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Stripped Away

Stripped Away

I will never forget the day of the strip search in the psychiatric hospital. The nurses walked into one of the common areas and smelled cigarette smoke. Cigarettes are contraband and someone snuck some in.

The nurses began searching our rooms. When they found nothing they were left to searching our bodies. They already had a suspicion of the culprit so they began with the men. The men were taken to another room where they were stripped and searched. No evidence was found on the men. It now became the women's turn to be strip searched.

Before the search was complete, the man who had the contraband confessed. Normally you would expect a room of ten women stripped down to their underwear to be extremely angry with this man. Instead, what he received from us was immediate forgiveness.

Identity

In a psychiatric hospital you are not allowed to have addictive substances, including caffeine and tobacco. I'm not sure who had it worse the smokers or the coffee drinkers. Since we didn't have coffee, we had other drinks. I do mean other.  As a community we all decided our favorite other drink was “pink”. None of us knew what flavor this mystery drink was. We just called it “pink”. Just like me, the pink drink didn’t have an identity. It was just -- pink. ...So in a psychiatric hospital in August of 2012 a group of people gathered around a table with “pink” and oyster crackers.  We prayed and had communion. The human spirit can connect with each other and with God anywhere.

Scrapbook Morphs Into A New Book

Well, by Alias In Town, began by compiling relative journal entries, poetry, essays and original artwork into a scrapbook. The scrapbook project was a personal effort to tell the story of a life journey from the brokenness, disparity and pain of chronic illness, addiction, and mental illness to being Well. This activity morphed into an incredibly vulnerable and emotionally raw book entitled Well.

Well, is a unique work of nonfiction making the reader feel as though they are looking at a scrapbook of a life story.  Preview the book by clicking [Book Preview] in the right pain or clicking on this link. (https://www.createspace.com/Preview/1242625)

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Hearing The Voice

Still Small Voice

Checking into a psychiatric hospital is not like checking into a hotel, that's for sure.

They make sure you have absolutely nothing on your person that can be dangerous.

You are not allowed to have any clothing with strings or belts.  You are not allowed to

bring in any personal items from home for fear they could be tainted with drugs. All

personal care items are provided by them. There are no mirrors for fear the glass would

be broken and used for personal harm. It is a sterile, scary, lonely, quiet, and eerie environment.

Read more in the memoir "Well" release date May 31, 2018

Looking Up From The Bottom

Suicide Attempt

The bonds of sleep were slowly sliding off my body and I could finally stretch out my my legs.  I yawned, rubbed my eyes and as I started to marvel at my morning breath the smell of strong alcohol hit my nostrils and the heat of anger flooded my body.  I was alive! Damnit! I was still alive! WHY!!! My 12 page suicide note was still attached to the bedroom door with the big bandaid because I couldn’t find any tape.  The empty Klonopin bottle was still on the nightstand. It was full less than 12 hours ago. A ½ liter of 100 proof liquor sat on the floor. The other half I had washed the pills down with.  I should be dead. DAMN! I kept saying in my head. I don’t usually swear, but I figured I already tried to kill myself so to hell with it. ...

...You can read more from this story in "Well" , a memoir, release date 3/31/2018