My decent into madness happened with
me unawares. The first warning sign would have to have been the day after I got
hurt. The scary thing is that it doesn’t feel any different than normal. I
guess the madness becomes the new norm. I was on my sister’s couch on the phone
with an adjuster from workman’s comp. I say I was on the phone with her but in
reality I was screaming at her. The day before, I was injured on the job…I had
my lungs burned by some caustics that I was using to strip the paint off of a
house. Have you ever smelled the scent of human flesh burning? It smells sweet,
sickeningly sweet, cloying. Tastes like nothing else I have ever tasted before.
Disgusting. The trauma was so overwhelming that I didn’t notice that anything
had changed in my thinking. The human mind is an amazing thing, it can gloss
over almost anything and make it normal. Like I said the madness was the new
norm. I was convinced that the woman I had on the phone was trying to destroy
the life that I had left. I was having flashbacks of the truck ride from the
worksite to the hospital. I could taste my lungs cooking. I could also taste
the blood that I had coughed up. I could feel the glass of the truck window
that I had my face pressed to as I was grasping for breath. All I could think
of at that point was what were my kids going to do without me. I knew I was
dying. I couldn’t breathe. I could feel it, over and over. I can feel it as I
write this. In the hospital they put me on drugs for the coughing and the pain.
I think the drugs masked the results of the brain damage. I remember telling my
x wife that I was having a hard time tracking, was easily confused. But still
had no idea the extent of the damage. So there I was screaming at this woman
absolutely convinced that she was trying to destroy my life. Looking back now I
can rationalize what she was actually doing, just trying to get my general
information for their records. I don’t remember much from the next month other
than the fact that I spent it on my sister’s couch recovering. I was in such
poor health that I was consumed by the pain, the coughing and the opiates. I
was scared all the time. That is one of the major parts of my madness, the
fear. It is like a forest fire, all consuming. I became convinced that my x wife
was going to try to take my children from me. I didn’t try to talk to anyone
about my suspicions. That was just the tip of the iceberg. Then one day as I
was driving home I found myself looking at the abutment of a freeway overpass
and I caught myself thinking that I could let go of the steering wheel and gun
the gas and it would be all over. I realized then that I was fanaticizing about
killing myself. I kept driving. What really jolted me about the episode was
that I had had that same exact thought every time I passed that particular
point on the freeway for the previous three months. At that point I went to my
doctor to express the fact that I was not doing so well. I didn’t tell her the
extent of the problems I was having. Even rattled I wasn’t able to open up
enough. I tried to manage a life that was descending to unmanageability with a
mind that was broken. I remember talking to my AA sponcer about how bad things
were financially, and how bad my physical condition was but left out how I was
faring mentally. The doctors couldn’t figure out why I was still having difficulties,
and why the treatments weren’t working. That went on for about five months. Then
I took myself off the opiates because I didn’t like what they were doing to me.
That was early December. Without the buffer of the drugs things got worse. Sometime
in early January I was at a jumping off place. I was going to kill myself. It
was as if the switch for live or not live had been turned to the not live
position. I got a wild hare up my ass and decided that if I was going to kill
myself that I would get drunk then do it. I went to the Plad Pantry and bought
some apricot Ail and proceeded to get drunk. As soon as the alcohol kicked in
the need to end my life disappeared. It was that quick. I got the first night
of real relief in almost six months. The next day I realized what I had done. I
had drank after having not had a drink in over three and a half years. In my
mind I adamantly declared that I wasn’t going to go down that path again. I decided
that I wasn’t going to drink again. That declaration lasted me about nine days.
Again I was going to kill myself. Might as well get drunk before I did it, what
did I have to lose. I got drunk. Again I was relieved of the need, no, compulsion
to end it all. And again The next day I was resolved to stay sober. This time I
made it thirteen days before I broke down again. The third time I just decided
that it was safer for me to drink. My mind was clearer than it had been for six
months and I didn’t want to kill myself anymore, and I didn’t hurt. The fear
was gone. The fear was gone and I could breathe. I talked to my sponcer about
my drinking again, and the fact that I would much rather be sober but that I couldn’t
handle what was happening to me physically. I still didn’t admit to him that I
had been suicidal, nor that I thought, or rather that I had been thinking that
my x wife was plotting to take the kids from me and that she may be plotting to
kill me. No, I kept that all to myself. I quickly picked up the being drunk all
the time. I would drink at night and stay dry during the day if the kids were with
me. That’s right I had my kids at least half the time. Soon though the drinking
started getting to me. I was drinking about a fifth of booze a day, had started
getting the shakes. I decided that I was going to quit the drinking so I told
my doctor all about what was going on, about the needing to kill myself and the
fear and of course the drinking. She proscribed me some benzos to combat the withdrawals
from the alcohol…I think I made it about three days before I drank again. So I
worked it out with my x that I would enter a low bottom detox center. I knew
that I wouldn’t get in for the first two days so I got enough gin to last me
and begged a ride to the detox center. The thing about alcohol detox is that it
can be deadly. You can actually die from alcohol withdrawal. The first day went
by without incident but day two didn’t go so hot. I passed out in the lobby of
the detox center and started vomiting on myself. The staff tried to revive me
but they couldn’t so they called an ambulance. I vaguely remember the paramedic
yelling at me saying that I needed to quit drinking or it was going to kill me.
The next thing I remember I was coming to in a hospital bed. I had to piss so
fucking bad that I thought I was going to wet myself. It took a bit but I was
finally able to get myself out of the bed at that time a nurse came into the
room and asked me what I was doing I told her that I was trying to go to the
bathroom. She gave me a funny look then told me that I could have just pissed
into the jug hanging from the bed that I had been in. I think they thought I
was homeless because the doctor quickly told me that I couldn’t stay there that
I had to leave. I had no Idea where I was, I knew that I was in a hospital but
not which one. I had to ask for directions just to leave the emergency room. I
called my x and asked her to come pick me up then I walked to a convenience store
to buy some malt liquor. I finally made it home to my gin supply and my own
bed. The next day I was admitted to the detox. Hooper detox is a center for low
bottom alcoholics and drug addicts…I lasted three days then I checked myself
out AMA and was drunk forty five minutes later
Chris McQueeney
