#22 Love or fear

My great escape is what landed me in the psych ward in the first place.
As I described to the psych registrar, my life had become like that meme where the dog is sitting in their burning home - the world was on fire, my workplace was on fire, my communities were on fire and I felt like I was on fire too.

During one of the peaks of Covid-19, I was living in the middle of an urban city where the military had been deployed to prevent people from leaving our city and they had been also stationed in my suburb. There were cops on every corner and since my housemates and I had had such awful experiences with the police before, we felt like we couldn't go on our daily sanctioned walks. Because everyone was ordering takeaway, there were dozens of motorbikes crowding the footpath (motorbikes near me is one of my triggers) and I felt unsafe wearing a mask because I felt like I couldn't see beside or behind me so I couldn't protect myself from predators. My world just became smaller and smaller, yet, I was still trapped in my room watching as businesses that were central to the queer community in our area were closing down next to us, domestic abuse was occurring next door and governments were using the stay-at-home orders to contain activists as they committed state violence, particularly against First Nations communities. While two of my seniors refused to believe my warnings about the institutional abuse that was occurring at work, my manager had low-key threatened my job because I was asking questions about leadership decisions to force me to return to the workplace when a) it was illegal to do so, and b) the decision was profit-driven with no consideration of the health and safety of staff and clients. My colleagues told me that it was not their place to join the union and others were using the crisis as a way to progress their career. On top of that, one housemate was also abusive and since I was the only one who stood up to him, I became his target for his manipulation and mind games. There were other things that were happening as well that I won't mention here.

As the chaos exacerbated, I was also descending into my own personal turmoil. I had been manic for weeks until I spent two days in a psychotic state in my room, not eating or drinking. None of my housemates came to check on me and I had missed two days of work. I had tried to call my mum to pick me up but ya know, that would have required her to go through military checkpoints, police and my housemate to get to me and the voices told me that if I called her, she or someone else I loved would die. So, I packed four specific items in my backpack that I believed would guide me through the hellscape of the city safely and left my ID at home so that if I was stopped, authorities wouldn't know who I was. I walked 45mins to the train station, head down, as I heard all of my abusers' voices threatening to hurt me if I kept going. Because one of the people that was complicit with one of my abusers was a police officer, every time I passed a group of cops on the corner, I was convinced that they had been sent to stop me. I was utterly terrified that I would be sent back to my house or locked up. When I finally got to the train station, I ran through the ticketing gate (because as I said, I'd left all my cards in my house) and jumped on the train. There were no coppers or soldiers on the train and the ticket inspector left me alone. That's how I successfully escaped to my hometown.

However, at the train station, so close to home, I had become catatonic and was standing still on the platform not moving. I guess the station officers didn't know what to do since I was picked up by a group of cops, put into an ambulance and held in the hospital. I wouldn't speak to anyone so no one at the hospital knew who I was (they'd gone through my belongings to find my ID haha jokes on you) but I did confidently approach the nurse at the desk to discharge myself because I knew that legally I have the right to do so and that I can't be physically stopped from leaving (although I have since learnt that that's not the case for Mad patients). She said no. In the meantime, my housemates had reported me as a missing person but I assume that they never realised that I was running away from them.

My escape from involuntary incarceration in the psych ward is another story to tell and I'm tired now just telling you the first half so we'll have to wait until I have the energy. Or maybe I never will. And that's an escape in itself.

For now, all that I want to say is that most people don't understand that Madness has it's own logic that makes sense to us. Every decision I made in my Mad state felt like a choice between love and fear. To me, love means changing the conditions that cause harm to people and the planet so that we can all live well. I could have stayed in my room for a lot longer, silently suffering and distressed over the violences that were happening to people and communities that I cared about, or I could escape to safety where I had more freedom and ability to resist the violences that were happening to those people and communities. Not many people would believe me but in the face of terror, I escaped because I chose love. Now, I try to live out my Mad values even when I am feeling saner but it is not the same pure courage that is Madness. While I do not wish my experiences on anyone, I think there is much to learn from escaping Mad people and so I hope that you choose love and escape with us too.