Youthful Blossom

CHAPTER 4: Four Days at the Mental Hospital

The woman, a probable nurse (I say "probable" as I am unsure of whether she was a nurse or not), took me to one of the three units in the hospital. The unit I was admitted to were for adolescents while the other two were for kids and adults each. She had me sit at a blue chair that was near the entrance/exit automatic doors of the unit and asked me to wait to be seen by someone. As I waited, I looked to my right and saw a girl in the big room of the unit that looked like a living room. She looked happy while she was watching the television that was attached to the big room's wall. I wondered "Will I leave this place feeling happy?" I thought I was going to be cured of my mental illness, but I was yet to know how mental illnesses were taken care of by professionals.
After my time waiting at the chair, a man, a probable nurse, came to me and asked to follow him to a room, where I had to take off my clothes, except my underwear, so he could make sure that I wasn't carrying anything that could cause harm to myself or others. I was so nervous and it was even worse as a socially-anxious person, but I knew it had to be done to ensure safety. He found nothing, so he told me to put back on my clothes. Then, I left the room with him and sat back at the chair. I had to use the restroom, so I asked one of the nurses for permission to use the restroom, and she agreed to it but she had to come with me to the private restroom since she had to monitor me at the restroom. She had to keep the restroom door half open to ensure I didn't self-harm. I had to urinate as she was standing next to the half-opened door and of course she wasn't looking at me, but she was hearing the sounds from the private restroom, which made me uncomfortable because she could have been judging me just from the sounds I made like the sounds of washing my hands or flushing the toilet. After that awkward moment, I went back to the chair. After waiting again at the chair, another nurse came and took me to a room at the hospital that I would be sharing with another boy, who too, was a patient at the hospital. The nurse had me stay in the room alone to wait for everyone to come back to the rooms as they were somewhere else, probably at the hospital's park. When they came back, I was nervous as I was like that around everyone, but I liked the energy that I felt from the boys. There was a boy who was there for physically attacking a teacher, and from my eavesdropping, one of the boys said the boy's name and the word "murder" in the same sentence. Surprisingly, that didn't scare me because I thought as long as I didn't interfere with his actions, I would be fine, and plus, I had social anxiety and yet-to-be-discovered autism, or specifically, Asperger's syndrome, so there was no way I would have had communicated with the boy.
As time went by, it was my third day at the hospital. All the adolescents from the unit went into the hospital's gym since we were told so by the hospital staff. When everyone arrived and settled at the gym, I was alone there on the floor as everyone else played with the friends they had made at the hospital until a lovely girl saw me and asked to come sit next to her and her friends, who were also sitting on the gym's floor, since they didn't want to play sports, but instead talk. She spoke to me as her friends heard. I think her name was Courtney, but I could be wrong. The girl was white and had a southern accent. She told me that she would pray for me, which I appreciated so much.
After our little chat, a boy who knew of me, as he had seen me in the hospital, asked everyone in the gym to cheer for me, which they did! My chest had this very warm feeling, which meant that I was really happy. I finally felt loved and cared for, something that I had been wishing for so long. I was actually less socially-anxious than ever before from attention. The body has spoken to me a few times, but I barely responded. I remember hearing him on the second day, saying that he was Bisexual, to another boy at the hospital, and I acted as if I was better than him because of my internalized homophobia. I really believed I was heterosexual, but this was only a month before before I started realizing the truth. After the four days had come to an end, I was taken to the hospital's waiting room to meet up with my mother and my two brothers, Jamie and Damian, as I was being discharged. I had spoken with my mother and father everyday at the hospital by call as they allowed their patients to contact family members and friends, but only with their telephones, and with a limited amount of time.
I was happy to leave the hospital, not because I hadn't liked it, but because I finally got to see my mother and brothers again. My time at the hospital was actually the best time I had the entire year of 2016 because I felt peace, and most importantly, understood. I was in a place with mental health professionals and teenagers who too, had mental health problems. I finally did not feel alone in the world because of the help. My voice was finally being heard! I thought I was going to end up committing suicide, but fortunately, I didn't.