Sarah Vaughan is Not My Mother: A Memoir of Madness (23 page)

With one hug all is forgiven and I thank her for all she's done. I offer to walk her out but she tells me to stay, and just like that she's gone.

14

 

I'm dying for a cigarette but things have changed since I was here last. There is now a sheltered wooden smoking area in front of the nurses' station. I decide to stand behind the shelter and smoke. I look up at the bush and walk over to a little stream that's meandering between me and the bush. I climb down and touch the water and remember how I used to run up through this bush first thing in the morning when I woke up. You weren't allowed to go there in your first week but no one had given me any official rules.

I walk part of the way up the bush, sometimes using my arms because it gets quite steep. I have loved climbing through bush since I was a kid. Suddenly, I feel slightly happy at being able to walk and climb after being locked up in the ward with its fences and barred windows.

After coming back down from the bush I tread the stones in the stream and my shoes get wet. As I walk back into my wing I see a familiar cat. The cat brings back memories of when I was last in here. I believed people thought of me as an animal: every time someone talked to this cat or told a story about it I thought they were referring to me. I was scrambling to remember who I was and would lock myself in my room for hours doing art so I didn't have to focus on myself. I covered my walls and ceiling with pictures.

Seeing the cat's traumatised me. I go into my room, lie on my bed and say to the voice, “I'm not a fucking cat.”

I hear a knock at the door. I get up and open it and a woman introduces herself as Susan. She says, “Do you want me to show you around?” I smile at her and say, “I stayed here a number of years back. I should be fine.”

I go to close the door and Susan says, “Well, how about a cup of tea or coffee and a chat?”

“Okay.”

I follow her out and see she is dressed very smartly in jeans, wedge heels and a wrap-around top. She looks back at me and says, “I will give you some of my coffee. We have to buy our own from the dairy up the road.”

She pulls a jar of Moccona coffee out of a drawer.

“How do you take it?”

“Black.”

We sit down in the living room, which is joined up with the kitchen. A man pokes his head around the door. I recognise him from last time as John, the head of staff. I smile and wave. He says, “Well, I'm off home. Catch up tomorrow.”

Susan says, “So, do you smoke?”

“Yes, I do.”

“Have you seen where you can smoke?”

“Yeah, the wooden shed.” I keep my answers to her questions short as I'm planning on having a short stay here.

“Shall we go out there? I smoke too.”

We go out to the smokers' area and Susan says, “You're only really meant to have one at a time and then go back in.”

A few people come over. They go and get themselves cushions so they don't have to sit on the wooden bench, then they introduce themselves. I can't hear their names so I give them all a wave.

Susan says to me, “On the first week you're not allowed out, so if you want anything from the dairy ask me and I'll get it.”

I say, “Thank you” and get up and go back to my room. I remember seeing
Ashburn Guidelines
on the noticeboard just down from my room, so I go and read them. I remind myself to straighten up and concentrate. I read something which seems to mean that you are not confined in Ashburn by law and are free to leave at any time.

I go back to my room with this knowledge in my head. I decide to time the staff's rounds that night to figure out the right time to make my escape. I ignore Susan's comments about not being allowed out in the first week and I go to the dairy and buy some filters. I decide I can survive without coffee for a while, which if all goes to plan will be only twenty-four hours.

On my way back I am careful to not make myself too noticeable in case some of the staff or other patients who have been here a while are out and see me. I don't walk down the main driveway. I walk alongside the stream and bush to the back of the smokers' shed.

When I get to my room I shut my curtain because the window looks out on to the back of the dining room. Susan knocks at my door. She says it's the end-of-the-day meeting. I say I don't want to go.

“It's compulsory.”

I follow her into the living room and find myself a chair in the circle the other people have formed. They go around and everyone reflects on their day. I can't hear a word of what they are saying so I get out of my chair and go back to my room. I decide I'm not going to worry about what they might think because I will be gone soon enough.

I close my eyes and visualise what I'm going to do when I leave here and who I'm going to ring. I reflect on the people I have met here and how different they are to the people in the ward. I think of how much bigger this place is, and how groupie it is. It feels like the kind of place that would turn up on a reality TV show. The people don't seem really unwell, not like the people in the ward in Wellington, half of whom were catatonic or driven by some religious purpose.

I go out and have another cigarette. I see someone from the other wing walking past holding keys in his hand. He's obviously been driving somewhere. I figure he can't be in a heavily medicated state.

When I go back in, I see people filing out of the living room. Susan says, “Dinner in ten minutes.” She looks less than impressed with me.

People walk past and stare at me. Some are wearing the latest fashion, but others are ghostly thin and in trackpants that are too big for them. They look sad: it is hard to be happy when you're starving.

Susan says to me, “Well, I'm going to have a cigarette before dinner. I guess you've already had one, so if you want dinner it is in the dining room in ten minutes.”

I go back to my room. I don't feel like being social but I am starving so I decide to go to dinner. First I check all my books in my bag. I find my passport and eftpos card in the safe zip-up pocket. They haven't asked me for them yet. The voice tells me I am not like these people and I don't belong here. He says, “You belong in Africa.” He says I am a tough warrior and will meet someone who can help me, but not here.

I decide to put on my black tracksuit as the sun is going down and I feel protected wearing black. The voice tells me I am a man and to be tough. Although it's not true that I'm a man, it's helpful to think about if I am going to make it out of here. The voice tells me I am really a warrior but when I was a child my muscle development was stunted by drugs I was given.

 

I leave my room and go to the dining room. I walk tall and proud and push my shoulders back. The food is out on a servery where you help yourself. There is a lot on offer, salad, quiche, potatoes and meat. I serve myself some salad and quiche and sit down at a table. I notice there is salt and pepper on the table, and silver knives and forks, and a proper plate that would break if you dropped it.

Staff are sitting with the patients. I recognise some from my previous stay but don't approach them. I look behind the servery and see the kitchen staff handing out plated meals to the people with eating disorders. I sit down at a table. I don't look up to see who's sitting there but I do notice a blond guy wearing a striped shirt. I have some racist dictum going through my head. I don't say anything but the moment I look at him I don't like him. Everyone seems to be laughing at his jokes, which I can't hear. Most people seem quite happy and content.

I eat my dinner quickly, not because I'm extremely hungry but because I don't want to be in the room. There's a trolley by the door with a bin attached and a place to put plates and cutlery. I don't need to scrape my plate so I start a pile and walk out the exit closest to my room. I ignore the smoking rules and light up as I walk around the outside of our wing's kitchen. I look in and see a couple of people sitting at a table. I look away and keep walking.

I walk up the path towards the gymnasium and past some brick houses, which I remember are where people stay when they are close to being released. I head up to the top car park, just by a big paddock. I look for the horses that used to be there but I don't see them. Shade starts to descend on the car park so I make my way back down to my wing. I see through the living-room window people watching TV.

I decide to go to my room and see how long their checks are. As I come in the door I see Susan sitting on the couch. She says, “Meds are at 7.30. Do you know where to go?”

“Yes,” I say, “the nurse's area.”

I look at the clock. It's already 7.45 so I realise I was gone a while and no one looked for me. I go back to my room and wait for the meds' queue to die down. When I go back there is less of a queue. I recognise the nurse handing out the meds. Her name's Priscilla. She was a Nazi who always came into my room without knocking, and flashed a torch right in my face when doing a check.

Priscilla says, “Oh, you're back. Now, I remember last time you were spitting them out.” She gives me the meds and then gets me to open my mouth so she can check I've swallowed them. I look at her sternly in the eyes as she does this and then I walk out.

I feel like a coffee but I don't have any so I check the kitchen to see what's there. Besides the appliances and the fridge and microwave there's nothing except a basket full of fruit with people's names written on them. I look in the fridge and see a bunch of yoghurts in a line, all named. It strikes me as a bit weird that people feel the need to name their food in this place when there is such a ready supply at all times, but people with eating disorders get so hung up on food they hoard it.

Last time I was here I thought it was part of my mission to become as thin as I could for some movie. Now, because I'm not as unwell, I can see how strange things are—for example, a place that is a hospital condoning and reinforcing behaviours around hoarding of food. I vow to myself that this is the only night I'm staying here.

I decide I am over the coffee idea. I get to my room and it's about nine o'clock. I don't know if Priscilla has checked but I don't worry about it. I've had a long day so I get into my pyjamas and go to bed. Just after turning out the light I see a torch shining on my face. It shines about every half hour. Each time I tell Priscilla to get out, and I roll over and put my head under the pillow.

In the morning there's a knock at my door and someone saying, “Morning meeting is in thirty minutes.” I have a shower and get ready. The shower is much lighter and airier than the one in the ward, which felt like a cave.

I walk up to the gymnasium for what is called “community meeting”. Basically, everyone sits in a circle and talks about who has been seen doing what. Last time I was here people would have fights. The only time I ever got mentioned I wasn't present. One weekend I had gone out with another patient and a patient's daughter, who was visiting. We sat in a car and smoked pot. After we got back we were drug-tested and the results came back positive, but by then I had escaped.

 

I sit in the meeting and look at the lines on the floor. I can't hear what they are saying, but I pick up the tone and start laughing to myself about how seriously everyone takes it. I look over at the head psychiatrist and notice her green socks. I see this as a “go” sign intended for me.

The meeting goes on for about half an hour and then I'm first to leave because I chose a seat by the door. I go to the correct place to smoke. I sit down on the wooden bench in the shelter and more people arrive. I can't hear but I gather they are discussing the meeting. I feel strange sitting here. This seems to be a world within a world and when people step into it they create problems and then try and fix them. They are escaping from the real issues that got them here. This strengthens my resolve to leave: I don't want to be here in six months doing all this.

Susan comes over and says there is morning tea and then group. I figure I don't have to go to a group because I haven't been put in one. I go and check out the morning tea. It's muffins. I have a muffin and sit and eat in the living room. I see the eating disorder people in the kitchen agonising over the butter. There must be a better place for them than being lumped in a heap here, I think to myself. I enjoy my muffin and sit on the couch. I look at the clock and it says eleven. Everyone goes to group. I go to my room and think what to do next.

I decide to go to the library and use the computer. There are books organised by name, plus a TV and a couch. I log on to the internet and check my email. There is one from an old school friend. I send her a long email about where I've been and where I am now. As I'm nearing the end a guy comes in and says he has booked the computer for twelve o'clock, so I finish my email quickly and leave.

I walk down the corridor, go outside and have a smoke. People are out from group. A couple of people ask me what I am in for and I say, “I don't really know—schizoaffective disorder.” They give me a puzzled look.

I don't ask them any questions. I'm focused on leaving. Everyone heads for lunch. I line up and find them talking about the group they just had. I stand and look at the pictures on the noticeboard of the Christmas party. I get myself a plate and make up a sandwich from the bowl of shredded lettuce and some beans. I don't stay and eat there. I go outside to the table where I sat while I was waiting for Waris.

I stare at the trees and have a walk around, really just killing time. I must be out a while because when I take the plate back it's two o'clock and people are back in group. I say thank you to the kitchen staff and head to the shed. On the way I look into the nurses' station and can see nurses in there. I turn around and the voice tells me to go to my room. I go to my room and try and get some rest.

I fall asleep and wake up groggy. I walk to the stream and smoke and smoke; my anxiety is running high over my pending exit.