I was 24 and flying high. I had just been accepted into George Washington University in Washington, DC in graduate school in a cell biology program. I had also landed a graduate job at NIH working under a scientist who was doing lupus research. I had my first psychotic break.
No one recognized the severity of my condition, but I ended up dropping out of school mid-semester and eventually returning to Alexandria, Louisiana to live with my parents. It was there that I met my first husband.
Two children later I applied for a graduate assistantship in English at my alma mater, Louisiana Tech University, in Ruston. At the end of my second semester, I found myself late at night at a professor's house. He demanded that I have a psychiatric evaluation before I returned to graduate school the following fall. Thus began my long series of hospitalizations, denial of my illness and eventually my recovery.
My first hospitalization was a three-day stint in a room with a bed, a small bathroom and barred windows. I had no contact with anyone except for a physician and the staff who brought me my meals. On the third day, two policemen handcuffed me, put me in the back of the car and took me to a neighboring city to a private psychiatric hospital where I was informed of my rights and admitted. This was a hospital for the well-to-do. I was there for a month after being medicated with lithium and receiving a diagnosis of manic depression. I was in total denial.
I got off my medication many times in the following years only to end up in the hospital anywhere from several days to four weeks. They were all at state-run institutions. I lost total custody of my children when my husband divorced me during one of my hospitalizations. Meanwhile, I finished my Master's Degree in English while completing an eight-month stay at a halfway house.
I decided to pursue my doctorate with the hopes of getting a good job and eventually receiving joint custody of my children. I moved to Lafayette, Louisiana (where I currently reside), took all my doctoral courses (did not make a single C) and flunked my written comprehensives because a private psychiatrist changed my medication six weeks before. I never retook my comps.
Instead, I was bounced back and forth from private doctor to public mental healthcare. Finally, I had an eight-month manic, ordered my second husband to leave and ended up in jail three times for disturbing the peace. All of the charges were dropped.
I have now been stable for a year. I was placed on all of the newer psychotropic drugs during my last six-week hospitalization.
This year I am gradually becoming a mental health advocate and starting to paint, one of my favorite occupations. I have fully accepted my diagnosis and am learning the parameters of my illness. I am learning that there is tremendous hope for the mentally ill and I consider myself blessed because it has made me a kinder, more compassionate and more perceptive person.