accessible and so damaging mentally on and off all psychiatric wards. I saw myself how easily drugs were passed over during visiting and through windows.
Psychotic Episode 1
I am a child of my Father in Heaven. I wish I was worthy of this title and I genuinely believe I have been a bad person trying so hard to be good for most of my 60 year life span. This is a difficult set work for me because it conjures up the age old subject of good and evil, and my myriad of fluctuating extremes of mental distress during the major mental breakdown in a local acute psychiatric ward, where I was detained under the Mental Health Act for 6 months. I was very ill and only now am able to recall acute episodes and the super strength I empowered in my body. During these highly disturbing periods I was frog-marched to a padded room after forcing open a closed door, where the staff were unable to restrain me from kicking a police officer. I was held down by a large number of staff when I had a forced injection that did not work.
Now I feel safe to explore and touch on this piece of work, without causing myself distress by sharing this super sensitised general experience. I felt totally alone and isolated from everything around me; people and my environment. I was highly emotionally charged and extremely frightened. I hit out at strong male nurses and managed to hurt them. Even two male nurses, one either end carrying me, were in great difficulty trying to take me indoors from a garden area they failed to prevent me smashing closed an outside door. They were my enemies preventing me from speaking to my Father in Heaven in the Skies, who was coming down to fetch me and carry me Home with Him.
I also believed the husband I once married was waiting for me there to marry me again. I believed I was suitably dressed as his bride. I had torn down a pale blue curtain which I believed was beautiful and powerful. This I draped over my nightdress and believed it would protect me from all evil. I used small pink rosebuds and herbal flowers to dress my hair and arranged a floral bouquet. When I was forced indoors, kicking silently and violently, I noticed the pink rosebuds had fallen from my hair on to the pathway riddled with cigarette stubs, outside the glass door. I begged the nurses to let me have my rosebuds back, but they refused to do so. I was totally bereft; stripped of everything I held dear, my pink rosebuds.
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Psychotic Episode 2
I leapt out of bed. Satan was in there. His evil spirit has disappeared into the mattress. I hurriedly stripped the bed, carefully folding each sheet and cover. The rubber covered pillow was particularly evil with death in it. Quickly and methodically I examined every item in the room I occupied in this acute psychiatric ward. I placed my neatly folded clothes at the base of my wardrobe and the worn slippers I discarded in a black ash bag. All items containing chemicals or were inflammable belonged to Satan and were also discarded in the black bag for disposal. Soon the evil in the bag began burning through and formed holes. The bedding was neatly stacked on the bed because it was contaminated by Satan.
I turned the mattress searching for coded numbers and letters. I found a label and also the year 2002; the mattress was two year old. I began decoding mathematically my mind became highly sensitised and powerful. This was all done by memory mentally. And all this important procedure had to be completed by nine o’clock am. Satan would be exorcised from the bed to the bathroom at the final decoding.
As this approached, I began stamping my feet from side to side and chanting the code. Suddenly, when I knew Satan would enter the bedroom from the bathroom at 9:00am,I turned to face him, when I erupted in a loud scream and urinated in abject terror. When I stopped screaming, a nurse’s face appeared in the window of the door and entered. I apologised for the mess on the floor and she cleaned it up. She told me to shower in the bathroom where Satan lived. I wasn’t being brave, I had no choice. I was standing on the very edge of Satan’s abyss; my next hell. I was a fallen angel and very ashamed of it. I needed to hide away; but there was no hiding place for me.
This episode happened not long after I was sectioned in the ward and the first of many. I was discharged 5 months later and remained in a locked ward for about 3 months of those 5. I was well on my way to becoming a casualty of my own psyche. I believed there was nothing left to fear. How wrong could I have been!
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Psychotic Episode 3
Here we go again; a flashback to a different world, a distant time. Yes, I am there; an acute psychiatric ward; a locked door. This is a distinct problem for me; I have no rights as a detained patient and would not be allowed out for a number of months. Today, I am in a roller coaster of madness from one high to another intermingled with a certain type of semi-sanity. Nothing is real anymore; I do not know where I am now. Who are these people in my new world?
But there is one I care about, a sort of a friend; she runs about manic, wild hair; wild eyes. She holds in her arms a distended stomach. Satan’s child was exorcised earlier from me with my waters and entered her virgin womb. She needs me. She will die. My new powers of mind and spirit will save her from the birth of the animal growing fast inside her. I watch as she runs to the bathroom screaming for help, “The baby’s coming! The baby’s coming!” She has no idea of the truth I know. She needs me. I need to prepare.
In my room I create a bizarre outfit complete with headdress. I feel I fulfil the part to act as her Saviour. I tear down the remaining azure blue curtain to protect myself and my friend from Satan. I noticed my pink rosebuds had been saved by some kind person and lay waiting for me to use their purity and love. I will use them to save my friend’s life in the birth. I cup the rosebuds and run up the corridor, to the bathroom, with the curtain covering my head and body for God’s protection from Satan.
I find my friend screaming as she sits on the toilet. I run frantically begging for help in a haphazard way. Some nurses, including a large male, reached the bathroom before me and closed the door, which I kicked open and forced with my left side. My friend lay prostrate on the floor; I placed the curtain over her open legs and scatter rosebuds for the Saviour to protect her from the animal she is giving birth to. Satan is nearby watching. I am distraught with fear and terror for my friend. I am removed and run to the herb garden. I reach my arms to the Heavens and call pleading to my God and Father repeating,
“Come Father come! Save my friend! Come Father!”
My friend appears fully recovered and startles me. I scream, I urinate over the ground and my clothes. I go to my room and discard the bizarre outfit to shower with much fear. I feel Satan nearby. I have no further memory of this day.
And my stay on the ward is peppered with episodes of varying importance yet valuable in each way. Time was confused as I was experimented with different treatments and on-going sleepless nights.
Kay Reed 12.5.2012
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Psychotic Episode 4
The night is fast approaching and I sit in fear away from the room that holds terrible memories of previous nights. I’m unsure how long I have been here but I feel unsafe and unsound. There was an episode when I heard either demons wailing or angels crying. Unfortunately, I couldn’t tell the difference such was my mental state; I do believe I was decoding at the time and highly disturbed. I do hope it doesn’t happen again; it frightened me because it seemed so real.
It is late evening; I am in my room in that place I had grown to hate. I live in constant fear of a particular very tall good looking man I know is Satan who is on the ward each night. I am still awake after the corridor is in the darkness; my light is kept on. There is no sleep in me and I fear what the night holds and whether I will survive it. The door has no lock and I feel unsafe; I am in another world. Suddenly, I decide to move all the furniture, including a wardrobe, against the door to prevent my enemies from harming me. Not content with this, I decide to write the sacrament blessing on many sheets of paper and fill a large jug with water from my own bathroom. I bless this by kneeling on the floor in prayer.
I become more frightened as the night draws on and I will get attacked by my enemies. There is no sound. I am safe with all the furniture fast against the door. As the night progresses I am more anxious and disturbed. I begin to scatter the many pages of prayers over the vacant floor and after blessing the jug of water, I begin to scatter it over the papers. Should Satan get in, he will be destroyed by its purity and holiness. I can hear sounds and I quickly refill the jug with more water and kneel down to bless it and myself so I can pour it over my enemies, the evil ones, and they will be destroyed should they attempt to come near me. I tear down the beautiful blue curtains to cover myself for protection; they are the Saviour’s Holy colour.
I hide, crouched in an empty corner near the window; outside are demons in the darkness but I am safe in the light.
There is noise outside and the door is forced but my enemies can’t get in; they open the door outwards into the corridor and they begin to move the furniture. I am terrified and hold my jug of Holy water to protect myself.
As my enemies enter my room, I throw the water over each of them and am severely reprimanded for destroying hospital property and their clothes.
Satan is with them and as he comes near me I beg him, “Don’t touch me! Please don’t touch me! Please”
The Holy water doesn’t work and it had destroyed the room, everything is scattered with paper and wet. I suddenly realise what I had done and apologise, offering to clean it up.
The nurses begin to try and comfort me and one returns with an injection.
I remember no more and sleep till morning. I cannot remember who cleaned the room and replaced the furniture.
A number of years later, I spoke to the 6ft 7ins night duty male nurse and discovered it was common for patients to believe he was Satan.
Ironically he is in fact a very gentle giant and a very good psychiatric nurse, who cared for me a great deal for the remainder of my stay as a detained patient.
He would often make me a hot chocolate at night and have a chat with me.
He was and is a very good man, who obviously realised how ill I was and I remained so for a large chunk of my stay.
Kay Reed
May 2012
Blessing on the Water
O God the Eternal Father,
I ask Thee in the name of Thy Son, Jesus Christ,
To bless and sanctify this water
To the souls of all those who drink of it,
That we may do it in remembrance of the Blood of Thy Son,
which was shed for us;
That we may witness unto Thee, O God, the Eternal Father,
That we do always remember him
That we may have His Spirit to be with us
Amen
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Episode at Home 2004
He lay aside me, “Do not be afraid; there is nothing to fear!” but I fear him. All trust had disappeared over many years.
Lights out;
he sleeps in a world I am unable to join.
Satan lay there.
I got up and switched on all the lights in every room.
Evil dislikes light.
The house is surrounded by demons and all lights inside and out are switched on and all window blinds are closed.
I cleanse the house of all toxic chemicals and inflammable aerosols throughout the night.
I slowly fill disposal bags with my husbands belongings.
I believe he is evil.
This procedure will be over at 9 am in the morning when the world will end and the Saviour will come.
I next cleanse myself in a plain shower, no soap and a finger to clean my teeth.
I place a damp white cotton long nightdress over my wet body;
I am barefooted.
To prepare the pure sacrament table I wash a crisp white cotton tablecloth in plain water, ironed whilst damp, and placed directly onto a plain wooden round table.
As dawn breaks the demons disperse from outside
On the tablecloth I place a very old large Bible with heavy brass clasps that I inherited from my beloved Lily, my Grandma and a cuddly dog with my sons recorded voice inside which I treasure.
I placed delicately two glasses one with water and the other with bread both covered with crisp white cotton handkerchiefs.
On my computer I type and print two sacrament prayers to bless the water and bread.
These blessings I did before opening the blinds at 9.00 o’clock.
I am at the window and look up at the skies.
I am still alive.
The episode is over,
I am exhausted and I retire to sleep.
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Winter 2004 Psychiatric Unit
There was a vacant room in that acute psychiatric unit that I called home for 5 months, and I was placed in it on my second admission. I had no resilience and even in my disturbed state I remember rocking to and fro in a chair while the nurse stripped the used bed. Someone had left in a hurry leaving behind some Roses chocolates, an empty bottle of lemonade and a used plastic cup which was to come in very useful that night.
The room was to harbour my worst terrors for a number of months and many terrible things happened to me there. This room was situated furthest away from the hub of the main ward and the nurse’s staff room. That first night of my second stay, I was extremely disturbed and knew I was holding on to my life as I knew it, by a thread. Fragile as my sanity was, I was left abandoned and isolated in this barren room with a mishmash of belongings in a bag.
The window soon became dark and I had no idea of the time. I decided categorically this was the end for me and I was going nowhere. There was no care and I was totally alone. One of my possessions was a very large pale green towel to wrap around my extraordinary large body; all weight gained through a very bad drug called Stelazine I had taken for psychosis for many years. Most of my life, during those 15 wasted years I slept drugged. My mother and brother were also treated with this drug for schizophrenia. They were both dead; my mother due to cancer and my brother killed himself whilst in care living in a community group home. My brother led a tragic life. May God forgive my mother. I have recently been told I have suffered from untreated bipolar disorder since a young teenager from those early years as a victim of bullying on the council estate where I still live. Locking myself away in my bedroom in those days never left me with a peace I still sought even until recent years. Locking myself away became a very painful habit that solved little. I have been paranoid for a lifetime. I am now 61 years of age and I am more stable now than I can ever remember although still on some treatment.
This piece of writing is rambling away with my pen and I now believe I am avoiding telling my tale of that most disturbing night in that barren ward in the local hospital. There was no lock on the door and it soon became apparent that no one was keeping an eye on me in my very disturbed state. I could do absolutely anything to myself. This was freedom in my pitiful mind.
With no idea of endless time I remain in a curled ball on the bed facing the wall with only a wall light above to comfort me. Unable to contemplate yet another night or day of mental torment, I suddenly find an answer. The other side of my room, my bed now an impending coffin, I fetch a dirty plastic cup and bite it into thin strips. These are a precious find and would solve all my problems. The large towel would come in useful to soak up the blood. As I lay on the bed closely facing the wall and resting my arm on the towel I start cutting my left wrist with the strips of plastic. Regularly I wipe the blood off the wall with my towel. Because I have never cut myself or attempted to sever my main artery before, I believe I am cutting in the right place. As the plastic strips become blunt I replace them with fresh ones. I find great comfort and relief in attempting to end my life. The cut is deep and I attempt to protect my protruded tendon and so I begin cutting around and beneath it. I cut into the night until I fall asleep exhausted, satisfied and at peace. A young male nurse did leave medication for me earlier on but failed to notice my circumstances.
When I awake in darkness I realise what I have done and press my alarm button for the nurse on night duty; she calls the doctor and tries to clean me up and the blood, my towel is sent with the bedding and I have no toiletries or change of nightwear. The nurse helps as much as she can and takes me to casualty to have my hand and wrist checked over. The surgeon is contacted and will stitch me up in the morning. The casualty nurse bathes and dresses my wound so that I do not get infected. I have never done anything like this before; it is called cutting. The following morning I sink even deeper into isolation and withdrawal. The surgeon does his work silently and expertly. I have two psychiatric nurses with me. I now believe I was very ill and in need of urgent help. I was quickly losing my sanity; normality is a long way off. I have no family, no friends, no life.
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Sexual Abuse
Psychiatric Ward December 2004
I would arouse to the closing of my bedroom door and the sound of running footsteps down the black corridor of that barren friendless place. Those steps belonged to two or three people.
I was drugged on these occasions and would awake in a darkened room with all of my bedding on the floor, my dishevelled body was very cold and my private parts were very sore. My underwear had been removed and replaced wrongly and my nightdress was raised around my cold body. On one occasion, I had graze marks from under my breasts downwards to my abdomen. These marks were red and were made by fingernails. This was happening on a regular basis and I became increasingly sore in my genitalia. There were broken capsules on the floor near my bed. When I showed the nurses they made no comment.
When I began having abdominal problems, I told my husband, during visiting, but he advised I kept it to myself and did not report it in case I got into trouble. Soon I was awakened each morning with lower back pain reaching around to my swollen lower abdomen.
Before I tried to get treatment for my worsening condition, I remember becoming distressed in consultations with the ward doctors and would cry “No woman is safe on this ward !!”, and I would run out of their room and return to mine. My bed would usually get soiled during my absence and it was not unusual to strip it clean for up to five times a day.
When I reported the pain and swelling to a junior doctor, she booked an appointment with the Consultant Radiologist who gave me some painful treatment with the aid of a monitor. I felt faint afterwards. Although she did not discuss it with me I knew she treated it. I had to be returned to the psychiatric ward in a wheelchair. Later that day I passed a lot of clear fluid and both the swelling and pain disappeared.
However I continued to be frightened both day and night and tolerated intrusion day and night. There were no locks on the doors and my room was only 3 doors away from the men’s ward. I was told the dividing door was kept unlocked for fire regulations. Men were constantly walking around the women’s’ ward and even damaging the TV and chairs in the women’s day room. Also they used the women’s only bathroom even to bathe.
At night, nurses insisted all hall lights were turned off. I was terrified. As a detained patient I had no rights over any aspect of my care including medication. Should I have refused any it would have been forced. I did not know who was sexually abusing me but I knew I was being drugged.
A few years after discharge, I reported it to POVA – Protection of Vulnerable Adults – an arm of the Police Force. I heard no more from them until I phoned a few years later and was told I did not have enough evidence. They did not protect me. I found the whole event rather painful and would not enter that route again.
Kay Reed
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Detention under Section 3 of the Mental Health Act
As my detention progressed and I slipped between sanity and insanity, I was suppressed by psychotic thoughts which were not in my control and yet quite unlike the acute episodes of earlier days and weeks. Those were well and truly in the past and I was now able to treat them as pain I had well and truly dealt with in the past. I was still, however, very confused.
One evening, I calculated mathematically that my father was not my real father and my brother was my son. I was sent to America to conceal the pregnancy at the age of 7 years. There was no reasoning to the thoughts only mathematics and coding on paper which was always removed from my room from a flimsy carrier bag. This bag became very precious to me and I clutched it under my arm for dear life wherever I went. Also I noticed changes to my watch and I realised it was not the one I treasured as a gift from my aunt in America that lit up in the dark. Both doctors and nurses made regular comments about the watch as if they wished to draw attention to it. I often wonder if staff members realised how much I was suffering. I was also suffering a great deal of weight loss.
I believed with out a shadow of a doubt, my real father was a drugs baron, a nightclub owner and a very bad man. I had been adopted at birth. My real mother had no identity and the one I had known was not real to me and I had not known love. I begin noting all house numbers of homes I had lived in and also my grandmothers’. I noticed there were similarities in the coding of these numbers. Also to investigate further I used my watch at night and found the hands on its face raced forward and stopped periodically which I believed were guiding me to answers in my search for who I was, where I came from and where my future lay. I was aware I was regularly sedated and missed days and nights lost in insanity and space in time.
The day came eventually when I was allowed to accompany my husband to the main part of the hospital. I only owned one coat and soon discovered how much weight I had lost when I had to wear it. Also I was pitifully weak. He told me to wear my only black bag and I was forced to hang on to him for strength and support to be able to walk. As we sat at a table with much treasured coffee I noticed a flurry of people pass us to leave the hospital even during visiting times. I easily became exhausted and confused and was glad to return to my room in spite of my deep fear of the evil and harm that surrounded me. I knew something terrible had happened but no-one would tell me what it was. I knew, though, I was disliked immensely and my family were very upset. I was beyond worry and hurt; I was devastated and felt very alone. There was much worse ahead of me on that barren ward of fear and even terror.
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Jan 2005
Much Later Episode
It was sometime in the middle of the night, all was in darkness and yet I awake feeling tingling fresh and new. When I reached the bathroom I was surprised to study this new me in the mirror because my hair was cropped short and suddenly I felt high with waves of excitement filling my bosom.
I wet my hair and combed it flat off my face very severely revealing very prominent features. Suddenly I am a man - I am the President of the United States of America - I am John F. Kennedy. Immediately I reach for a black trousers in my wardrobe, some dark plain shoes and my husbands dark paisley dressing gown. I am a man in every sense. Before leaving the room I reflect in the mirror for self approval. My mission - to find my real father and suddenly I am heading towards the nearby mens ward. I know where I am and I know I will not be noticed because the staff normally watch television in the lounge. In turn I kick open each door shouting to the male patient in bed, "Are you my real father? Do you know where he is?" This was a dangerous thing to do, especially as there was a murderer on the ward awaiting a psychiatric assessment for sentencing in the courts. I saw no staff member during this entire episode. The noise I made could wake the dead. I discovered, in the fourth month of my detention under the Mental Health Act, that each patient had what is called a 'named nurse' to have someone to take a special interest and to speak to their patient. A number of years later I asked mine while she worked in the community if any of this episode was relayed to her verbally or in my notes. She said 'neither'. It certainly appears little if anything is recorded in notes.
I am still surprised how I managed to create a Haven, in that place of Hell, for my lost spirit. I nurtured myself by reading a very battered and torn New Testament I found in the dining room. In my privacy I read and consoled my wayward lonely soul with those abject pages. Slowly and surely I healed and my world healed with me. Xmas came and went and I got on my bruised knees and thanked my God I was still alive and getting stronger both mentally and physically. Flowers became a large part of that healing process and I kept a pool of photographs of my beautiful family and floral garden at home. I learned to face each tomorrow and trusted no one. I insulated myself and my world in turn insulated me. These days my door was rarely closed and slowly I allowed my world to enter.
Kay Reed
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Real Experience
One very mixed up day, the nurses suddenly changed my room and I was taken to the rear of the square ward, furthest away from the staff room and the hub of things. As I was left in the room, the nurses left the room after telling me to lie on the bed. I felt disorientated and noticed the room was immaculately clean and polished. Whereas my normal room was very dusty with balls of fluff over the floor. This was due to the fact the cleaners could not enter because I was unwell for such a long time. It all felt rather strange and I heard footsteps from above the ceiling. Anyway I tried to relax on the bed and was overcome by a rotating experience at the entrance to my vagina; I was afraid to move because it felt like a machine. It was very frightening yet not unpleasant and it penetrated even further until it reached the cervix high in the vagina and I was unable to stop myself having a very powerful climax. It then slowly disappeared. I was completely alone in the room. This is the first time I have shared this experience. It did happen on one other occasion but it was much more complex.
Kay Reed May 2012
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Slight improvement on better days
Some people begin to look a little familiar and are very ill, ranting while walking fast in circles around the ward, this place of Hell. There is no way out but the one door to the outside world and two doors to the central herb garden; one from the television room and the other from the dining area. In better days, after discharge, I created a floral gift at home for the patients and the Ward Manager placed it on a high shelf in the dining room. I am told my flowers are still there.
I should have noted I had not been readmitted to that place mainly due to the excellent care I have received since 2004 from my new Community Psychiatric Nurse. When discussing my episodes with a close friend, we now believe the way I dealt with them was favourable because had I not faced my deepest fears and chose to run away instead, I would still be mentally ill and not stable as I am now. My nurse told me I could be curled in a corner of a barren room. I am one of the lucky ones! My medication has been greatly reduced and in fact all treatments are very much hit or miss. Medicine might suit one patient and not many others.
During my breakdown Psychiatrists came and went and each one with a fresh diagnosis and new treatment. This made me very ill indeed. I am what I am today because of the deep trust and bond of respect I have for my nurse. I am very lucky she is very good at her job. We both believe I am able to gain such accurate recall to write my episodes is due to the fact I have greatly reduced my medication. My recall is not just memory; I actually have full body and time experience at that psychiatric ward and see everything in absolute detail as I did at the time including emotion. It is only because I am now in a safe place, both mentally and emotionally, I can do this. This is nothing to do with bravery; I have not had any choice. There is nowhere to run! The demons were all around me and I fought for my sanity and so my life. My episodes I have chosen will follow this piece of writing. All are healing in their own way and all important for cleansing my mind, body and soul. I emerged 4 months later a new woman with a new mind and new image in a completely new world. I felt I had reinvigorated myself with the help of medication and a new wardrobe of clothes mainly from charity shops. My room was now filled with flowers and soft furnishings with even a window garden of primroses and hyacinths, the smell was breathtaking. My new make-up enhanced my newly prominent facial features. Also I experimented with hair products and new spikey styles. I discovered for the first time in womanhood I had a cleavage and invested in under-wired bras from a nearby supermarket with the help of a lovely assistant there. My husband did not know what to do with me or how to cope.
On a more humorous note, I decided to borrow a hammer and nails to hang some paintings in my room. This was a successful attempt and everyone admired my room and let me get on with it with no interference. However no-one knew I had a hammer in my cupboard on an acute psychiatric ward. On a good day I had the confidence to hand this over to staff in the office for safe keeping. This was greeted at first with shock and humour as I was faced walking around brandishing this hammer in such a place. It was quite hilarious and those enemies of mine soon became friends. I totally misunderstood them during my stay and ordeal. Very difficult times, they were difficult times indeed.
Kay Reed
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The Place
During recovery on ward January 2005
There were no seagulls in the other place. Here the comforting dawn brings welcoming light, and the clutter of seagulls rest noisily on the grassy bank outside my window. I open my curtains as blue as royalty, dressing such a large window for a small room. Beyond, clusters of red berries like dripping grapes hanging from young soft leaved holly trees. The seagulls as large as life, rest beyond my window and I wonder at their magnificent beauty. They are part of God’s Creation and I am momentarily comforted watching them silently from the nearby chair. Someone is watching me. I am now aware I am someone that I haven’t been before in this hostile place. But I cannot write my name for I am unsure who I am. And my loyal pen that has spoken many words for me now lies redundant (yet proud). I fear its power and I reach to put it out of sight. The harsh day awaits me (boldly). I fear this like the door which I know I must open to let in the day, for me to enter reality.
Please my Father in Heaven forgive me my weaknesses; I have been here so long, lying secretly in silence, drinking my own pain. Flowers on my sill arrest my disturbed thoughts, for I remind myself that they are only thoughts. But I still cannot tell which thoughts are real. My flowers are real though. I have a window sill garden full of brightly coloured flowers and I love to nurture and care for them. I am capable of that; this is my consolation, my comfort.The closed door looks at me from the corner of my eye and I fear what it stands for. It is only another one. Not so long ago through timeless zones, here, where my mind has travelled many broken journeys, there have been six doors, each with a different message telling me not to open and walk through into a hostile world. It’s safer to realize what exists this side. I change my gaze from the door to the beauty on my sill. I reach out and touch my flowers. This is reality, the beauty of the petals; each pot holding different varieties and colours. And for a moment my mind finds solitude, I will sit here forever and my world will spin without me. And within me for a brief moment I find peace.
Kay Reed 2005
Psychiatric ward during recovery
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Quiet Thoughts - July 1st 2005 - At Home
The slow easy beat of the mantle clock ticking my life away, the rhythm of mixed memories, and I am still cased in emptiness within my usual four walls which should be my home; a place of sanctuary and love. Once upon a time there was a sort of happiness, the only one I knew, so many years ago now, when I wasn’t married and my children laughed and I laughed with them. The feelings elude me, now I am cold as a coffin. Medication now buffets life’s storms each day and yet I carry within me a void that happiness should fill, all hope of love still a distant dream, friends and family as distant as the shore from my window encasing a lonely spirit that is now me. There are words, ‘how’ and ‘why’, but no answers come easy these days. It is enough to survive each day with little thought for the morrow. I wish for a real poem written for me by him, for we are apart; strangers as we ever were. Love has eluded me once again.
Please my God, grant me bravery to cup my life in the palm of your hand, grant me solitude and peace so that maybe still my spirit might soar like a mighty eagle over the cliff-top like the seagulls many years ago as I watched them flock at an isolated beach early morn while the world slept.
Life still makes little sense even now, so much pain and so many years later. Nothing changes like the seasons governed by nature at God’s hand. If I prayed tonight like I prayed before in that now distant barren place, I would beg my God to grant me serenity, peace and love in my life, that is the life I have. I have reached this land at much cost, and my loss is unbearable to face. This night, as alone as a lark in a field, even my grief eludes my senses numbed by medicine. Those who respond in compassion suddenly disappear from my life like pins in an alley. Reassuringly, I have the faith and knowledge that one day I will know the answers and that which I do not know will be revealed to me. Tired now, I cannot make sense of the mysterious maze of events and damage that has consumed my life. I thank my God I still possess trust and a reassuring love for those I keep close to my heart. One day, I will arise with the revelation of my life, and then and only then, will I have hope once again in my world. Until then, please God keep your angels forever watchful over my children and their children, keep them safe and keep them sound. May the blessings of good health and happiness always be theirs.
Kay Reed
~~~~~~~~~~
Depression 1982
The easy sea rippled gently onto the empty beach, except for my presence; I sat on a rock, it had my name on it. Seagulls soared above as if there was no tomorrow. Last nights news told me that my mother was going to die. There was a confusion of emotions, yet no grief in me for her. She had suffered from schizophrenia like my brother. And now the cancer was growing deep inside of her. This was an ongoing blackness that had been my companion for many years as far back as I can remember. Life events had taken their toll and I felt empty; a void I could not fill. My only proof of a life were my three beautiful sons; all healthy and strong. It was too early for even the fit health conscious. Contemplating walking the steep steps to the road, I glanced around me at nature and captured the moment. It must have been important, because all these years later I can return there reliving the moment in my soul. I am so grateful I could not see a future. And I am also grateful that I can sit here today and write my memories away.
As Donovan sang in my youth,
‘Oh seagull I want your wings; I want your freedom and your life’.
Kay Reed – May 2006
The Drummer
Unfortunately I am me,
I am unlike anyone I know,
I am owned, by right, by myself.
If it's not to your satisfaction
Then leave.
We each settle for our own patterns of existence.
Can I help it if I hear a different drummer.
Maybe you never heard the beat of those drums.
And maybe I am afraid to miss even one beat.
Kay Reed 1985
Some dialogue for a change
A nurse knocks on my door, “The doctor is waiting for you Kay.”
I reply in dread, “I’ll be there now.”
The door remains closed.
I wish I could run away.
I enter the doctor’s room greeted by a circle of professionals including the psychiatrist who rarely speaks which I find very annoying.
To my surprise he says,
“How are you today?”
Silence.
“Do you know where you are?”
“Not really! – Think I’m in hospital – been in two countries!!” I reply.
“You’re in Hospital near home. Do you know where you are?” he asks.
Silence.
“Not really! – No!!”
I feel suddenly unsafe and start running away down the corridor to the familiar surroundings of my barren room and safety. There is some comfort in the closure of my door. There is a deep fear I feel in my inner being that I had lost touch with. I sought warmth in my blanket with thanks I have survived yet another ordeal.
Kay Reed
January 2005
Hospital Ward
