Emergency Room

Note: This story contains sensitive content. Mental health, self-harm, suicide.

I wake up in the morning sweaty as can be. The night before had not, indeed, opened my eyes (my apologies to The Smiths), but had actually glued them shut further. Figuratively, of course. My mouth was stained neon pink from the 20 Benadryl I swallowed last night. Unfortunately, I had not done my research on a lethal dose of Benadryl, so I am still, unfortunately, 100% alive. Damn. Not even a good attempt. I would rate the attempt out of five stars, but I don’t even think it deserves to be acknowledged because of how miserable it was. 

I am incredibly fatigued as I walk into my backyard to swing on my spider swing. I hadn’t been on it in years; my mom used to push me on it as high as she could and I would imagine I was flying on a broomstick and delivering a stuffed cat toy to a privileged brat, just like Kiki had in my favorite movie, Kiki’s Delivery Service. This time, I am not flying. I am swinging at a snail's pace. Up and down, up and down… it would be meditative if my situation wasn’t so dire. Up and down, up and down… maybe I should tell my parents. Up and down… Sarah, that’s an awful idea, your worst one yet. Up and… but what do I have to lose? I slow down the melancholy swing from its max speed of 0.2 mph and lift myself up. 

Dad is already looking at me through the back door. He’s perplexed as to why his 14-year-old daughter was busy looking numb on a child’s swing. I’ll ease his confusion by telling him about my failed attempt. Surely he will feel better! (He won’t.)

“What the hell?” Oops. “Katherine, get out here!” Yay, Mom’s coming too! “You did what?” See Sarah? Your worst idea yet.

Mom’s crying now. In her room with Dad. She thinks I can’t hear her, but I've pressed my ear to the door like in a cartoon and I’m currently hearing her hysterics as to what they should do with me. I hear “therapy,” “emergency room,” and “hospital” all as possible candidates. After about 30 minutes, they decide on a lucky winner. Take your guess! What is it? Ding ding ding! It’s the emergency room! (Applause, please.) 

Suddenly, we are in the car with Mom crying in the passenger seat and Dad driving with his stoic deposition, as per usual. I’m picking at my already chipping nails to give myself a fresh, psychotic-looking, ER-appropriate manicure. We pull in and Mom’s still panicking, but Dad seems perfectly fine. I somehow get a room almost instantly while a white and blue wristband similar to the ones you get at the Pacific Pier when you buy a full-day pass gets wrapped around my wrist haphazardly. Now, it’s time for the Waiting Game. If you’ve been through the American healthcare system, you know precisely what I am talking about. Take a guess as to how many hours it took for the nurses to help a suicidal teen in crisis. 12 hours! A new record! Those 12 hours were full of me making awkward prolonged eye contact with the nurse watching me to make sure I wouldn’t try to stab myself with the plethora of sharp items in the hospital room and watching It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia on my iPad. Danny DeVito is staring into my soul when a real doctor knocks on the door. I don’t even have time to ask “Who’s there?” before the male, middle-aged doctor named Steven or Richard–a white guy name–walks in. 

“Why are you here today?” asks Brian(?).

“Suicide attempt.”

“Okay…” Todd(?) writes something down on his clipboard. “Do you self-harm?”

“Yeah.”

“Where?”

I showed him the measly little scratches I had done up to that time. He does a check motion on his clipboard. He’s filling out my problems in a form. Hilarious. After a few more questions, all without him asking my name, he leaves me with the same nurse who was watching me before; she already seems fed up with her job of watching a sweaty suicidal 14-year-old girl play Angry Birds Star Wars on her iPad. Tragic. Lucky for me, I have crippling insomnia, so I get to watch the clock in my room tick by hour after hour. I’m bored, so I start picking at my skin and pulling out hairs from my uneven DIY bangs. By the time the clock hits 1:30 am, I have a little collection of tiny, bloody scabs and pieces of short brown hair, still attached to the root. I don’t know how I fell asleep; I just know I did so poorly. I woke up about 20 million times during that night (morning?) and tossed and turned until my nurse left at around 6:15 am. 

Nurses that watch high-risk patients have to play a little relay game. When she left, she tagged in an incredibly young-looking male nurse with a Rick and Morty keychain on his keyring alongside his Toyota Prius ignition key. 

“I like your keychain, the Rick and Morty one,” I say.

“Oh, thanks! I like the show a lot,” says Rick and Morty guy.

“Yeah, me too. Have you seen the new season?”

We proceed to have a 20-minute conversation about the questionable direction the producers of the show are going. This guy is a welcome break from the Doctor who only asked what he needed to and the nurse who wouldn’t even look at me. This is the first time I’ve been talked to as a human in 24 hours or so. Me and Rick and Morty Guy are still discussing the Dragon Episode (don’t watch it, trust me) when a female, 30 or so-looking nurse walks in with a long needle and what looks like a pipe cleaner. The needle is one I’ve seen before: the drawing-blood needle. Oh, no. Then, the pipe cleaner: this isn’t just any craft pipe cleaner, it’s the scrubby rough kind you use to clean out your rainbow metal straw you bought in 2017 that makes every drink taste metallic and bloody. I don’t know what she plans to do with this pipe cleaner, but I hope that soon I will be lucky enough to find out. 

She begins by drawing my blood. She’s not very careful about it and just seems to stick the long needle in. She’s pulling the little handle back and nothing’s coming out. So she tries again, this time looking for a vein in my arm. She pulls back the handle again to no avail. She finally calls for backup, and a much older, more experienced nurse walks in looking frustrated. She guides me through how to make my vein accessible and implies that I need to work out. My blood gets drawn successfully (third time's a charm).

Now, the pipe cleaner. Time to find out what its purpose is.

“We’re going to give you a COVID-19 test.” Oh. “Tilt your head back.”

I have no time to process what is about to happen when the nurse shoves the pipe cleaner so far up my right nostril that it feels like it’s scratching my brain. She very painfully twists it around for 10 seconds and then pulls it out. Phew.

“Other nostril.” Oh no. 

The same rough pipe cleaner is shoved up my left nostril, and the process is painfully repeated. When she pulls the pipe cleaner out, I see that it’s covered in blood. I don’t believe that the intention was to get a second blood sample, but I was so kind as to give them a bonus. Tears are still running down my face while I’m recovering from the medieval torture device, not because I’m sad, but because that’s what happens when a long, spiky stick is shoved up your nose for 20 seconds. 

I’m waiting in the painfully dull room for another 3 hours waiting for my COVID test results. A different nurse has already replaced Rick and Morty Guy and she seems even more fed up with her job. My bad. The doctor comes back in the room with my COVID results.

“Negative.” Not surprised.

“Sarah, do you know what inpatient treatment is?” 

Yes. “No.”

“It means the patient is kept at the hospital to recover.” 

I know. “Oh.”

“I’ll be right back with your parents, Sarah.” 

Not the parents! It’s too late for me to ask the doctor to politely send me home so I can continue blasting Destroy Boys lying down on the hardwood floor and maybe attempt to kill myself (again). He’s already out the door. I hear murmuring outside and my mom’s signature yelp she does when she cries. A few more yelps. Two knocks at the door. The doctor walks in alongside my parents, my mom’s eyes are swollen and her cheeks bright red from wiping away tears. She’s trying to hold it together but her composure is one wiggly block away from the Jenga tower falling. To quote Destroy Boys: Sorry, Mom. Dad looks like he just came back from a round of golf: bland, white, and tired. How he always looks.

“We are going to recommend you admit your daughter into inpatient treatment,” says the doctor.

Dad says something along the lines of, “Whatever is best for your well-being, we’ll do it.”

Mom can’t even choke out a word. Or look at me, for that matter.

“Alright, Sarah. First thing in the morning.” And morning did come.

I wake up in the cold, hard bed and look around the room. Ahh, what a beautiful day in the hospital. Removable ceiling tiles, fluorescent ceiling fixtures, and the smell of rubbing alcohol. Take it in, Sarah, you deserve it. The next thing I know, a student nurse walks in and says it's time to go. Where are my parents? Do I get to say goodbye? Where am I going? The student nudges me into a… wheelchair? Maybe to get more sympathy for the mental patient. He whisks me around the hospital like he’s taken several 14-year-old girls to the mental hospital. He knows his way around. He pushes me forward in my wheelchair until we arrive at the pediatric psychiatric wing. He opens the door with a key, and I get my first glimpse into the psych ward. Everyone is staring. 

“This is Amy, she will be your nurse for your time here,” says the student nurse. I stay silent.

“Alright, Sarah, let’s get up and go into your room and you’ll have some alone time.” Alone time?

My room is completely plain with no doorknobs and no racks and a sloping shower head so I don’t try to hang myself. Then, Amy takes away my shoelaces. And then my hoodie strings. And then my earrings. And then my dignity. Just kidding.

“Sarah, you have a mandatory 45 minutes of alone time once you arrive. We will do checks through the window every 10 minutes or so, don’t be alarmed.”

“Okay.”

She walks toward the door, opens it, and closes it. Then I hear a click. She locked it. I’m trapped. I can’t handle my numbness and fear and pain anymore, and it all comes out in a big screaming sob. No one bats an eye. I cry harder into my pillow.

Fresh, salty tears, spit, and mucus completely soak the fabric on my one and only pillow. My pillow feels cool on my cheek, and I let the liquids slide down my face, over my nose, and pool on one spot on the pillow. 

I just wish I had killed myself better.