November 14, 2011
Every evening before I went to bed, I called the nurses’ station at Huntington Hospital to see how the rest of Gabriela’s evening had gone, and if there had been any changes since I’d left at the end of visiting hours. I always asked if Gabriela wanted to talk with me on the phone. Only once had she taken my call. I could hear her breathing but she didn’t speak, and then she just hung up.
Then each morning, I called to see if Gabriela had slept during the night, if she had taken her medications, and if there was any improvement. Generally, the response from the nurse was that Gabriela hadn’t slept. She had occasionally taken some of her medications, but never the blood pressure or anti-psychotic ones. And she was still spending all of her time standing in the hallway and not speaking.
It was either that first Friday or Saturday of Gabriela’s stay at Huntington Hospital that I had met with Abby, the social worker assigned to Gabriela’s case. I wasn’t familiar with the role the social worker would be playing in this scenario.
Abby was a relatively short, sturdy Latina from Argentina I believe. She dressed business casual.
Abby ushered me into her office, which was quite small with just enough room for two chairs and a desk. Her thick accent and intense demeanor were distracting during our conversations, but I gathered that she would try to work with Gabriela and me on “after care.” During all that was going on with Gabriela, for me to even consider “after” was almost impossible. I was glad to know someone would be working with me on what to do after the hospital released her. God knows I was not equipped to tackle this job alone.
I didn’t know the first thing about finding help for mental illnesses. For weeks before Gabriela’s first break, I had tried to find mental health programs that would work for my daughter. And I’d tried again after she was released from Henry Mayo. Each time I had run into concrete walls. The only thing I knew was that wherever Gabriela ended up, it would have to be an in-patient facility, at least in the beginning; and a day treatment facility as she improved.
Honestly, at this point in time I would have listened to any reasonable ideas. Abby collected as much information from me as she needed to get started. It was all pretty generic: insurance information, family structure, and where we lived. She said she would work with Dr. Duncan to make sure his recommendations were also considered.
Abby said she had met with Gabriela, and that Gabriela had been uncooperative and hadn’t answered any of her questions. Abby obviously thought Gabriela was being intentionally difficult. I found a little humor in this and thought to myself, “Really? She didn’t answer your questions?! She’s not fucking talking to anyone! She’s not being belligerent!”
If Abby hadn’t been so busy yammering on, she would’ve noticed the “is this a fucking joke?” look on my face, and that she had completely lost me. I was just being polite by letting her finish her lecture, because I had mentally disengaged after she made it clear she was offended that Gabriela hadn’t spoken to her.
Those first days at Huntington all seemed to run together. We had arrived on the Thursday, when Gabriela was clearly on her way to a psychotic break. Then, within 24 hours, it happened. She was on her second full psychotic break within ten days, and this one made the first at Henry Mayo seem like child’s play!
Five days later on Monday, I arrived at the hospital to find Gabriela was no longer wearing the jacket she hadn’t taken off since she was hospitalized. I greeted her warmly. “Wow, you look so much better without your jacket.” With her jacket off it was easy to see that she had lost a lot of weight.
Gabriela was still speaking rarely and, according to the staff, only with me.
As usual, Gabriela was standing in the hallway next to her bedroom door. But now as I talked to her, she wobbled, catching herself first on the wall and then on me. She looked as though she were about to collapse. I supported her against the wall, and told the client assistant I was afraid Gabriela was going to fall. The CA, in turn, yelled out to the other staff: “Fall risk!”
Gabriela was put into a chair, and because she was so weak and so out of it, there was no argument. As before, she sat with her feet raised, hovering in the air until I tucked a pillow under them so she could relax.
I retrieved a bottle of water and a snack bar from Gabriela’s locker in the nurses’ station. I knew she hadn’t eaten but I was going to offer her food anyway. Sure enough, Gabriela took a small piece of the snack bar with her fingers and pushed it into her mouth. It was almost as though she had forgotten the mechanics of chewing food. She struggled to chew that very small piece, and choked as it inevitably went down her throat. I smiled and asked her if it was good? She quickly put another piece in her mouth, this time with more success at the chewing. She made her way through about half the bar, which was good enough for the first try.
The CA smiled warmly, as though she was saying, “Good job mom, keep it up.”
The CA that day was Violet, a warm and beautiful African woman with a great melodic South African accent. Every word she spoke was a song. She was strong, loving, and well-read.
I came to know that when Violet was working, Gabriela was well cared for. I never had to ask for updates; Violet inserted any updates that were important into our conversations. She skillfully delivered information in a way that didn’t upset Gabriela but let me know if there were issues I needed to be aware of.
Because both Violet and Gabriela spent their days in the hallway, Violet often talked to my daughter. Early on in Gabriela’s stay she would try to get Gabriela to take her medication, to eat, to drink, to lay down and sleep, and to shower.… She had never been mean or pushy, but always encouraging and caring.
That day, sitting in the hallway, I told Gabriela that she needed to take a shower. I told her that I loved her but that she stunk, and while she “had the right to be crazy,” she surely did not have the right to be stinky. Violet openly giggled and Gabriela looked a little flustered. Unfortunately, my humor didn’t work, so there was no shower that day…. But at least Gabriela had started eating again.