It is not the stuff for the faint of heart.
When a child like my son Jack suffers a nervous breakdown, it’s as if he has become possessed. The violence is a traumatic thing to experience, a frightening scene to witness. He issues guttural screams. He claws at himself, tears at his clothing. He punches the wall full-force, enough to break skin and bone. But he will not feel the pain so much as he will welcome it, covet it, the same way an addict lusts for a drug. This is not Jack lashing out. This is Jack hurting himself. Rather, by hurting himself he is trying to cauterize the deeper pain that has consumed his soul. This is as close as Jack will get to harming himself, without actually committing suicide.
By breakdown’s end, the boy is spent.
He is soaked through with sweat; face and chest moist from tears, saliva and snot. Dark hair is mussed and matted. Hands and knees are encrusted with dirt from the garage floor, some of the cinders having cut into his skin. He is cut and bleeding in more than a few places. It’s possible he’s broken a finger; maybe a pulled muscle. His exhaustion is so profound, he wraps his arm around my shoulder allowing me to support most of his weight for the journey from the rented garage to our terrace apartment.
On the walk across the common, his head will hang low, chin against chest. Big tears fall, but the sobs more quiet now. Voice will be a hoarse whisper.
“I’m sick,” he will mutter. “I’m sick.”
It’s all I can do to hold back my own tears as I get him through the back door and onto the couch.
What to do next?
I don’t know what to do next. I’ve never before experienced the breakdown of my child. All I do know is that my pulse pounds, mouth is dry, hands tremble. I need a drink.
Looking at Jack laid out on the couch, eyelids at half-mast, I consider dialing 911. But I fear the move will absolve me of all control. In every “Cuckoo’s Nest” sense of the word, I picture the nuthouse. I see straightjackets, injections, big powerful men dressed all in white who instead toss Jack into a rubber room, bolt the door behind him.
Not over my dead body.
I decide to do something totally out of character: I call his mother, seek out her help.
Once more I hold back tears when I tell her, “I can’t handle it.”
My ex-wife insists he needs a hospital. That she knows what he’s going through; that she too had a breakdown not long after our separation which led to months of rehab and a strong medicine which she will ingest for the rest of her life. In the end, her bipolar condition is what led the courts to hand over custody of my two boys to me.
Since then I have tried to play Mr. Mom and Mr. Dad, but looking at my son sprawled out on the couch I feel a failure. My ex, however is willing to do what she can. She’s going to place a call to her doc at the Four Winds Psychiatric facility in Saratoga. The doc will in turn call me in order to get a better idea of Jack’s symptoms.
I await the call.
When the doc calls I am no longer able to hold back my emotions. The flood gates open. It’s some time before I can get my message across.
“My son is sick,” I tell him, reiterating Jack’s words precisely. “I don’t know what to do.”
Doc tells me to calm down. That if I fear for Jack’s life; for my own life, to immediately get him to the emergency room. I tell him that it’s not necessary. I trust my son, even in this condition. I trust in him; trust that he will not do anything to harm himself or me or his little brother.
Then comes the question: Do I have guns in the house? If so, get rid of them. Get rid of anything you might constitute as a dangerous weapon. Hunting knives, ropes, darts, razor blades.
“Ditch the bottle of Tylenol,” the doc says. “An overdose can be lethal.”
“I prefer Ibuprofen,” I tell him.
“Excellent,” he says.
He wants to see Jack first thing in the morning, start him on medication. No more school for a while, no more friends or activities. “Keep a close watch on him. Let him sleep if he wants to sleep. Above all, don’t excite him.”
He hangs up.
I feel drained.
Drained, stomped on, gutted, bled out, crushed . . .
I pop a beer, drink down half of it on one swallow. The alcohol goes right to the sweet spot in my brain, tempers my despair, my anxiety. I stare at Jack on the couch. He’s fetal, sleeping like a baby. I remember him as a baby, like it was yesterday. I remember changing his diapers, holding him against me, tossing him in the air, hearing him laugh. The boy passed out on the couch I do not recognize.
What follows over a period of 24 hours is a series of tests and consultations with psychiatrists and psychologists. Jack is placed on anti-anxiety/anti-depression medication. While admittance to a hospital is once more discussed, it is argued by the professionals that to lump Jack in with persons suffering from schizophrenia and psychosis would be a grave mistake. At this stage of the game, that is. This news comes as a relief, although I’m not entirely sure if the relief is for me or for him (I dread the thought of visiting my son in a psychiatric hospital).
Steps must be taken in order to get at the root of the depression. Initially the steps are simple and practical.
Do I possess firearms?
There’s that question again.
If so, I must remove them from the premises. There’s the answer once again provided for me. Does Jack appear suicidal? Does he speak of hurting anyone besides himself? Do I fear for my own wellbeing when in his presence?
All the same questions that I fielded during my initial phone conversation the previous evening.
As necessary as the question are, they are disturbing.
I am a gun owner. But I don’t fear that Jack is about to use them on me or anyone else, least of all himself. But of course, this is exactly the attitude that will get someone killed. The guns will be removed this afternoon, I assure the doc.
It will be decided that while Jack takes a break from school he is to begin a series of therapy sessions with his psychologist. These will occur three times a week for an hour at a time. The sessions begin the very next day.
His mother and I are called in first to discuss Jack’s childhood. Was there fighting around him?
Yes, that’s why we divorced.
Did he have tantrums?
Yes, major ones, lasted for hours at a time.
Did he exhibit signs of obsession and/or compulsion?
Yes. For instance, if you didn’t tie his shoes perfectly, he’d go into a kind of seizure.
Later, as a pre-teen, he would not leave his bedroom without knocking five times on the wall.
How did he take your divorce?
Not well. He lashed out at his mother. Etc, etc., etc.
By the end of this first fact-finding session I am again crushed, bled out, drained. I am convinced that this boy’s problem rests with me and me alone. I am at fault for his breakdown. The way I’ve raised him is the problem. My ex-wife and I—all the fighting: it is the root cause of Jack’s depression.
But then the doctor asks about my family history and a different story emerges altogether. My ex-wife’s side has two documented suicides and several more of depression and bipolar syndrome. My ex-wife herself is bipolar.
As for my side, it’s no better.
I immediately recall a story my dad told me about his own early teenage years. How one afternoon he came home from school and without warning found himself clutching at the driveway, convinced he was about to climb up on the roof, toss himself off. A nervous breakdown followed. He was later diagnosed with depression, at a time when depression was considered shameful. Those persons afflicted with it were to be hidden, kept out of sight of the “normal” people.
My father would go on to beat his depression to become a successful business owner. Yet he would still suffer two more breakdowns. Because the depression never really leaves you. It disappears, goes into a kind of remission. You can’t fight genetics. One day he would tell me of my great grandfath
er who committed suicide at the dinner table—by cutting his own neck with a straight razor in front of the whole family.
The doctor looks at my ex-wife and I, raises his right hand up and down and up again.
“This depression is genetic in nature,” he says. “And it is weaving its way in and out of your bloodline.”
Bloodline.
Sitting there inside that office I suddenly regret having had children.
It is not a good thought.
This is not so good either: Jack is not genetically blessed and it breaks my heart.
But this is the modern world. Medicine and therapies are available now that can afford Jack a “normal” life. So the doc encourages.
Nor is the stigma of depression an issue.
I have no problem writing about it. It is my own therapy to write about it. If only I could step inside my son’s mind, observe the grinding wheels and gears, observe the monster hidden behind them. I might understand more, be able to better write about it.
But no matter how close I am to my child, I am an outsider looking in. I am on my knees looking down into the pit. There is nothing but cold darkness.
The news is not all bad.
In one week’s time, Jack makes his first advance. He cracks a smile.
I’m not entirely sure what provokes it. Something I say or his little brother says. Maybe something Kramer spits on a “Seinfeld” rerun.
A simple smile. A grin really.
It’s not a whole lot. You might not give it a second thought under any other circumstance. Anything normal that is. But for me, that smile represents hope. It is the future and it is possibility. It warms my soul like mother’s milk.
I know that we have a long road ahead. There will be more breakdowns. But perhaps the next time it happens, Jack will be ready for it. When it does, I will be there to carry his weight.
—2009
Three Hearts Beat as One
L and I talked a bit tonight . . . Correction, we've talked a lot since the first blog post a few days ago. It seems to have created a bit of a stir. From Mexico to NYC to Los Angeles to Bulgaria and in between, the reactions poured in. Okay, trickled in, but it’s still pretty cool how this blog-thingy works.
Instant gratification.
Said reactions and commentary culminated with a call to me from L while I was grabbing a beer at a favorite dive after a Blisterz rehearsal.
"Who . . . is . . . L?" she demanded.
"You gotta ask?" I said about the clamor. “Helloooo?”
I'd been snagged, fair and double square.
The truth: a mutual friend had alerted L to what was happening via a Facebook message. Thank God for Facebook. “Oh my,” is how said mutual friend put it.
Oh my, indeed.
But L was and is, in a word, cool about it.
L is into it!
For once, we are in total agreement. My guess is that she is looking for a way to get me back. Which is nice, but I'm not that easy. Okay, yes I am . . . and I'm a big fat liar. I'm not sure she wants me back. Or perhaps it’s the other way around. Although I would never admit to this in public. Or maybe I just did.
But L did bring up a startling suggestion.
Perhaps we should write a book together . . . about love and heartbreak and reunion. I think it should be a crime novel. Our split . . . It was a crime.
Oh, and have I mentioned L invited me over to her house last night?
But only to talk . . .
To talk, damnit!
No bootie calls!!!
We talked.
I wanted more.
I always want more.
She was wearing a sheer blouse and low cut sweat pants . . . Hang-out-who-care clothes.
She looked ravishing.
She sat on her bed. I lay beside her. We were breathing in and exhaling our combined air, stirring to mutual heartbeats.
Moments later, I listened to the sound of my daughter's breathing through her bedroom door. I sensed her heart pumping blood through veins and capillaries. An integrated network of life. A body of cells, blood and oxygen. A body that is as much my own as it is L's.
Moments after that, I left, wondering how long my heart has to beat . . . Without L . . . Without our baby.
I wonder still.
(To be continued . . .)
—2009
The Dead Giveaway
I’m barely through the front door of the house (her house) when she grabs hold of my arm, pulls me into the unlit bedroom that adjoins the vestibule and the bathroom. Without a word, she takes hold of my wrist, guides my right hand down into the front of her jeans.
The jeans are already unbuttoned.
Like a snake through wet grass, I slide in easily. She must have unbuttoned the jeans before I came through the door. She must have unbuttoned them knowing I would do this; knowing I would want to do this.
“Make me cum,” L whispers, wet lips pressed against my lobe.
She’s not wearing underwear, so I feel her moist, soft place. I feel it on my fingers, my fingers inching and moving in and over and around and in. It’s a nice, soft, warm, neatly trimmed place.
I work slow but fast; gentle but rough, her long black hair splashing against my face.
She kisses my neck with those lips I remember, breathes in and out hard and rapid, braces herself with her arms balanced on my shoulders, hands pressed against the back of my head.
It happens.
She shudders, bites my neck.
Coming from the bathroom beside the bedroom, the splash of bathtub water.
And a voice.
“Mommy.”
“Coming sweety,” she says.
“Yes you are,” I whisper.
She pulls my hand out, buttons up, exits the bedroom for the bathroom.
“Time to wash your hair, my love.”
Later I walk alone in the deep night.
I still smell her on my fingers even though I have washed.
When I smell L, I picture her face—the thick lips, the small nose, the dark eyes. I feel my stomach go tight, my throat closes up. On the rare occasion this happens, it’s not unusual for my eyes to tear up. When I smell her scent I am reminded of loss. Loss washes over me like a waterfall of blood and tears. It’s the tangible things I miss: the scent, the feel, the touch, the lips on a neck, the fingers on her moist sex, her mouth on my body. It’s the chemical properties of us that I miss. The physical us. Us together as a whole. The tenderness of us.
Or maybe tenderness never entered the “us” equation.
I try to put “us” of my mind. But no soap in the world, no matter how expensive, can remove that scent.
I make a pit-stop at my local for a quick beer.
The place is dead. Empty. But I catch the eyes of a young woman seated on the opposite end of the horseshoe bar. “Young woman” is a stretch. The girl is maybe 21, 22 at most. A couple years older than my oldest son. Long brunette hair, dark eyes, smooth skin. Knock out, drop-dead-gorgeous.
I’ve seen her around. I sit next to her.
She smiles that slow-mo, milky eyed smile that tells me she’s had a few already.
“You’re sexy for an old guy,” she says with a giggle.
I feel my 44 year old face go redder than Johnny Walker. I try to respond, but my mouth is clamped shut.
She leans into me, pert young breasts nearly pressing up against me.
“I’d fuck you,” she whispers. “Totally.”
I laugh. I laugh because my built-in auto-response mechanism appears to have malfunctioned. I laugh, like an ass, in the face of this beautiful girl. Yeah, I want to fuck her. You betcha. But I also want to crawl under a bar stool and disappear.
I’m a total choke.
But here we are seated next to one another at an otherwise empty bar. She, a ravishing 21 or 22 and me, a useless 44. The resulting heavy silence turns into senseless and stupid chit-chat that lasts for the length of one beer.
Bored, beautiful
girl gets up and leaves.
The bartender, a young muscle-bound man not much older than she is, approaches me. He tosses me a glance that could cut a rattlesnake in two at thirty paces.
“Nice work, Chief,” he says.
The next morning, I buy two large coffees, bring them with me back to the house (her house).
L is still in her pajamas. She’s moving furniture around. A chair here; a sofa there; a desk up against the far wall. It’s what she does every Sunday morning. So I recall. This obsession with moving the furniture around . . . it’s not like she’s trying to rearrange the living room so much as trying to rearrange her life.
I smell her scent inside the house. It enters my mouth and nasal passages, jump starts my senses like hot volts to the naked wire.
I say “Hello,” set the coffees on the coffee table.
I ask about the little one. The little one is in the bedroom playing.
“Nicely,” she says, before issuing me a wave of the hand; before guiding me into her bedroom, and finally the bathroom.
She unbuckles my belt, unbuttons my jeans. She pulls down her bottoms, lets them fall to her ankles, turns to face the sink and the medicine cabinet mirror. She reaches under, guides me into her.
It takes all of three minutes, the bathroom door slightly ajar so that she can listen for the child.
Later, after washing, we sit at the table, drinking tepid coffee.
I smell her scent on my hands mixed with the rosy smell of pricey hand soap.
I feel the tightness in my stomach, the closing up of my throat.
“That was nice,” I say. “The past couple of times . . . It’s been nice.”
She looks up at me quick—wide, dead-giveaway-eyes.
“Don’t get carried away,” she says, out the corner of her mouth.
Tight stomach falls to the linoleum. You can almost hear it go splat.
“Why do you say that?”
She cocks her head, sips her coffee, peers off into a kitchen landscape of modern cooking appliances, junk drawers, rack drying china, cutlery and spilling over garbage cans.
Pieces of Mind Page 3
