My First Trip to the Psychiatric Hospital - Part 3

Time behaves oddly on a psychiatric ward. Without access to our phones or computers, the only means of distraction came from television, books, and the other patients. If it weren’t for the locked doors, you might consider it a retreat from almost all technology. You do have access to a phone during certain times of day. The phone at this hospital looked like it was taken from a decommissioned public phone booth. Almost as wide as my body, the unit was the only outlet to the real world for myself and the other patients.

Pro Tip - if you are considering a stay at any hospital, know that they will take your phone. Write down the numbers of people you would like to call from inside. The only number I remember is the landline to my parents’ house that was disconnected years ago. Much more useful to have the contact information of friends and family with you instead of relying on our collectively patchy memory for phone numbers.

During group times, which I’ll discuss in my final post of this series, the nurses removed the receiver so that there was one less excuse for us not to go to group when the bell rang. The television was turned off as well, which was only slightly less painful than you might think. We couldn’t watch anything violent, anything sexy, or anything with “graphic content.” Basically, nothing interesting, which is rather infuriating when you’re an adult used to binging Dexter.

For our protection, the television was encased in a plexiglass shield, and bolted to the wall eight feet off the ground. Because somebody had to use the old ground-level television to hurt staff or hurt themselves on busted glass.

This is why we can’t have nice things.

Because each day is a carbon-copy of the day before, I battled a constant sense of déjà vu. Even more disorienting was the constant awareness of the time. We knew, to the second, when the nurses would ring the bell for group, rousing us from whatever distraction we had managed to latch onto.

My distraction was books. I was pleasantly surprised to find a decent selection of sci-fi and fantasy books in the common room. I discovered and fell in love with, a series called Night Watch, about vampires and wizards in modern-day Russia. Curiously, I couldn’t watch violent shows, but I could read intensely violent books. Something feels off about that.

Weird reads have always been my escape from terrible thoughts when I was out of the hospital, and I was glad to indulge my literary desires between groups and other therapeutic activities. Yet even while reading, I was painfully aware of the time.

An hour before group, everyone was relaxed and amiable.

Thirty minutes beforehand, this quiet sense of: “oh no, we’ve hit the halfway point,” permeated the ward.

Fifteen minutes, ten, five — a collective groan sounded as all the patients realized that our hour of distraction would be ending. When we would soon have to sit in a circle, learn something, and talk about how we felt or about why we were there. Group is a fairly benign experience. Not nearly as bad as I’m making it sound, it’s the waiting and the imagining that causes the agony.

Always knowing what time it is in a place where you can’t leave, constantly watching the clock so you can milk just one more minute of precious time reading a book, watching a show, or talking with a friend; it makes the day crawl by.

Pro Tip - not all hospitals have a selection of books. I highly recommend packing a few of your favorite paperbacks. Make sure they’re paperbacks. Hardcover books are not permitted because, well, they’re blunt objects and can be used to assault staff. Again, this is why we can’t have nice things.