Draconian Detox (Part 3)

Days 3 and 4 (not much longer now)

I couldn’t sleep again. I got out of bed, and walked down to the nurse’s station hoping to get something to settle me down long enough to close my eyes and relax.

“I can’t sleep, is there something I can take to knock me out?”

"Your best bet for some relaxation might be a shower. But personally, I'd recommend a bath. The locker room should be accessible at this time—it's after hours, so it should be empty," advised Motorcycle Patty, the night nurse. With her skinny body, short hair, and androgynous appearance, she was a regular presence, roaring into the parking lot on her Harley at 11, just as lights out commenced.

“You can’t give me anything?” I tried one more time.

"No, you've only been in here for a few days. We don’t give anything out until you've gone four days without sleep, and it isn’t guaranteed that whatever we give you will help anyway."

“Thanks,” I said, keeping the sarcasm out of my voice.

Photo by Anthony Tran on Unsplash

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Inside the ladies' locker room were six stand-up shower stalls, one tub, and 12 basins. It was the first time since intake that I found it completely empty. I looked down into the bathtub, and it appeared clean, but I wasn’t taking any chances.

I had the idea to lay my threadbare towel down inside the porcelain tub, thinking it might help protect me from germs. I took off my clothes, stepped in, and lowered myself down onto the towel. I turned on the hot spigot and reclined against the cold porcelain, waiting for it to fill.

As the tub filled, the hot water began to relax my muscles.

The bright lights above were shining down on me harshly as I noticed my skin turning bright crimson.

My head was throbbing, and breathing was getting tough. The air was filled with the scent of baby powder coming from who knew where, making me gag every time I breathed in. I kept the water scorching hot, refilling the tub whenever it cooled. I concentrated on relaxing my muscles.

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I stepped out of the tub onto the grimy, stained tile floor and suddenly realized I didn’t have a towel. Shivering, I couldn’t air dry fast enough to put my clothes back on.

I refilled the tub with hot water and climbed back in to warm myself once again. This routine continued through the night until dawn.

The wakeup alarm blared over the loudspeaker precisely at 6 AM. The sun swiftly rose over the horizon, casting brilliant red-orange rays of light through the high windows, which softened the harsh overhead lights.

Girls began to filter in to use the toilets and take showers. I didn’t recognize anyone, and inexplicably felt afraid to ask for help.

Sunbather Susan and Pickled Sally finally hobbled through the door, clutching onto each other, with Susan supporting Sally.

“I dreamed I was sailing in the regatta with my lover,” Susan said, greeting me.

“Do you have an extra clean towel I could use?” I asked, ignoring her implied invitation to start talking about yachting again.

“Where's yours?”

"Here," I said, pointing to the bottom of the tub.

“Will you hold on to Sally until I get back?”

“I’m wet,” I said, stating the obvious. “Can’t she sit on one of the benches?”

Susan didn’t reply. Instead, she let Sally drop onto the floor and turned around, walking back out the door.

I hesitated to creep across the tile barefooted, but after only a few seconds, I realized it was the right thing to do. Stepping out of the tub, I tiptoed over to Sally, who was wriggling around on the cold floor, trying to pull herself up into a seated position.

“Hold on Sally, I’m going to get you,” I said, motioning to the metal bench in the far corner of the locker room.

I leaned down and lifted her up by her underarms, my wet body pulling her to the bench. Her metal leg braces scraped loudly across the tile floor as we moved to the far side of the locker room. I dumped her unceremoniously onto the rusty metal seat with a loud thud and stood beside her until Sun Bather returned.

“I’ve got wet brain,” Sally said, matter-of-factly.

“How do you know you have wet brain?”

“The therapist told me.”

“Do you believe everything those nut jobs tell you? I asked viciously.

Sun Bather walked through the door before Sally had a chance to answer. In her hand she had two dry wash cloths. “This is all I could find,” she said sweetly.

Bitch. I knew she didn’t want to give up her precious clean bath towels she had stashed for tanning.

She sauntered over and handed me the wash cloths.

“Sally it’s time to eat breakfast, you can join us Patti; I can’t wait to tell you about the regatta in my dream, and how good the sex was,” Sun Bather giggled; as Sally struggled to raise herself and she tried to smile, but it came out more as a grimace.

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I entered an open shower stall to warm up again, then quickly got out and dried off my legs and arms. After dressing, I went to the nurse’s station for meds and then hurried to the cafeteria for breakfast.

As usual, nobody said a word to me, and I didn’t make any effort to reach out. Sun Bather and Sally were sitting in a corner by themselves and motioned for me to join them across the room.

I was still miffed about the wash cloths. Housekeeping only issued one towel daily, and when I requested an extra one, they denied it. Sun Bather had an inside connection, and I needed to find out who it was so I could get an extra one, too.

I sat down at a table with the loudest group I could find and listened to the war stories without comment.

"Why did everyone think it was so heroic to land inside this hellhole? Was I ever getting out and back into the real world?"

I ate everything on my plate and didn’t exactly know what it was I’d swallowed. I had no taste or smell left.

Whatever pills they were feeding me weren’t helping my withdrawal symptoms one bit, but they were making me agitated and my thinking was fuzzy, and I felt uncoordinated.

It was a chore emptying my tray and getting it over to the dishwasher. I retrieved a Styrofoam cup and asked my neighbor for a sip from her extra cup of fruit punch.

“Don’t spill it, your cup is tipping sideways. This stuff is precious and we can’t afford to waste it.”

“Don’t worry I won’t drop it, and thank you,” I said, remembering to be polite

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My eyes were blurring over, and everything around me was so hazy that I'd be lucky to find the room for the morning meeting without asking for help.

After finishing my fruit punch, I followed the noisy crowd down the hallway to the lecture room. I found the nearest empty seat by the door and plopped myself down, thankful that all I needed to do for the moment was to sit still.

Today began with quizzes based on past lectures. The staff wanted to know if we had been paying attention. I wasn't, and would have preferred to save us all time by saying so out loud, but the threat of punishment for not following the rules motivated me to keep my mouth shut.

The lecturer passed out the paper and pencil. The first thing assigned was to print first name, patient number, and date of birth.

I couldn’t get a firm grip on the pencil and didn’t understand why it wouldn’t stay in my hand.

The words on the paper were nothing but black squiggles and smudges. I tried opening and shutting one eye and then the other. Nothing changed.

Raising my hand, I asked where I was supposed to fill out the information, explaining that my vision was blurry.

The class fell silent, their chatter coming to a stop. A few turned around to look at me, their sniggering filling the room.

“Where it says ‘name’,” the instructor remarked sarcastically.

Luckily, the long-haired blonde guy sitting next to me pointed his dirty fingernail to the spot where my name was supposed to go.

Struggling to see through the haze, I scratched my name and numbers onto the paper as best I could. I pressed down the last of the numbers, the lead in my pencil broke. I didn't bother attempting to answer any of the questions—I couldn’t read the words anyway.

After a few minutes the instructor came around to collect the papers. When she got to me she glanced down at my paper.

“Are you trying to be a smart ass? This writing is worse than a kindergartner. You didn’t even bother answering the questions,” she snapped, glaring down at me.

I struggled to respond to her. It felt as if the skin on my face was stretching and tearing every time I attempted to open my mouth. My tongue was glued to the roof of my mouth, and my arms felt like lead, pressing heavily on the table with the pencil still dangling from my right hand. My mind raced with commands, but my body couldn't keep up. I was losing control of everything.

Was this what it was going to be like forever?

It was almost exactly how I had imagined what it would be like to be insane: trapped inside a body out of control, with a mind filled with wild thoughts careening back and forth like rogue ping pong balls, losing touch with reality.

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“Okay, no yard time. you’re confined inside all day. Maybe next time you’ll behave like an adult.”

I nodded my head, or at least I think I did. It was hard to distinguish between what was happening outside and the swirling thoughts inside my head.

For the rest of the day, I aimlessly walked back and forth between the locker room and the activity area, where the TV was located. I alternately took showers, silently praying for help (though I didn't know from (or) for what), and attempted to force out my tears. Still, I didn't cry.

I couldn’t wait for Mom and Brother's visit on Saturday. I had asked the nurse to call them for visitation since I couldn't see the numbers on the payphone to dial out myself. They were bringing me more sweats and sunglasses.

My thoughts kept drifting to Dad. I struggled to recall what he looked like. All I could remember was the pink light shining down in the morgue on his black toes when I went to identify his body. I couldn’t recall the sound of his voice either. The only memory I had was how much I had loved him, that he had been gone for three weeks, and that was about it.

Photo by Sharon Lawson on Unsplash

Semi-Conclusion:

The detox was primarily used for persons mandated from court, either to stay or get out of jail after completing a treatment program.

Pickled Sally was in because Medicaid was threatening to terminate her disability unless she dried out from booze.

Sun Bather was in there hiding from being served divorce papers from her rich husband who was also going to try to keep the teenaged kids after finding out about her infidelity and hidden alcoholism.

Two (males) were hiding from the law, avoiding being arrested, one was facing a murder charge in another state.

The alcoholics were mostly older men, four or five were women were in there, one was given weeks to live, she was dying from cirrhosis, and of course this group included Sun Bather and Sally.

The drug addicts were both male and female, predominantly male, most all under 30 years old.

And then me. I was 43, female, not court mandated, and I really wanted to get clean. I was in there voluntarily. I didn’t care why I was addicted or what damage the drugs had done to me. And I wasn’t taking copious amounts—I was actually only a pill or two above the prescribed dose from the doctor.

I wasn’t special. I was an anomaly.

I only wanted to get clean and move on to the next chapter in life, which included competing in my first triathlon that September and going back to college for my degree.

Of course there is always more to the story of addiction and things never appear as they seem.

See you next week!