Sarah Vaughan is Not My Mother: A Memoir of Madness

by Thomson, MaryJane

  I finish my cigarette and go and lie on my bed. The voice starts speaking to me. “I had to say that about the police because your life was being threatened if you kept texting me. You were bought by a gang and I had to buy you back so I’m allowed to be friends with you now. You’re a very important person. You’re a prophet.”

  I put the phone in the drawer beside my bed. The voice says, “When are you going to text?”

  “I will text tomorrow. I don’t feel like it tonight.”

  My mood has sunk. I just want to sleep but it’s still light. I lie on my bed and close my eyes. Waris comes in with my meds. I take them. She sits down on my bed and asks me how I am.

  “I’m all right.”

  “What’s wrong?”

  I can’t really tell her so I say, “Guess I’m just tired.”

  “Well, the codeine will do that. Why don’t you get right into bed and get some rest.” She helps me get into bed. I pull up the blankets and close my eyes.

  “Night, darling.”

  “Night, Waris.”

  I start feeling drowsy even though it’s not yet nine. I just want to switch off for the day.

  When I wake it’s near six. I go out to the smokers’ room. The coffee trolley is being wheeled in by Shelley.

  “Good morning.”

  “Morning,” I say, half asleep.

  Lester and Hemi are in there. Mark is waiting at the door. I walk in and sit down. I can’t say much as I’m very sleepy. I get a coffee and take it back to my room. I tell Lester I will talk to him later.

  I get back into bed and the voice says, “Morning.” I say “Morning” back and ask what it has been doing all night. The voice switches to Rose. She says, “I came in and visited you to make sure you were still breathing. You know you’re dying.” I sit and ponder this for a bit. “So I’m slipping through the cracks,” I say.

  I hope to do this. In my mind I am just a ghost, travelling through. My diseases will go uncured and I will die. Being in an institution can make you feel alone and forgotten, as though you are all just chucked together to fiend for yourselves, cast-offs that society doesn’t want to know about.

  I say to the voice, “I’ve done a good job. When do I die?”

  The voice starts sobbing and says, “Three years. Your mother needs you. She wants you to return home where she is. She will hide you and protect you. If you keep doing your music you may live longer.”

  I start to feel my chest tighten. I think I’m having a heart attack. I roll over and rest my fist between my heart and the bed to apply pressure. I’m in lots of pain. I start praying to God to give me a heart attack that will kill me because I can’t bear staying in here any longer.

  “You have only three months to live,” Rose says. “You must text me. I don’t want you to die in here.” I get up because I don’t want anyone to come in and see me like this. It’s 7.15 and I wonder if it’s too early to sing. I decide to have a smoke first.

  In the smokers’ room Lester is now screaming into his ear plug, “Come on, come on.” He puts his arm out and points to the chair. I don’t really feel like sitting there but I do. I roll my smoke and he stops screaming and asks me how I am.

  “Good. How are you?”

  “Fantastic, darling, fantastic.”

  He resumes screaming.

  I get up and start having an argument with the wall, hoping if there are any baddies they will hear me. “So you gonna cover it up, run away with it all,” I shout.

  The baddies are a gang who I believe have recorded me on video and exploited me for pornography to make money. I generally try not to think about this but when I get angry it comes out. I also believe they have run away with my art and photography and used it for their own purposes. These thoughts have hung around for years.

  I start dancing and flashing my midriff. “You don’t even know my name. There is nothing you can do to me that you haven’t done before.”

  People start walking in to smoke. Lester and I carry on for a bit, then I go back to my room and write a song in code. I sing it very quietly. “How long are we going to be walking in this here jungle, full of them mindless mongrels, just taking theirs, say no prayer, they just take, take, take.”

  I sing this and write more words until Dean comes in and tells me it’s breakfast time. I start singing “Redemption Song” and when I’m finished the voice tells me I’m Bob Marley’s son.

  I say, “I can’t be. He died in 1982.”

  The voice says, “He went into witness protection to be able to impregnate a woman to give birth to you. Those other children aren’t his real children. You’re his only true son.”

  I sit on my bed and start to believe it, then I pick up my guitar and sing another Bob Marley song. The voice says, “That’s genius; you could only understand those lyrics if he was your father.”

  I go and have breakfast, walking kind of staunch and tall. There are only a few people in the dining room. I go and stand over Virginia’s table to try and intimidate her.

  Then I change back to being me. I sit down and eat my coffee on oats, and then I take the bread back to my room and lay it on my sheet. I eat the banana and replace it with another one.

  I go outside for a cigarette and walk around the yard and smoke. I start panicking when I see how low my tobacco is running.

  Fiona walks up. “Morning. How are you?”

  I start speaking really quickly. “Oh, I’m good. I just need some more tobacco, but I’m going out soon. Do you want anything? I’ll get you a nice coffee if you like.”

  Fiona laughs at how fast I’m speaking. “That would be nice.”

  “So, how did you sleep? I hit a downer last night.”

  “Really? Well so did I. I’m dying to get out of here. Nola seemed to know a thing or two.”

  We sit down at the table. “Yeah,” I say, “but I don’t know how reliable she is. I mean, she’s in here. When I first started coming in here I used to run around taking everyone’s advice, ringing lawyers, reading about my rights, but none of it got me anywhere. Once you’re here you’re pretty much stuck because you’re required to undergo treatment and the judge will always follow the doctors’ advice.”

  Fiona looks disheartened. Perhaps I have burst her bubble a bit. “Sorry,” I say, “don’t want to make you lose hope or anything, but I really don’t think you’ll be in here that long. You don’t seem mentally unwell to me.”

  “Well, you don’t look unwell and you’ve been here for ages.”

  “Yes, but that’s because I escaped.”

  “There you are.” Waris is at the door. “All right, we go at 9.30 after morning meeting and I see about getting you to the doctor,” she says.

  I still haven’t worked out what I’m going to say to the doctor. I start to feel tense so I roll another cigarette and Fiona says goodbye. She’s off to have a shower.

  I start thinking about how I have only three months to live so I don’t see the point in seeing the doctor, then the voice talks to me and says the doctor might help extend my life. I go to my room and lie down. I admire my pictures and the way they mostly cover the great expanse of white wall opposite my bed. I look at the white wall beside me. I think it might be time to start on that wall. The walls have a slight green tinge from the green lino on the floor. The room’s like a little cell. I look at the white sheet I put down to cover the green lino and decide I will stain it with tea later to make it look more interesting.

  Waris comes in and tells me I need to have a shower. I hate having showers: you don’t know what others have done in there. I tiptoe into the big bathroom, which has a toilet and a sink, have a very quick shower and then run out across the corridor to my room. I put on my white singlet and blue shorts.

  Waris comes and asks me if I’m ready to go. I roll my last cigarette as we walk out of the hospital past Security, out the secure door, through an entrance to the outside world.

  Waris says, “So, how are you feeling, MaryJane?”


  “Ah, not bad, just keen to get out of here.”

  We cross the street at the lights and see Lester, also out with a nurse. He starts posing and says to me, “Darling, you’re a star.” I laugh.

  As we walk up Riddiford Street, Waris says, “The doctors said at morning meeting you can start getting unaccompanied leave.” This is music to my ears. On unaccompanied leave you can go out on your own for a morning or an afternoon. It’s usually a sign they are looking to release you.

  “Really? I’ll be out all day. You won’t see me.”

  “Steady on, MaryJane, you will be allowed out for only a few hours at first. Maybe you should start thinking about what you’d like to do.”

  “I need to go to the housing part of the council, where you apply for flats.”

  “Oh MaryJane, the doctors are hoping you will go home eventually.”

  This makes me angry. “Waris, I’m old enough to look after myself.”

  “Yes, but you have been very unwell.”

  Even though I have been in the ward so long, I don’t believe I have a mental illness. They just don’t trust me because I’m young. I want my freedom to be the way I want it to be. Basically, I want to return to the life I had before, which involved taking drugs and hibernating.

  We cross Constable Street and head up to the supermarket. I pick the usual suspects: tomatoes, bananas and oranges. Waris gets her usual pink smoothie. I laugh, “You’re funny.” I find it amusing that she never fails to get her smoothie.

  We head to the bakery, where I buy coffees.

  “No mince pie today?” I say to Waris.

  “No, too early. I’ll get a Danish. You should buy yourself some food too,” she says. “You’re too skinny—much skinnier than last time you were in.”

  We walk around the shop. “That’s because last time I was in ICU. I couldn’t walk anywhere and I was eating a loaf of bread a day.”

  When we arrive back Fiona is sitting with Lester. I give her her coffee. I feel bad I haven’t got Lester anything. “Do you have enough smokes? I could roll you some of mine.”

  “Oh babe, I got heaps. I was out buying those when you saw me.”

  It’s nice to have a coffee that’s not instant in a polystyrene cup. I take off the lid.

  Lester says, “How can you drink your coffee so strong?”

  I just prefer it, I tell him.

  On the outside I never worry much about food. I can go all day without eating. But in here it’s food and coffee all day.

  Waris comes over. “The doctor can see you now.”

  Suddenly I feel nervous. I follow Waris out through the green doors. “You’ll be okay,” she says.

  I wait for what seems like an eternity. Finally, the doctor opens the door and I walk in. The walls are pink and he has a computer on his desk. He says, “So your normal GP is Dr Husk.”

  “Yes.”

  “What can I help you with?” He looks at me through his steel-framed glasses, which are so shiny they singe the hairs on my arm.

  “I have been having problems with some bleeding.”

  He looks at me in a concerned way. “What kind of bleeding?” This is really awkward. “Well, I seem to be bleeding from everywhere down there.”

  He tells me to move on to the bed. He checks my blood pressure and heart rate and says they are normal. Then he asks if he can take a look.

  I remove the lower half of my clothing and I say, “All passages are bleeding and I have abdominal pain.” He takes a look and then moves his chair away. I put my clothes back on and he feels my stomach, pressing down.

  “Is this sore?”

  “Yes.”

  “Well, I found nothing abnormal as far as the bleeding is concerned but if you are getting pains in your stomach I would recommend a scan.”

  I think to myself, typical that they find nothing abnormal as far as the bleeding is concerned. The doctor is now an enemy. I say briskly, “Thank you doctor, that will be all.”

  I walk out and go back to my room to commune with the voice. I am upset that it has let me be humiliated in front of the doctor. “You are supposed to be looking out for me,” I mutter. I have come to trust the voice and believe what it tells me. Now I’m frustrated and angry. “I don’t have AIDS. I didn’t get raped. It’s just my period. You lie to me. How can I trust you? I’m not dying. There is nothing wrong with me. You just lie to me all day.”

  I get down on my knees and do a picture. Waris comes in and asks how it went.

  “I hate going to the doctor,” I say. “He said there’s nothing wrong with me but I should get a scan on my stomach. I don’t want to. I hate tests.”

  Waris sits down on my bed. I keep doing my picture.

  “It’s good there’s nothing wrong with you. Are you going to lunch?”

  I look up. “I could maybe see what it is but I don’t feel like it.” Even though I’m starving I can’t take another stew.

  “Well, go see what it is. You have a drug test later.”

  I stand up and leave my picture on the ground. “Waris, is it written in my notes that I can have unaccompanied leave?” Often the doctors will say things but not put them in your notes.

  “Don’t worry, my darling, it will be done tomorrow morning. Maybe think today about where you want to go and what you want to do.”

  “Cool.” I walk down the corridor to lunch vowing never to speak to the voice again. Lie, lie, lie, I think to myself, it’s always the same story, year after year. What a fight it is to not think you’re Jesus.

  7

  I line up for lunch and have a sense of shame standing in the queue. I feel embarrassed I went to the doctor. I try and let it go.

  Fiona and Lester are at a table with Anton. The table is full so I grab my tray and go and sit in the lounge. Antoinette the cross-dresser is there. He says, “You coming to music later?” I open the lid on my tray and see quiche, a scone, and some lettuce in a plastic cup. I take the lettuce and eat it. I say to Antoinette, “I might come. See how I go.”

  Olivia, a music person, sometimes comes and supervises a music group. Occasionally she visits me in my room and we play songs—but only if I’m in the mood, and somehow today I doubt I will be. Antoinette is busy straightening his dress, trying to sit like a lady. He’s not a very convincing woman as he has made no attempt with his hair or make-up. His hair, which is mostly grey and not styled, looks quite ’80s, but not in the right kind of way. I want to suggest a wig: if you going to do it, may as well do it properly.

  I return my tray to the dining room and join Lester and Fiona at the table outside.

  “Babe, been waiting for you,” Lester says. “I don’t want you talking to Antoinette. He’s really racist. He called Lloyd a nigger. He said, ‘Dirty nigger, don’t come near me.’”

  Fiona changes the subject. So how did you go with the doctor?”

  I feel my shame returning. “Not that good. He says there’s nothing wrong with me. I feel like some drama queen hypochondriac.”

  “No darling,” Lester says. “I’m the drama queen.”

  “You’re not a hypochondriac—you were in pain,” Fiona says.

  Lester yells, “Fuck off!” as Antoinette walks past muttering to himself.

  “He suggested some tests,” I say, ignoring Antoinette, “but I’m not so keen on that.”

  “Well, babe, you should get them,” Lester says.

  “I’ll see. On a brighter note Waris told me today I’m allowed unaccompanied leave.”

  “Oh wow, lucky you. They must think you are getting better.” Fiona sounds excited.

  “Yeah, they must. So if you guys need anything from the city, let me know.”

  I smoke my cigarette and go to my room. I’m still hungry. I have an orange and think to myself, I’m never talking to the voice again. But as I’m chewing the voice comes back and says, “I’m not lying to you. The doctor was wrong. No doctor in New Zealand will help you. They know you’re from me, God, and want you to heal naturally.
You’re a sign I exist.”

  When the voice talks like this it can be very isolating. Although I still walk around and act as if nothing is wrong, I have these thoughts at the back of my mind. They make me think there is a lack of humanity in the world and I have only myself and God. The voice is a constant companion, filling the void of not having close friends or family. I long to be in a place where I can be with him, ultimately through death: my spirit will leave my body to be with him and I will no longer be suffering.

  At the moment I am suffering quite a lot. The voice talks on, slowly convincing me he is real. I look for a sign to prove to myself it’s true. I look at my pictures for guidance as to what to do next. I can make out a guitar in one so I pick up my guitar, certain my life is going to be short, and I sing, “Bury me not on a lonesome prairie.” The voice compliments me.

  Just as I’m putting down my guitar Waris comes in and says I have to take a drug test. I know it’s going to come back positive because I smoked the oil not long ago. I hope it doesn’t mean I can’t go out. Waris gives me a container. I give her a sample and go back to my room and start another picture. Waris tells me, “You can go to the OT room. Good for you to be around other people.”

  I give in to her persuasion and go down to the OT room, even though I don’t really want to be around other people who I think are out to get me. The room has a couple of couches pushed up against the wall and a big table in the middle with chairs for making art or jewellery. There is also a whiteboard with a word puzzle on it, and some doors to a little garden with a fence separating it from the street.

  I sit down at the table with Jo and Nola. Nola is talking to Sue, a nurse, and Jo is making a necklace. Rachel is sitting on the couch, reading the paper. I get a big piece of yellow paper and a Vivid and I put lines everywhere, then I join them up to make them look 3D. I feel fulfilled while I’m doing it, one of the few times I do. I’m not letting life pass me by, not wasting my short precious time. Some people comment on how good it is. My paranoia gets the better of me: they obviously pity me and are trying to boost my ego. When I’m flicking between the voice and real people it’s difficult to know who is telling the truth. I find it hard to believe people like me when God is telling me the opposite.