The Center Cannot Hold: My Journey Through Madness

by Elyn R. Saks

It was as though in the absence of the familiar Vanderbilt routine, the fantasies had come to fill the void, and I couldn’t shut them off. Whole hours would go by at night when I was stuck in this alternative universe, struggling to decipher what was going on inside my head. Scenarios came and went of their own accord—it was like being unable to get out of the theater while demented movies ran endlessly through the night. I have been falsely accused of using drugs and put into a residential drug treatment program. Staff from Operation Re-Entry work there. At the program I spend time with no one. I speak hardly at all. I carry my Aristotle book everywhere. Staff call me in and tell me I must start socializing more. I can’t. I am called in again and staff order me to start talking. They say my Aristotle is a crutch and that I must stop carrying it around with me. “No,” I cry. “I will not give up my Aristotle!” Staff take my Aristotle away by force. I lose control, tearing the office up in a wild frenzy, shouting at the top of my lungs. Staff restrain me. Several hold me down and they call 911. The ambulance takes me to the emergency room.

I have issues myself with unwanted intrusive thoughts. Everyone has them but those of us who deal with mental illness have a harder time dealing with them. Those who don’t suffer from mental illness can handle them on their own while a mentally ill person may not be able to.