Finding My Way Home

We would be awakened in the middle of the night by my parent’s fighting.  Then there were unexpected bursts of rage from my mother at us and strangers on the street.  My mother, a young Jamaican immigrant, must have found it challenging to traverse the cultural divide of island life to big city life.  And yet, over the years her untreated mental illness led to job losses, isolation from family and friends, homelessness and at its height several hospitalizations in mental wards throughout the city.  Sadly, I followed suit to a much smaller degree but somewhere deep inside of me because I resembled my mother so closely I thought that she and I were destined to have the same life.

My psychotic episodes during my daughter’s first year of her life resulted in two hospitalizations: one in the Bronx and the other at Harlem Hospital.  Soon after being released, I was given the directive that I needed to be on Lithium for the rest of my life and remember sitting in a large psychiatrist’s outpatient waiting room while other people exhibited side effects from the drug:  shaking legs, off putting demeanors, etc.  I took myself off of the medication without a doctor’s help and proceeded to spend the next year in bed debilitated by depression.  My mother took care of me and my daughter who would toddle over to the bed I slept in while I remained incapacitated and terrified that I would never regain my strength enough to work and support us.  As a young, black woman who was a single parent, my resources were limited and I did not know many people who had dealt with mental illness or even talked about it.  People just tried to be there for me but were at a loss as to what to do.  My sister made the tough decision to have me hospitalized once I became a danger to myself and others.  My behavior during the nervous breakdowns put me in dangerous situations where I’d roam the streets, talk to strangers, give my mink jacket away for a bag of weed, break windows, talk to myself and climb up on top of a totally unknown person’s van.  The owner of the van tried to swipe me down using his cane as I tried to dodge the attack.

It is a wonder I did not get seriously hurt during my escapades.  I was even told later that I tried to walk the yellow line down the middle of the street while cars were on the road.  I would call people randomly in my quest to connect but with a disconnected way of communicating.  A few times my daughter’s father tried to find me and return me to safety but basically I was unreachable.  I managed after a year of debilitation to gain my strength and slowly head back to the work force.  I later was introduced to a wonderful support group that gave my life an anchor and which led me to therapy which I have been going to off and on for the past fifteen years.  I went through another depression which was triggered by an emotionally abusive relationship and decided to take medication this time around.  I was referred to an excellent psychiatrist through a therapist who told me I didn’t need to suffer the way I did.  After encouragement from a friend in my group, I mentioned it at a support group and several people came over to me later to say they too were on medication.  This helped me to feel less shame about needing medication during a rough emotional period.  I stayed on it for six years and was weaned off of it when I wanted to have another child.  I have still had to deal with the effects of the depression but have shown neither signs of clinical depression nor any serious psychosis.  Staying connected to other people, going to therapy and my support groups which includes working out regularly with a great group of women keeps me  on track most of the time.

I seek many avenues of help unlike my mother.  I go to therapy, find ongoing spiritual support and have several networks to help me to stay healthy in various arenas of my life.  I have become less judgmental of my own mother’s severe mental health issues and her lack of support in finding the aid to give her a more livable existence.  I still have pain from growing up with someone who was out of control but I am lucky that forty years later there are many more avenues of help for me and that I was given the type of spirit to seek help when needed.  Sadly, whenever I walk into most self-help arenas there are very few people of color.  I have had many feelings about this over my twenty years of seeking help but miss that more people of color don’t seek this type of help.

About the Author: Frances Saunders

Frances has a B.A. in African-American studies from Smith College. She received training by the California Black Women’s Health Project to be an advocate for Black women in the political arena. She has an A.A.S. in Writing & Literature from the Borough of Manhattan Community College where she came in second place in their annual 2005 non-fiction writer’s contest.  She is currently working on a book entitled “The Black Woman’s Guide to Preparing for a Husband.”