Mental Health

Yes. Mental health. Very important this one. Are you stable? Do you need a fix? Your meds, are they working? How's your sobriety?

5:45am - "time for your vitals, can I take your blood pressure please? Just stay in bed. Okay breakfast in 10mins!"
6am - "Wake up! Time for breakfast! Come on wake up!"
7am - "Meds! It's time for meds! Line up!" (I affectionately refer to this as 'the med truck' - portable station complete with the mornings meds...) Vitamins, Paxil, Buspar.
8am - "Stretching class! Come on time for exercise!"
9am - "group therapy! Patio is closed people - time for group therapy! What are your goals for today?"
10am - personal time = NAP!
11am - snack time - 'open patio, please - fresh air...maybe?'
12pm - "lunch!"
1pm - "Robert! Buspar!"
2pm - game of 'bullshit' with my schizophrenic friends - they, I must say, are some of the rarest folks I've ever met...
3pm- "snack time!" -really? Who the fuck eats this many times in one day?
4pm - Arts & crafts! Come on!!! (oh Gawd how GAY!...)
5pm - personal time: "Robert, Buspar!" -game of makeshift basketball with my roommates. It's like the college life I never had.
6pm - "Dinner!" -eww, same shit - chicken, over steamed veggies, mashed potatoes, juice, soda, bread.
7pm - "Patio is open!" - visiting time in 1/2 hour!
7:30-8:30 - visiting time - Diana visits me everyday for two weeks - fucking Saint, this girl...
8:30 - "visiting time is over! Patio is closed!"
9:00 - closing meeting: "did you accomplish your goals for today?"
10:00 - "meds! Robert! Come on!!!! -buspar, depakote (1000 mg).
10:30 - "lights out! Bedtime!"

They check on you every 15 mins. throughout the entire night. Flashlight in the face, making sure your not bedding a local lady on the floor while she's supposed to be refining her, dysfunction. Wanna be an adult and feel like a child? - check in to the mental health hospital for a couple weeks. You might actually like it. I did.

I decided it was time to take some time out. I checked myself in to a mental institution. And, I met some of the best people I could hope to ever spend time with. A two week adventure, that I volunteered for - I ACTUALLY LOVED IT.

Okay, okay! I tore up my apartment. I may have broken some glass, and punched a door to it's measly death - maybe sliced up an arm or two with a knife and showed up at the E.R. with a .2 alcohol level while still able to match wits with the doctor that was telling me I shouldn't even be able to hold a conversation. Yeah, I did all that. So what? At least I didn't use a chainsaw like one of my best pals I met in the hospital - that's hard core! A chainsaw? Really?