New Year New Me

   New Year New Me 

     Holidays at Dammasch State Hospital were the worst. I mean, most days at the hospital were pretty hard, but at least if it was just a random Wednesday in the middle of March, you weren’t feeling so awful about the fact that everyone else in the world was celebrating. Everyone else  was sharing a big meal with their families, or opening presents, or giving their sweetie a kiss at midnight. Everyone else was content and warm and happy and not in a weird place separated from the rest of the world. If it was just a Wednesday it’s better, because we’re all miserable and bored if it’s just the middle of the week. It’s easier to ignore that this situation you’re in is just really not normal, even if it actually starts to feel normal the longer you’re there. 

      Maybe it would be different if I had been older, and maybe it’s better than it was in 1972. I hope so. I know now that I can choose to celebrate or not. I know now holidays are really made up dates that were created by cultures or religions or card companies. No biggie, really. The year and a half that I was in the hospital, though, I was only 14 years old, and holidays still meant something. Even though that was almost 50 years ago, I can still feel it deep inside along with so many other memories I have tried to numb out. That twinge in the chest. That flash in my gut when i smell creamed corn. Or bleach. Or urine. 

      I had gotten to go home on a pass for Christmas, mostly because my parents felt guilty for making me stay over Thanksgiving. My dad drove the station wagon from Portland, OR to Wilsonville to pick me up. He grumbled a bit about the traffic, but otherwise he wasn’t being as grumpy as usual.  He even let me pick the radio station for the half hour drive home. To be honest, I was just so relieved that he actually showed up this time I didn’t care what music was in the background. There were so many weekends that I was given permission for home visits, all to have my parents cancel at the last minute or just not show up altogether, that I stopped putting in requests. Ok, that’s not completely accurate. I still put the requests in for visits, but the other kids in the hospital stopped voting to support my visit, which was a requirement. One kid told me that it wasn’t that they thought I didn’t deserve it, they just couldn’t deal with watching me stand at the door and wait. They couldn’t stand to see my disappointment and the way I tried to make jokes to make up for it. I know. It was really pathetic. 

     When we pulled up to the house, my brother Lee ran outside with his dog, Angel. I wish I could describe a scene from a movie where the long lost brothers have a beautiful embrace, but it was more awkward than that. Mostly we just focused on all the ways we looked different. My hair was a little longer and Lee was a little taller. He had new shoes and I still had the ones I wore when I first went into the hospital.  I played with the dog a little bit, but the dog seemed confused about who I was and how I belonged to this configuration of humans. Lee and I hadn’t seen each other since I first went into the hospital. That had been about 6 months ago. My parents never brought Lee to visit. They said that they thought it would be too scary for him to see it. I didn’t understand that though, since Lee was only 10 months younger than me and I had to actually live there. Plus, Lee was the most brave kid I knew. He was always the one to try out whatever scheme I had concocted first. My parents thought I would set these situations up to get him into trouble, like some Master Manipulator, but like I said, he just wanted to be the one to try it out first. Plus, if I had just watched Lee jump off the roof with an umbrella and hurt his ankle, I wasn’t going to follow him and do something that dumb. I would just climb down off the roof and try to get him to be quiet so we wouldn’t get in trouble. I wasn’t stupid, or crazy, or dangerous. We were just being boys. 

       I ended up being home for 3 days for Christmas that year. It was nice being home and eating my mom’s cooking, but in the back of my head I knew I was going to have to go back to the hospital. I didn’t understand why I needed to go in the first place, and I definitely didn’t understand why I had to go back. I still don’t understand it if I’m being completely honest. I know a big part was my being gay. I know that you think that’s not a reason to be in the hospital now, but this was a different time. I can also admit that I was a little bit of a handful. Lee and I were adopted when we were really little, but I still think there was some PTSD going on from whatever it was like with my biological mom. That wasn’t something people knew about back then, so my parents put me in the hospital because they just thought I was out of control and my dad was mad that the pills the fancy doctor he took me to didn’t work.  

      At least this time when i made that drive to Wilsonville I would know where I was headed. That first time, my parents just told me I had an appointment to see a new doctor. I had seen lots of doctors and didn’t think much of it, even when we entered the grounds and saw the big sign that said “Dammasch State Hospital”. I remember making fun of the name because it was close to the word “damn”. I met with the doctor and answered his questions. He told me he wanted to talk to my parents, and that I could go with this nice nurse. I was taken to this room and there were all these people in there that just looked really crazy. I mean, no offense, but there were people rocking and drooling and talking to themselves. It was like a scary movie with every cliche you could expect, minus the actual straight jackets. I told the nurse there had been a mistake and that I needed to see my parents. They just ignored me, so I started yelling about seeing my parents, and if I’m being honest, I was also screaming and hitting and kicking and I knew that I was proving their point about me being unsafe but I couldn’t stop myself. 

     I was back at the hospital for  New Year’s Eve that year. We had gotten back a few days before and it was kinda weird because most of the other kids were gone, and a lot of the staff were on vacation, and we didn’t have our regular school schedule because it was supposed to be a vacation. A vacation, even though we were locked up. The staff had put up a tree that was still there and they tried to make things festive by letting us play games and eat pizza. There weren’t really enough kids there though to play charades and Monopoly just took too much focus and concentration. The staff that were working were the older ones that weren’t that much fun in the first place. We knew the younger ones were out partying with their friends. 

      The tightness in my chest kept threatening to spread down into my belly. I knew that if I could just keep it contained in my chest that it would be OK. Once it spread to my head or my belly it was like I was drowning and then I either needed to rock or to scream and both of those options just justified why I was in the hospital. 

       I thought about what Lee was doing at home. He was probably having a couple of friends spend the night. Although, to be more accurate, he was probably spending the night somewhere else. No one would call our house “the fun house” where you could stay up late and eat junk food. If he was smart he was at a friend’s. I thought about what my older sister was doing. She was still home from college, and she was probably going to a party, hoping to get a kiss at midnight. I knew she was too much of a good girl to be drinking or smoking, but I knew she would be having fun. I didn’t have to think too much about my parents. Every year my mom would make steaks for them and Spaghettios for us, and they would watch the people in Times Square. I remember asking why we weren’t there, not knowing that New York was a million miles from Portland, Oregon. I should have asked why they were satisfied watching other people have fun rather than going out to a party or having fun themselves. 

     I shocked the staff that night by telling them that I was going to bed early. We were told we could stay up until midnight, but the tightness was setting in and had spread to form a lump in my throat, and if i laid down it might ease up a little. Maybe I could read the magazines that I brought back from my visit. There were National Geographics and a couple of MAD magazines from Lee. The staff had to scan the National Geographics to make sure there weren’t topless ladies from Africa, which is pretty ironic given that part of why I was there was for being gay. I guess they knew me well enough to know that I could use those photos to trade with other kids on the unit. 

      I laid in my bed and looked out the window. It wasn’t raining and I could actually see some stars if I focused past the bars on the window. I thought about ways that I could show everyone I could go home. I could use the new year to make a new me. The word “safety” got used a lot, even though I hadn’t really ever hurt anyone. I could try, though, to be safe. They wanted me to focus, and that had been getting better, even though my mind still wandered a lot. Maybe if I just tried to be a goodie like my sister, my parents would love me enough to bring me home. Or maybe I could just pretended to like girls. I breathed into the feeling in my chest and kept my eyes on the stars. I felt the rush of release when the tears started to fall. I tried to make sure to not make any noise though, because maybe if I didn’t cry so much that would also get me home. I just breathed and focused and cried and tried to go to sleep. 

    My eyes finally started to get heavy as I heard the countdown come closer on the TV in the other room. The staff had been chatting but then everyone got quiet. I closed my eyes and tried to picture the view from my window at home. I had no idea that I would never have that view again, that my parents would refuse to take me back home. I had no idea that my future would involve another facility and then a foster home where I would be molested by the foster dad. I had no idea I would choose to leave the foster home and live on the streets, selling my body and finding control in a way that only makes sense when you are desperate. I had no idea that someday I would get off the streets and off drugs and I would get my life together, and that I would have someone I love make me my own steak on New Year’s Eve, and that if we wanted to go be in the party we could, or if we wanted to watch it on TV that was OK too. I heard the staff clink their glasses of soda and say “Here’s to a new year!”  as the numbers counted down. 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1…