Half Awake -- Love & Psychosis

Chapter 7: Concrete Walk of Pain

This is where I will get to the nitty gritty parts about psychosis. First, my brain starts to think one hundred times faster than normal. Turning my intrusive thoughts into uncontrollable feelings and emotions. Theyre heightened. Sometimes I will start to hear things that arent there, and my vision will go blurry. During an episode of paranoia psychosis, my ears will ring, Ill cover my ears, and start to scream and cry like a toddler. Its surprising that I remember every inch of psychosis and mania, though. Being half awake means that I know Im in psychosis but theres no waking up right away.

I can lose focus on things very quickly and start to feel restless. I spent my nights of mania crying and fearing when Ill ever be able to sleep, and I knew I needed to sleep but my body wasnt going to let me. I started to question what was real, what wasnt. This figure of speech also remains to the people: Who is real and who is not real? The people who depersonalized so much that they lose touch of reality in a different way.

There are times that I question everyones awareness as well. Its hard to tell when someone else is having their own break of reality, but how they treat others who are different to them is the answer. Simply, Ill put it this way, I am a human being with real emotional feelings. Treating me differently because I experience psychotic symptoms with my bipolar disorder, is discrimination. I dont have super powers, Im not a violent person, and Im too scared to actually kill myself. There have been times where yes, I wanted to give up, but thats because I didnt take a step back and count how many reasons I have to live.

The causes of mania are sleep deprivation, cannabis, genetics, and also hormones. I have my own triggers and I am fully aware of them, thankfully. I was smoking weed to help with sleeping, but one night I didnt sleep. I was playing video games with Kyle. I started to feel delusional and exhausted, but as soon as I laid my head on the pillow I didnt sleep. I didnt do anything really. I cried a few times because I was scared, and I started to worry about how Kyle treated me as a person. With my heightened emotions at this time, I was still fully aware of everything but this was the start of mania.

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My bare feet walked this concrete path carved just for me. Eyes swollen, helpless in my own corner. I was sweaty, freezing, and scared. Not just to lose Kyle, but to lose myself too. In this corner Im powerless. A garage lit up in the night where I didnt want to be. Several calls to my parents went unanswered, and I was alone. Not with Kyle, not with anyone. To feel what this pain feels like, the floor of the garage felt like every shattered piece of glass inching into my feet. If I could describe what having two police officers questioning you felt like, I would tell you it was just like being in a mental hospital. Ive never been more hurt in my entire life, and Kyle didnt even do it. All I had to do was break up with him to see the true colors of everyone else.

Anyways, Im in a corner! Both officers kept asking me what my plan for that night was. I told them I wanted to go to bed, more than anything in the world. I had been awake for days, what more could go wrong? Emotional abuse is terrifying. (Please learn how to love and respect your partner and know how to do it.) My top love language is words of affirmation, and I was uncontrollably screaming and crying. I was trying my best to control my own emotions, but being in psychosis and half awake made it so hard. I had never been more scared, hurt, and in pain in my entire life. When Kyle and his family left the garage, I felt a sigh of relief. The people who had just hurt me the most were gone. I was explaining to the officers what had happened before this garage event, and they seemed to believe I was being emotionally abused by my own boyfriend. I hung out with the officers for quite some time, showed them around and told them about the video games Kyle and I played. I didnt know it, but they had already called an ambulance to take me to a hospital to check for bruises, or any sign of physical abuse.

In the ambulance the man was kind. I dont remember his name, but he was just around the same age as me. I was freezing on the stretcher, afraid, confused. It was already 1am, and I had completely forgotten to tell my dad that I had the cops called on me and they sent me away in an ambulance! I called my dad, crying, telling him that I had just broken up with Kyle and they were taking me to a hospital 45 minutes away. My heart was broken, and I chucked imaginary middle fingers in the air to the emotionally unawake people I thought were family.

All the time, I sit in hospitals and wonder who was going to get me out of it. This hospital was different. I had to sit there for hours and wonder who my ride home was, or if Kyle loved me and my heart was breaking for no reason. I didnt sleep this night either, bringing my streak to three nights without sleep. I laid there crying, trying to figure out if this pain was worth it. It wasnt.

I finally got a hold of my dad again around 5am, and he told me he was on his way. Lynn, his amazing girlfriend, came along for the ride as well. I told them everything in the car. How it felt to be emotionally backed up into the corner of my own garage with no help but myself (sheesh). At this moment, I started to care about how Kyle was feeling too. I kept messaging him and keeping him posted, and I even told him I loved him and cared about him, and that I was sorry not only for that night but for everything else too.