October 25, 2011
My cell phone ringing woke me out of my first real sleep in days. Sitting up on the sofa, I answered.
“Hello.”
When I answered, a young woman introduced herself as DeeDee Mattisoff, client relations, from Dr. Wreck’s hospital. After that short intro she told me she had been asked by my daughter’s neurologist, Dr. Wreck, who was also head of the Adult Epilepsy Center there, to contact me.
Dee Dee was letting me know that any communications between me and any staff member there at the hospital from this point forward would go through her. The reason, she explained, was because I had upset Dr. Wreck’s staff.
Fully awake after that comment, I interrupted her, “Upset?” I was puzzled.
“Dee Dee, let me tell you a little story.” I proceeded to briefly explain the events of the last few weeks.
We had been asking Dr. Wreck for help for nearly one year. In our three-year relationship, I could count on one hand the number of times I’d called the doctor and those were all in the last three weeks.
I sarcastically told her I was indeed sorry to have “upset” the “staff,” but this doctor was the only one out there that had a chance to rescue my daughter.
Clearly, now that Gabriela was taken into custody just hours ago by the police, and put on a mandatory hold suffering from a complete psychotic break, my phone calls requesting help were justified. And I believed, at the end of the day, that if I’d “upset” the “staff” that that was insignificant collateral damage.
Dee Dee was silent; she had obviously had a completely different picture painted for her of the situation. She was given directions, patted on the head and sent out to do her job. Then stepped right in it. She asked that I keep her posted on my daughter’s progress, then she gave me both her cell number and her email address, and quickly ended our conversation.
I’d started back to the behavioral hospital at County to visit my daughter, when my cell phone rang. It wasn’t a number that I recognized but I answered anyway. It was Gabriela. She asked when I would be back to see her, that she didn’t like the hospital at all.
We talked the entire drive. Finally, as I pulled into the hospital parking lot, I told Gabriela I would be inside in just a few minutes to visit, and hung up the phone. I went directly to the nurses’ station in the center of the building. It was completely enclosed in glass. Several corridors extended on either side of the station, each with locked windowless doors.
I asked the nurse on duty if I could see my daughter. She told me that Gabriela was getting ready to be moved to another facility, that I would not be able to see her tonight. I asked where Gabriela was being transferred to. She didn’t know, but I could call back about nine PM and they may have an answer at that time.
Could I speak with her on the phone?
“No.”
I stood in the center of the hallway, feeling like Alice in Wonderland having just eaten the cookie that made her so small. Tears poured down my face as the nurse in the glass room turned, without ever looking up, and walked away.
I couldn’t see my daughter, I couldn’t talk to her, and had no idea where they were going to ship her. I was sure this morning when Gabriela was finally put on a hold that things would get better. Now I was left completely on the outside.
Strangers were going to take care of my daughter, and I had no idea where she would be, what it would be like, and what they would be doing.
Leaving my daughter that evening was very difficult, we had been through so much together, I knew she would be frightened. I didn’t want her to think I had “Frances Farmered” her. She was so out of it when she arrived, I wasn’t sure if she would even remember the events that brought her there.
I walked slowly down the steps of the building, unable to control my tears. My throat ached. The only sign of my crying was my wet face, I didn’t make a noise until I sat behind the wheel in my car and closed the door.
I leaned forward, my head resting on the steering wheel. I cried loud and hard. It didn’t make me feel the least bit better. I didn’t want to drive away; I just wanted to stay with my little girl.