Journal of an Unfortunate, Life-Altering Incident

Journal of an Unfortunate, Life-altering Incident

By

Joe S. Thomas

08-06-2018:​ I have become fed up with the side effects of the medications I am currently taking. I feel that the side effects are outweighing the benefits at this juncture. The list of medications are as follows: Methadone, Celexa, Klonopin and Lisinopril. As of today I am cutting each of these medications by half and plan to wean myself off of them gradually. I have told my girlfriend not to give me the last disc of Methadone no matter what. Methadone is a pain medication, Celexa is an antidepressant, Klonopin is a benzo and Lisinopril is for blood pressure. I am diagnosed as Bi-Polar, but usually I am depressed. There’s not much energy or happiness in my life and I believe these medications are adding to these problems. I am nervous, yet determined to do what I feel I need to do. Beginning tomorrow I am starting a walking routine to get in some exercise and hopefully lose a few pounds and also to just feel better in general. Here we go. This is something that I feel I have to do alone. I know what the doctors say, but these days, their words hold very little weight with me.

08-07-2018:​ I awoke at 7:00 am today right after my girlfriend left the house for work. I was sluggish, but I pulled myself from the bed, put on my exercise shorts and shoes and made an energy boosting drink made out of powder from a well-known nutrition store. It’s supposed to curb your appetite and also give you energy. I grabbed my headphones and went to the walking track which is literally about 1 mile in circumference and circled the town in which I lived. The sun was shining, I was working up a sweat and the energy drink and my endorphins were apparently kicking in together. I was feeling pretty great after my 3 mile, fast-paced walk. I cooled down, wiped the sweat from my body, got in my car and went back to the house for a light lunch and a shower. It was only 9 am and I had walked more in two hours than most would all day. I felt it was a small victory but I knew I hadn’t started feeling the effects of cutting the medication yet. It’s always in the back of my mind. Day 2, well done. Normally at some point in the day I would take a nap, but on this day I felt great and skipped my slumber.

8-09-2018:​ I have been keeping up my exercise schedule and still feel good. It feels like I’m definitely not as sluggish as I’ve felt for years but I could feel the beginning of what I call the “electric tingles” that seemed to shoot throughout my body telling me I’d better get ready. The drugs are leaving my system and I am definitely beginning to feel strange feelings. Abruptly stopping the Klonopin alone can cause seizures. I am coming off two very addictive substances that I’ve taken for years. My anxiousness about the whole thing is starting to bother me a bit. I’m trying to tough it out. I know it’s not going to be an easy feat.

8-11-2018:​ Again, I have been keeping with my schedule. My sleep cycle is really off and I haven’t been sleeping much at all. Other than the “electric shock” feeling shooting through my body every few minutes and the lack of sleep, I feel great. I feel as though I don’t need any

 sleep. I stayed up all night recording and mixing music without a wink but I’m in a great mood and I seem to have energy. This is what I was hoping for. I’m sure all of the medication isn’t out of my system yet but when the jolts stop I feel like I may be a new man. My girlfriend said she noticed my energy and she knew I hadn’t been sleeping so she mentioned it to me. It sounds strange but I’m not complaining. It seems my tremor has even subsided somewhat. An extra bonus!

8-16-2018:​ I’m still not sleeping well but my creativity and energy seem to be going strong. I finished a few stories I’ve been working on and recorded some songs as well. I am keeping with the exercise and routine but it seems as though my girlfriend is annoyed by my energy and lack of sleep. She told me I was acting a little strange. I told her it was probably just the medication working its way out and not to worry. She keeps telling me I’m not my normal self to which I replied, “good.” I haven’t had this kind of energy and feeling since I was a teenager. I just wish she would be happy for me.

8-17-2018:​ After another sleepless night filled with editing and writing music I reached out to an old friend I hadn’t had contact with in years. I wanted to have her do the cover of the book of short stories I am working on. I knew my girlfriend was jealous of this girl but she shouldn’t be. We have always just been friends and she lives in Canada. My friend and I agreed on a price for the artwork and I went to get a money order to send her. When I arrived home my girlfriend was in a pissy mood and apparently looking to argue. When I told her about the artwork she yelled “you are not yourself, why are you even talking to her?” I explained about the artwork but nothing seemed to give her any relief from being angry at me. She stalked into the bedroom, grabbed my pillow and a blanket and threw them at me. “You can sleep on the couch if you ever sleep again,” she said and stomped back to the bedroom and locked me out.

8-18-2018​: Today, after my girlfriend came home from work she saw the money order for my friend and she seemed to snap. All I remember was her hitting me with a copy of Dostoevsky’s Crime and Punishment.​ It was a hardback book and it wasn’t the smallest in the world. The book hit me in the chest. I looked at her dumbfounded because we aren’t the type of people who get physical with each other. When the book hit me, it hurt. I saw red and was in her face screaming before I even knew what was happening. I punched the lamp off the night stand and told her to go fuck herself. I grabbed my acoustic guitar, book bag, my computer and some clothes and left for a hotel. She was crying and just kept saying, “I don’t know who you are anymore. If you leave tonight you’re going to get in trouble.” “Fuck you,” I said and slammed the front door.

8-19-2018: ​I still haven’t slept. I’m staying in a hotel, running out of cash fast and I can’t stand to face my girlfriend. I still feel strangely energetic but my mind is starting to mess with me. As I was checking into a different hotel I had my guitar, computer, and everything else on a cart by the door so I wouldn’t have to carry it by hand to my room. I turned around to pay for the room and sign the papers. As I turned to get my stuff it was gone. A brand new Dell computer, a $400 acoustic guitar and everything in my bags were stolen in a matter of minutes.

 This was the last of the journal entries that were made due to the insanity that ensued that night. I began to get very paranoid. I found myself thinking everyone was looking at me and talking about me. I couldn’t sit still in my room so I decided I would walk to the guitar store not far from my hotel. I still can’t explain why, but I found myself walking down the middle of a busy city street seemingly daring someone to hit me or say something wrong to me. It was just starting to hit me about how much money I’d just lost in a matter of minutes and I became irate. I didn’t know at the time, but I was having a manic episode. As I said earlier, I always swing toward the depression end of the spectrum and I’d never experienced the opposite end which is mania. The paranoia was getting the best of me. I thought I was being spied on in my hotel room. I thought there was a camera in the smoke detector so I sat outside for hours. I would pace the parking lot, sit on the bench for a minute and repeat these actions. I thought I saw someone I knew walk into a restaurant that was close to the hotel. I walked into the place, looked around and made a beeline for the kitchen. I thought the person was trying to hide from me as a joke. As I walked into the restaurant's kitchen I was suddenly bombarded by management asking me what the hell I was doing. I just smiled and set off the alarm by going out of an emergency exit. I must have looked quite insane walking back down the middle of the same street back to the hotel because when I arrived, the cops were waiting for me. I was sitting on my bench as they pulled up. There were two cars and three cops. In my mind, these were the assholes spying on me from the fire detector. They asked me if I was the man that just left the restaurant kitchen and walked up the middle of the street. In my state of mind I simply told them yes. When they asked why I was doing these things I told them about my belongings and all of the swirling shit with my girlfriend. “Do you realize you just committed felony trespassing,” asked one of the officers. “Man, after the bullshit I’ve been through today that’s about the least fucked-up thing that’s happened today. “Are you on drugs,” the officer asked. “No, I said, “I’m just a nervous person and I’m getting more pissed by the second. Why aren’t you motherfuckers looking for my shit instead of harrassing me for walking into a restaurant?” “You need to watch that smartass mouth before it gets you into trouble,” the officer growled red-faced. “Look, fuck you,” I said to the cop. “Officer Rainey, I believe this bastard is hopped up on drugs. Cuff his smart ass.” “Are you fucking kidding me you sonofabitch,” I yelled as he grabbed my wrist and twisted it until I thought it would snap and then he clamped the cuffs on as tight as possible. They placed me in the back of the cruiser and I cursed the cop for all he was worth all the way to the county jail.

There are millions of Americans that have some form of mental illness. Jails and prisons are not where these people can receive any sort of help at all. In fact, the harm done to me over the 72 hours they held me will stick in my mind forever. After being booked, I was placed in a very overcrowded concrete room that smelled of piss and death. Upon entering the cell I just sat down in the middle of the floor. As the guard shut the door, two inmates sucker punched me and split my eyebrow open enough that I had to be transported to the hospital to have the gash glued

 together. When I got back to the jail I was placed in a cell by myself. Being off my medications, having had no sleep and my manic episode started to truly get to me. I attempted to call my girlfriend to pay the $200 dollar bond to which she replied, “I have to work tomorrow.” I flew into a rage and called her every horrible name in the book in front of the whole booking department and the inmates that were there too. I couldn’t believe she was doing this. I sat in that cell alone for 15 or 16 hours without any mattress, blanket or food. The more time that went by the more pissed off I became. By this time, I had a concussion, I was going through a manic episode and I was coming off of all my medications. I jumped up and started beating the plexiglass windows that kept me in this small, dank cell that seemed to be closing in on me by the moment. I was beating on the glass to try and get someone’s attention about the issues I was having. After an hour of this I gave up. In 30 minutes 4 SRT (Special Response Team) guards opened my cell and all of them led me up two stairs that led to another solitary cell away from the booking department. As we turned the corner I was tased in the ribs breaking 2 of them and filling my lungs with fluid. I was also beaten severely in the back of the head after already receiving one concussion. After this the four of them threw me into a shower and left me there for what seemed an eternity to lie on a metal floor while trying to deal with the damage inflicted on my mind and body.

After 72 hours I was released and my mother had to take me to the hospital to have my lung drained. At this point you may think the story is bad enough. It’s not over. When I finally do make it back to my girlfriend’s, her family is there telling me I have to leave. We had been together for 10 years. I still loved her and needed her now more than ever. She was so cold and downright mean about the whole situation. It truly broke my heart.

Friends, if there’s a lesson to be learned here, I would have to say that sometimes we are put on these damn medications due to things beyond our control. I found out the extremely hard way that I am one of those people. May you never experience anything even remotely similar,