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There are certain places I’ve been that I hope you never have to go to- trap houses, a night spent in a jail cell, rehabs and detoxes among others. But there is one place I’ve been that I don’t like to talk about in polite conversation, locked behind the doors of a psychiatric hospital. And not just once, let’s just say with my diagnosis and personal disposition the count got high.

What do I remember from those places the most? The smell of cleaner and piss constantly in the bathrooms, being watched showering and shitting because I was there for SI or SH and I couldn’t be trusted to be alone. Having virtually no control over my life except choosing what I ate and sometimes that wasn’t even a choice. When you’ve been controlled to the extreme in any way re-entering the world can be scary and dis concerning. I remember standing in a grocery store with Kyle a few months ago completely overwhelmed by the amount of choices I had in front of me to pick from- I could literally eat whatever I wanted to. I remember literally shutting down in a restaurant on a date because I couldn’t handle being out in “the world” with “regular” people who were just going about their daily lives. I still get up on rehab time every morning and while slowly adjusting more and more to the outside world full of chaos and choices I admittedly do still get overwhelmed at times.

Of course most places like this are no where as bad as they used to be, in this country anyway, but they can be pretty brutal. Before entering the unit you are always strip searched, you usually have to take a shower under observation and change into some form of scrubs or hospital clothes before your real clothes are gone through and returned to you if that’s an option at the facility you land in. Your reading material, list of people allowed to visit, times to use the phone and just about everything else are completely and utterly controlled from the moment you step foot behind the locked door. Nurse doesn’t like your attitude? That might mean no phone access for the day. Get a little too upset with your doctor? Reason to put you on medication you might not be comfortable taking. Get too rebellious and start to stand up for your rights and autonomy? Even more reason for a doctor to have a judge section you for 30 days minimum whether you agree or not. Essentially in these places I lost most if not all of my rights as a person.

There were times I needed to be hospitalized for my own safety, but there have been times I’ve been held minimum three days just because a former provider disagreed over a course of treatment or I got “to emotional” in session. And once you’ve been hospitalized once, people can use it as a tool to control and threaten to get you to behave in a way they want- “oh, you’re going to be like that, I’ll call the fucking hospital” is something I’ve heard far too many times from far too many people.

What happens to survivors of this kind of trauma? At least for me, for a long time I solely identified as a crazy alcoholic who couldn’t be trusted like most adults. I didn’t know how to talk to civilians as I call them, people who have had no experience with this world I’ve come to know so well. I didn’t realize that it’s not part of normal conversation to analyze every single sentence the person you’re speaking with utters for signs symptoms and possible violence. That most people don’t spend the whole day discussing their neurosis with their friends, going over intimate details of their traumas like they’re discussing the plot of some boring movie.

Just like living in a pretty unsafe city left me with certain habits so did all my psych hospitalizations- I like to have my back against a wall in crowded rooms, have to be able to always see the doors, I don’t like loud people, loud noises, talking with anyone who seems particularly unbalanced and sometimes when I get really stressed or whatever and I’m inside I have to go outside, not be restricted by four walls and a door because being locked up so many times fucked me up bad. You go in possibly because you experienced some kind of trauma and you come out feeling even more broken. But then, it’s a broken system.