**TRIGGER WARNING: GRAPHIC DESCRIPTION OF SUICIDE ATTEMPT**
5:00am
Nurse takes my blood pressure.
I get up and go to the eating hall where we have breakfast. I sit at a table on my own, as per usual, and eat my breakfast.
It is Friday today, my second Friday in this Psychiatric Hospital. Tomorrow would be two weeks since I tried to take my own life without being able to stop myself from doing it – surreal…
Two weeks – 14 nights…
A fortnight…
Fortnight: A fortnight is a unit of time equal to 14 days (2 weeks). The word derives from the Old English term fēowertyne niht, meaning “fourteen nights”.
Wikipedia
I finish my breakfast and take a shower. The wound on my wrist has healed properly and I stare at the scar while the warm water runs over it. I trace the bumps of the new skin with my index finger…
“What have I done?” I think to myself in disbelief. It feels so long ago, that moment my body acted autonomously and planned my final day on earth. I was merely a spectator during the whole episode, mute. My planning was to such extent that I drove out into the mountains where there is no cellphone reception. I took beer and painkillers. I took my switchblade knife with the serrated blade, stuck it in my arm, and slit my wrist. Deep, with purpose and focus. I really hacked away at my own arm until I could feel the warm blood streaming out of my arm. I let my arm hang behind the passenger seat in my SUV with a plastic floor mat to catch the blood, just so that it wouldn’t make a mess. Even in my last our I was still considerate…
Or was I?
I have two daughters, family, friends, colleagues, acquaintances, people that know I exist. Still, in my mind (the part which planned and executed this) it was clear as daylight that my last day had come. Me, the one that is alive today, had no power whatsoever over this other Me who just slit my wrist. I felt that my kids and everyone else would understand. I had a strange calmness to me, which I have never felt before. I blacked out and probably thought I was dead.
Well, well, well, not so fast young man! ME, the person typing this, woke up!
YES, I WOKE UP!
Still confused as hell though, with extensive damage to my arm and with blood-loss I still managed to drive myself to a hospital, which is where my whole life changed. Where my new life began!
And now I stand here in this shower and look at the scar and feel indebted in a sense. I owe mother nature or destiny or some anonymous gods my life. I owe it to all my loved ones to try and embrace my new self. I owe it to myself to see how I can:
- Come to terms with what happened
- Understand my autism
- Understand mu ADHD
- Understand my OCPD
- Overcome my depression
- Relive my past 4 decades to see it in a new light as a Neurodivergent Person
- Keep a grip on the present
- Re-calibrate my future!
I get out of the shower, get dressed and go to my room.
The Psychiatrist arrives and I tell him about my thoughts in the shower. He asks me an interesting question:
“When do you want to go home?” he smiles.
“Excuse me? What did you say?” I ask.
So he continues to explain to me that he would obviously like to keep me booked in for another week for observation, but he is very pleased with my progress and would like to know how I view the possibility of going home.
He could see that I haven’t even thought about it up to that point and suggested that I think about it and let him know the next day when he visits me.
We go over the usual medication feedback regarding comfort, side-effects, nausea, pain, dizziness, etc. All good on the medication front, Doc.
We finish off our session.
Lunch
Psychologist arrives in the afternoon and we chat about my morning session and the possibility to go home. He is of the opinion that I should think about staying another week, just to be safe. He also suggests that we continue with our talk-therapy sessions for at least another year. I can see he was caught off-guard and looks flustered.
We finish our session and he leaves.
Dinner
Shower and then coffee.
I lie on my bed and start considering that I should probably go back to the world.
I decide to sleep on the matter and to trust my gut-feel and my subconscious to present me with an answer the following day. The 14th day that I am in this hospital. A fortnight, sounds like the computer game Fortnite, funny!
I go to the nurses station to take my medication, in front of them, no other way is allowed.
I climb into bed and before I fall asleep I see the beautiful faces of my daughters in my mind and I smile…
anonymous gods 
Leave a Reply