Our Darkest Moment

Our darkest moments give us a chance to show our truest, rawest versions of ourselves because, often, that is the only part we have left. In those moments we have been beaten down and stripped away until only a skeleton of our sense of self remains. We have nothing left but the very core of our beings, so how could we be anything other than who we truly are?

As logical as that may sound, I’d have to argue that that isn’t always the case. I know that the grief and pain I felt in my own darkest moment was not who I was. I know that when I was given the chance to give reign to my authentic self, I passed it by. I gave up and instead, surrendered to a handle of liquor and a bottle of pills. Those things were not me, and it was for that reason they were so appealing. I had spent unending years fighting an invisible foe that I could never seem to better. My days were cast under its shadow and my dreams were of its projection. I could find no peace; I could find no rest. So, in a thoughtless and vengeful second, I conceded to the will of exhaustion.

I woke in hospital bed hours, days, weeks later; time didn’t seem to have much power in that space. My mother sat quietly by my bedside, her eyes swollen and red from crying. A few snapshots of a memory alighted in my head: a dark room and an empty prescription bottle, and me crawling to the door. I was so thirsty. I couldn’t find a reason for being so painfully thirsty. The next image was my hand reaching for the faucet to get a drink of water. Then a man kneeling over me in a uniform jacket. I was on the floor. He asked me questions but I couldn’t speak. I couldn’t move. Next I was in an ambulance, then a hospital room where they were cutting off my clothes. I remembered not wanting them to see me naked.

And now I lay in a room I couldn’t remember with a weeping mother and a haunting recollection of what I had done. It was overcast outside, the faint light silhouetting her sagging shoulders with a dull halo. I watched as they sank deeper until the grey lulled me back to sleep.

When I woke again I had been moved from the ICU to a brighter room. It felt as though only minutes had passed but they assured me it had been days. A stranger sat with me each day, watching in an inquisitive silence.

“Did they tell you why I’m here?” I asked one of them.

“No, they don’t usually disclose patient information like that,” he had replied. But it was clear they all knew. Even so, I didn’t tell them anything.

Finally, later that week, they declared me stable, physically at least, and prepared to discharge me into the hands of the mental institution. I was strapped to a gurney and paraded to another ambulance, alone, save for the paramedic who acted as my “sitter” for the hour-long drive. He was friendly enough, but wary of me, seemingly surprised at my amiable demeanor.

I was institutionalized. My room was large and bare aside from the two beds positioned on opposite walls from each other. Fortunately, the other bed was unoccupied. My clothes were carefully selected to adhere to the guidelines of the hospital: the proper coverage without draw-strings. I stuffed them into a doorless cupboard.

The bathroom was carefully constructed to conceal any screws and the mirror was a reflected sheet of metal firmly plastered to the wall. To my surprise they did allow a shower curtain, though it lacked rings at the top. They issued me a toothbrush, a plastic comb, and hospital-grade socks with the non-slip treads on the bottoms. We were not permitted to wear shoes.

I hardly slept that night. My windowless room was too bright from the fluorescent lights leaking from under the door and the thin blankets did nothing against the chilly air. The undeniable similarities to a prison did nothing to weaken my resolve that I did not belong there.

The next morning they woke us too early to take our vitals and then drew us out for breakfast. I stumbled out into the cold lighting and shuddered. The other rooms were arranged in the outside perimeter of a larger room, at the center of which stood a collection of walls, mostly glass, encasing our “recreation” space. Inside were three dining tables spread apart from each other, a chair and couch stuffed into one corner, and an electric piano without its power cord in another. I took a seat at one of the isolated tables and watched silently as my demented companions drizzled out of their rooms.

Breakfast was eaten in silence, if it was eaten at all, before we were shepherded to the group therapy room further down the hall. We made our introductions around a large square table and I couldn’t help but feel that we had been transported back to an elementary school art class. The walls were decorated with armature finger paintings and poorly penciled portraits. Some of them had words of encouragement scribbled on them, like “Hang in There!” and “If it’s Not Okay, it’s Not the End!”

Group therapy proved useless.

The people around me were so broken and, even forced together like this, alone. Like me.

How was anyone going to get out of here if we had to fight our terrifying monsters alone when we wanted nothing more than to surrender to them? And I knew that some of these monsters we shared.

Sitting across from me was a young woman wrapped in a swaddle of blankets and completely silent. She had not had breakfast with us and she did not introduce herself when the therapist asked her name.

“Will you have lunch with me?” I dared ask her on our way back from our session. She peered at me from under her hood of blankets and I was afraid she wouldn’t answer or would outright reject me. But to my surprise, she nodded.

“I’m Mae,” I said once we had sat down with our food. “It’s nice to meet you. “

“I’m Elle.” She took a tentative sip of chocolate milk.

“Thanks for sitting with me,” I pushed. “I just got in last night and I don’t know anyone yet…”

“I’ve been here a few days and I still don’t know anyone,” she smiled slightly.

“That's not surprising seeing how much group therapy sucks. Who’d want to talk to anyone after that?”

“Yeah, I hate it. What’s even the point?”

“God knows,” I laughed.

Gradually, Elle opened up to me. She had been in the state visiting her family for a couple months, but her kids were in Philadelphia, thousands of miles away. She didn’t want to elaborate on her situation and I didn’t want to push her. All I really knew was that she was horribly depressed and didn’t have much drive to improve.

She asked if we could eat dinner together, too.

The next day, a couple more people were introduced to our unit and Elle invited them to eat with us also. By dinner on my second day, we had to combine two of the tables to fit all of us. What a group of weepy misfits we were.

There was Kyle, who broke after his wife divorced him. He wept daily on the wall-mounted phone.

Matt, a young man with some social peculiarities that got him into trouble before his admission. His autism made him a poor judge of character and he ended up taking the fall for a few of his buddies for some undisclosed activity. Handcuffs awaited him upon discharge.

Last was Roger, or Rodge, as he preferred. He fell off the wagon when he tried to drink himself to death. Originally a middle-aged Texan bartender with a crazy ex-wife, he decided a move to his home state might brighten his affairs. Clearly that choice lacked some perspective.

There were others that floated in and out, but it was us five that fully depended on each other. We had all our meals together, group therapy, and hours of free time to talk away. Even the staff commented on our closeness.

“I’ve got a cinnamon roll here,” I announced one morning at breakfast. “Anyone wanna trade for an extra cup of coffee?”

“Yeah, I’ll trade,” Kyle offered, handing me his coffee. They only allowed us two cups each in the morning, and I was fairly certain they were decaf.

“Anyone have an extra syrup?” Rodge asked. “These pancakes are so frickin’ dry.”

“I’ve got one,” Elle piped up.

“Ah, you’re awesome!” he smiled.

“Christmas is in just a few days,” Matt pointed out through a mouth-full of pancake. “Do you think they’ll let us out by then?”

I shrugged and searched the faces around me. “I don’t know. Does anyone feel ready to leave?”

“I’m ready,” Kyle asserted, breaking into his cinnamon roll.

“I think she means stable, not just wanting to go,” Rodge offered helpfully.

“Yeah, I know…” he looked down as if ashamed. He knew we’d all seen him crying the day before. Visibly, he seemed the least prepared to leave and he knew it.

“Worst case scenario, we all spend Christmas together,” I said, feigning cheer. I felt desperate to spend Christmas with my family, like everyone else here surely did. “Who knows, maybe they’ll give us a little extra coffee as a gift.”

“Yeah, that’d be the day,” Rodge rolled his eyes.

“Group therapy in ten minutes,” one of the counselors called to us. “Meds are ready in five.”

Rodge sighed and nodded toward her as she walked away. “That woman’s gonna be my second wife.”

“Yeah, sure,” I scoffed, standing to clear my tray. “What's her name then?

“Our love goes deeper than who we are on the surface, Mae. I don’t need to know her name.”

“So how are we feeling today?” the counselor, a short dark man, asked once we had gathered around the square table. “Kyle, I know yesterday was a hard day for you. Are there any changes in your general mood today?”

Kyle’s face shone bright red from the attention. He was a big man, much bigger than anyone else there, and the irony of him being the most emotionally fragile was not lost on him. “Yeah, I-I’m good.”

“I’m glad to hear that,” the man nodded kindly before addressing the rest of us. “Now, I wanted to go over some coping strategies for when you feel low or out of control.”

This was usually how sessions went: a lecture. We were given worksheets to fill out and surveys to complete. Frankly, I was surprised we weren’t assigned to write a five-page essay dictating how comfortable the beds were. In other words, these sessions were useless. It didn’t take long to recognize the patterns and buzzwords in the questionnaires we had to go through. It was easy to manipulate your answers so you’d appear perfectly functional.

Again, not helpful.

These people were struggling for their lives and no one here put in any effort to assist them. So I decided I would. I knew from experience how vital community and connection was to our survival. It’s when we feel alone that we lose sense of ourselves, isn’t it? That’s how it was for me.

I watched Elle transform into a beautiful, warm, funny woman after a single interaction where she’d felt seen. So that’s what I sought to do; to see these people. See their pain and struggle, and with it, their strength and overcoming. I didn’t have the false hope of fixing any of them, but as long as they knew they were not alone and that there was a hope somewhere for them to heal, I had done my part.

We stayed after our session had ended and played Apples to Apples.

“The word is ‘absurd’,” Matt announced, placing the card onto the table. I rummaged through my cards, arranging them from funniest to lamest in my hand before tossing one onto the pile.

“I think I’m gonna go home once I get out of here,” Elle suddenly said, laying a card down on mine.

“Where else would you go?” Rodge said sarcastically.

“I mean back to Philly,” she glared at him. “I miss my kids.”

“Why did you leave?” Kyle asked casually.

“I don’t know… my mom is here.” she shrugged.

“You don’t have to talk about it if you don’t want to,” I offered, “but just know that no one here is in any position to judge you.”

The last card was placed and Matt began studying his options.

“It’s complicated. I just… there were… I didn’t think they needed me. They seem to be doing fine without me. I mean, they love their dad.”

“I’m sure they do,” I said. “But that doesn’t mean they don’t love you just as much.”

“I know.” She swallowed hard to abate the tears brimming her eyes.

“Hey,” I said softly, placing a hand on hers.

“I just… What if I can’t do it? Take care of them, I mean. What if…” she trailed off.

“Elle, you’re their mom and you are enough. You’re enough.”

“Yeah, Elle,” Rodge added. “You are enough, okay? You’re totally awesome.”

“I wouldn’t be sitting with you guys if you hadn’t invited me over,” Kyle said. “I’d be in a lot worse shape if it wasn’t for you. You’re kids are lucky to have you as their mom.”

“The winner is ‘The YMCA,’” Matt interjected with his cards. Elle laughed and raised her hand.

“That’s mine. I won.”

Elle hadn’t expressed any desire to leave the hospital until that moment.

“Merry Christmas Eve!” Rodge exclaimed cheerily at breakfast. “I wouldn’t want to spend today with anyone else, except maybe that brunette counselor… Amy?”

“On to somebody else already?” I laughed.

“Hey, if I had seen Amy first I would have only ever been interested in her.”

“Well at least you know this one’s name.”

We did our daily trades and I got my extra cup of coffee to sip on as everyone ate.

“I’m going home today,” Elle finally broke the silence.

“What?” Matt choked on his muffin. “You’re going home?”

“The psychiatrist said I’ve been stable for a while and my meds are good. He said I’d probably be out before lunch. They’ve already called my mom to come pick me up.”

“Elle, that's great! Congratulations!” I beamed.

“Yeah, it is. But I’m really gonna miss you guys.”

“We’ll definitely miss you, too,” Kyle said melancholically. “But I can’t say I’m not a little jealous of you.”

“You’ll get out soon, Kyle. When you’re ready.” She wiped a tear off her cheek with her sleeve. “Thank you, Mae.” she turned to me. “I’d probably still be hiding in my room with a blanket around me if it wasn’t for you. And then probably none of you guys would be here either.”

“I don’t know,” Rodge shrugged. “I think I would’ve eventually pulled everyone together.” Elle hit his shoulder teasingly while Kyle shook his head.

“She’s right,” Kyle agreed. “I’d still be sulking in the corner for sure. I doubt any of us would be as stable as we are now if we hadn’t all come together.”

“I probably wouldn’t have talked to any of you,” Matt added.

“Yeah, you guys are right,” Rodge admitted. “We definitely couldn't have done this without Mae.”

“Oh come on guys. I may have initiated the group, but you guys saved me, too. I’d be a mess right now if it wasn’t for you. Elle, if you hadn’t accepted my offer to eat lunch with me, I wouldn't have spoken to anybody else. I’d have shut down completely, so thank you. We really are gonna miss you. I hope you know that.” I pulled her in for a hug and everyone else joined in.

“No touching,” the counselor, Amy, called from the office window. Rodge waved his hand dismissively at her.

“Well now you’ve ruined my chances with her,” he chuckled.

Elle was released a couple hours later in her real shoes and hoodie with drawstrings attached. I doubted I’d ever see her again, but I’d surely never forget the impact she had on me.

That afternoon I was called into an individual session with Dr. White, where he announced I could be discharged the next day: Christmas morning.

My remaining time in the psych ward was a bit of a blur, fueled by my anticipation to see my family and the dread of my looming goodbyes.

Kyle, Matt, Rodge and I played Apples to Apples with a couple other people who had been admitted that day. It was an unusually exciting game filled with laughter and ease and I realized how real all of this had been. From my life hanging by a thread because of my own choices, to the chance to build myself up again with all these people who were equally as broken.

None of us were healed, but we were real. There was no longer a buffer between who we were and who we thought we were. We were just us. I was just me.

Elle moved back to Philadelphia and won custody of her daughter and son. She has regained her sense of self, found a fulfilling job, and continues to learn what it means to be enough.

Kyle was discharged two days after Christmas and finalized his divorce. He rents out rooms in a house he bought following his discharge.

Matt was released into the hands of the authorities and served his six month sentence. He now rents a room from Kyle.

Rodge was readmitted to the hospital after a second attempt at suicide days after his initial discharge. He has since become sober, found board at a halfway house, and works a steady, full-time job. He plans to move back to Texas.

I was later diagnosed with dysthymia after enduring seven years of depression. But even in that time I fell in love and got married and, together, my husband and I are raising two beautiful daughters. I am who I want to be, and finally, who I want to be is me.

**** All names of characters have been changed to protect the privacy of the individuals portrayed in this story ***