A Beautiful Poison

Palo Alto
April 1997

I treasured alcohol in every form. I drank when I was sad, when I was happy and when I was bored. I drank when I was at a party, I drank when I was at school, and I drank when I was alone. Whenever alcohol was available I indulged.

I am torn from my restless sleep by thunderous sobs coming from the TV room. A familiar feeling of panic fills my 13-year-old body as I leap out of bed and race down the stairs, as fast as my skinny legs can carry me. I peer into our gigantic TV room and see my older sister curled up, a cocoon on the couch. She is wrapped in thick blankets and is trembling with tears. I lean over her and ask in a small quivering voice “what is wrong?”

“Everything.” It is the only word she speaks, and it is a familiar one. I do not understand how I can make her happy and how I can chase this depression far away. Though I am almost two years younger than my sister, I still feel that it is my job to take care of her. Protecting her has become my world, and it is all I know. I’ve become a light sleeper, easily awakening to her cries. I have learned how to lie in order cover up for her and keep her out of trouble. I would do anything for my sister; I live and breathe for her alone.

This depression has intruded into my sister’s life for as long as I can remember, and it appears to have no intentions of leaving. My parents have tried, as well as numerous doctors, but it seems no one is capable of driving it away. The evil thing has dug its way into her brain and refuses to leave its newfound home. It seems to me that at this point there is little anyone can do.

I find a face hidden within the massive covers. “Don’t tell mom and dad.” The sullen face whispers to me. I am only 13 but I know the kinds of stuff that she does to escape her sadness. While my parents and their doctors are looking for an answer, my sister has taken the matter into her own hands and has used drugs as a method of self-medication.

-Nicole Hodges

It was alone at three in the morning when I finished all the gin. I was numb, feeling only a pleasant tingling that misted my pale skin. I felt like a queen as I sat on the roof outside my window smoking a cigarette. There were no flashbacks, no panic attacks and no fears - there was only warmth which raced through my body making me feel like the world was mine.
But deep within the locked corridors of my soul that feeling was still there. It was a feeling that I had always known – a feeling that had followed me through my life and was slowly corroding the spirit of my existence. The longer I lived – the longer the empty universe within me expanded. “You are nothing,” is what I would hear and I am nothing is what I believed.

At night, when the day’s drugs were fading, the wretched realities of my life crept into my consciousness. So I often drank at night hoping the magical beverage would disinfect the oozing sores of sadness that years of shame had exposed. While alcohol suppressed my physical senses, it sensitized my oozing sores, thus throwing me into the swamps of self-pity and depression where the murky water reflected desperation. And even though alcohol never succeeded in completely easing the pain of my pussing sores, I remained convinced that it was the miraculous remedy.

I still however could not sleep. The earlier day’s amphetamines were still working my mind awake. Pills were the next step – Seconal, Valium, Klonopin – they were all prescribed to me. So I would pop anywhere from five to fifteen of the various medications and would either get sick or go to sleep. I had taken a bunch of pills and was lying on the couch the night my sister interrupted my nighttime routine.

“I drank too much.” A feeling of nausea creeps into my stomach as I spot a bottle of painkillers on the floor below her. Now it is me who is trembling. I tell my weak, noodle-like body to stay calm.
“Michelle,” I say trying to be stern, “how many of those have you taken?” Before I am given an answer I snatch up the bottle and am relieved to see that the bottle is still almost completely full.
“I drank too much.” She repeats.
“I know that,” I say taking in gasps of breath. “But how many pills did you take?”
“Don’t tell mom and dad,” is her only response. I painfully suck in gulps of air. In these times I must remind myself to breathe and tell my trembling heart to keep on pumping.
I rock back and forth, my body trembling with panic for I am struck with my decision. Do I wake up mom and dad or do I listen to my sister? What if this time she really has drunken too much and guzzled too many pills. I wonder if the amount of her intake tonight is enough to kill. My 13-year-old brain does not know what to do. I decide that I have no choice but to sit all night by this little cocoon to make sure that she doesn’t die. I figure as long as I am next to her she cannot slip away.
Uncontrollable sobs begin to tumble out of my mouth as I stare at the cocoon on the couch wanting, more than anything that I have wanted in my 13 years, to believe that she will be okay. I want to be able to march upstairs, wake up my parents and announce, “Michelle is going to be okay.” And this time really mean it.
Everyday I hear the same sad songs. I do not know what I can do to help or when it will ever stop. All I know is how to listen and how to stay by my sister’s side. I know that if I am next to her she cannot die. I fear that someday when I am not around she will take her own life, and that the threats she makes will someday become reality. My sister is my life and therefore losing hers means losing my own. That is why I must always stay with her and make sure this fear of mine never comes true. This constant worry seeps deeper into my heart, with each breath that choose to take.
-Nicole Hodges

For a long time I resented my sister. Nicole cried about everything, was close to my mom and never broke the rules – so I thought her weak and pathetic. Nicole had had the same group of friends from preschool – friends whose parents were also friends. In my opinion she had everything easy. Why was it fair that I should be filled with so much pain while she knows only happiness? She never got in arguments with mom and dad and so even though I thought she was weak I also saw her as perfect. I hated her out of my self-pity; I hated her because I thought for her everything had bee so easy, and for me everything had been so hard.

Earlier this afternoon I invited a friend over to my house. As the two of us are on our way to my room, a thick evil smell leaps out at us from the hallway as we walk passed. It is the ring of smoke that follows my sister everywhere. The smell itself is different from the stench of a cigarette, and the fact that it is the smell of drugs terrifies me. It is an odd sweet smell that I had never known before. It tears its way into my stomach wrenching apart my ribs and sinking deep into my abdominal.
The smell made its first appearance when Michelle began her road of self-medication. It works day and night to destroy my sister, hiding her underneath its dark thick cloud. It dances around our house laughing and singing about how it has taken over my sister. The evil smell creeps under the crack in my door and haunts me as I tried to sleep. When I feel the smell at night I know that my sister is home, and that she is busy destroying herself in the other room. I lay in bed helplessly covering my nose, hating a world that would taunt me with such a smell.
This afternoon my sister happened to have passed through the house. Though my sister was nowhere to be found, the thick evil smell was evidently present. “Sorry about the smell,” I remark to my friend, Anna. “My sister’s just burning incense, you know, air freshener stuff.” I lie and pray that she does not know the truth about the smell that is in my house. “Sorry, it smells absolutely horrible.” I apologize again.
“Actually a kind of like it.” Anna takes me by surprise, and I spin around to let out a breath of relief. My 7th grade friend has no idea as to what she just admitted to liking and I thank god for that. My friend fell for my lie and therefore to her, I remain just another 7th grade girl like herself.

-Nicole Hodges


It was not possible for me to imagine that my actions could cause my sister pain. But if I knew at the time that she was suffering because of me I would probably have been happy. Not only did I not want Nicole to be happy, I didn’t want anyone to be happy. If I have to suffer so much unhappiness, why should anyone else be happy? If they could only feel the way that I felt for just one moment they would understand why true happiness for people like me doesn’t exist. Nicole, being what I believed to be a “happy person,” was only happy because she had never felt pain like mine.

“Don’t tell mom and dad.” The cocoon on the couch repeats. “They’ll send me away.” Her fierce words knock from my thoughts and unto the ground. What does she mean they’ll send her away? My mind begins to race and tries to take in the information that was just given. I had heard of torturous, lock-down schools for kids who had drug problems. My parents would never send her to such a place, or would they? The thought of my parents sending her away sent long shots of pain through my already weakened body. My sister was all I had and I could not loose her.
-Nicole Hodges

What I can see now, which I could have never understood then, was that Nicole was not happy and she was not weak. It was her who would hold me when I came home drunk and depressed, she would comfort me as if I were her daughter - a poor helpless baby. She would listen to my life, even when I could see in her eyes that every word I spoke brought terror and fear to her life. And yet I saw her as the weakling. Everything about Nicole that I believed made her weak actually made her strong; and it was because of my own weaknesses that I could see none of this.

“Don’t tell mom and dad.” The voice whispers again, tearing me from my thoughts. I am reminded of my situation. I was used to covering up for her but this time is different, because I truly do not know what to do. What is this time she really did go too far? My trembling body continues to rock back and forth in an indecisive panic. Hours pass and I remain in the same state. It all comes down to one question. Can I take care of her alone? By now my tired heart is still racing and my body is trembling out of control. I look down and see frail shaking hands. The sight of my weakened body knocks the wind out of my system as I am hit with the reality that I cannot take it any longer. There is no denying that this time I must get help from my parents. My skinny legs then take me racing back up the stairs in the same way that I had came.
-Nicole Hodges

My dad suddenly threw open the door to the family room and grabbed from the carpet the bottle of pills. "How many have you taken?" He roared ripping the quilted blanket from my undernourished body.
"Only one." I lied refusing to look at him. For a couple of minutes he just stared at me. "What?" I yelled impatiently at him.
"Michelle… what are you going to do with yourself?" He spoke in a helpless tone and walked out of the room. Fuck you. You don’t know what it’s like being me. But somewhere deep down his words terrified me. If only I had more gin. But before I knew it the sandman had come and temporarily relieved my pain.

The Rorschach instrument reveals that his young lady sees the environment as a threatening and potentially dangerous place in which to operate. She often builds considerable anxiety and, at such points, will "disengage" from it is any way possible… The Rorschach further reveals internalized anger, which Michelle seems hard-put to more directly express. She also may feel "singled out" by others and "under scrutiny" (albeit in a somewhat negative manner).

-Richard Arnold Komm, Ed. D. 07/08/97. From Psycheducational Evaluation: Interpretation of results.


My parents were going to be out of town the next weekend. While my sister spent the weekend at the house of her best-friend, my cousin Lisa would stay with me.

"Hey, do you mind if I have a couple of friends over?" I asked Lisa innocently.

"As long as it is just a couple…" She replied with an understanding grin on her face.

That was how it began. I called up random friends and told them that my parents were away and they could come over. Around seven that evening I went over to my favorite Safeway store and stole four bottles of Absolute Citron and two bottles of gin. When I got back to my house I started drinking and, as usual, I was drunk before the party began.

I liked hard alcohol the best and I liked it strait. I loved the warm burning sensation that tickled my esophagus as it flowed down my throat. The problem was that most of the time when I drank liquor strait I would end up consuming so much that I would make myself sick. It was my friends that suggested I drink only mixed cocktails so that I wouldn’t drink so fast. Some of my friends even told me I should stop drinking since I just didn’t seem to be able to handle myself.
I loved being drunk. When I was drunk I wasn't myself, and I loved it. All of my insecurities and flaws seemed to disappear, and I would become a fearless party animal. I wasn't afraid of anything when I was drunk, and I wasn't shy. I was able to talk to guys, or rather throw myself onto guys, without my shy and doubtful qualities getting into the way. Drinking allowed me to feel free – free from some part of me that I hated.

I never thought that I would ever throw a party. If you had asked me earlier that week if I was going to have a party because my parents were out of town, I would have said no. But this was the instantaneous moment that represented my life. I called all of my best girl friends and invited them all to spend the night - they could invite whoever they wanted. I set the pool table up and opened the garage door - it was only eight - and I was already completely trashed.

I can remember the first couple of people arriving, and then the rest of the night is pretty hazy. The party had been a real "hit" because that night all of the local dealers and gotten lots of drugs so my house was the perfect place to sell, make deals, and smoke up. At one point I can remember being in my back yard, surrounded crowds of people, and then feeling sick. I fell off the lawn chair that I had been sitting in, and was picked up by Erin's older sister, Megan, and her boyfriend, Jeff. I can remember them holding me over a bush as I threw up all of the alcohol that I had consumed that night. They then carried me back to the lawn chair that I had fallen off and told me that they would keep an eye on the party for me. Whatever. I lit a cigarette and starred up into the starry night.

Surprisingly enough after I threw up that night I only drank a little more, and so as things wound down - about fifteen people were in the family room watching a movie or passed out, others were sleeping in my room or my sister's - I was able to clean up a little. I went around the house collecting beer cans and Vodka bottles, cigarette butts and drug paraphernalia. After collecting three giant garbage bags of party trash I went into the park and threw the bags away in a trash can. Then I went to sleep.

When I woke the next morning one of the girls told me that I cousin had gone to the hospital because she was having a severe migraine. All the while my party had been underway Lisa had been up in my parents room - probably overcome with a combination of guilt that she was allowing the party to go on when her aunt and uncle had put trust in her, as well as not wanting to seem "uncool" to her younger cousin. A pang of guilt washed over me when I thought that it was my fault for her migraine, but I quickly shook it off.

It was Sunday morning and my parents would be home in the late afternoon. The house reeked of cigarette and pot smoke, and there were tons of beer cans and stuff still lying around. I lit incense all over the house and did a second round of trash pick-up. About two in the afternoon I was tired of cleaning, and kicked everyone who hadn't already gotten up out of the house. The house looked good enough to me and so I left with Marisa to go tag up some creeks downtown. After drinking a twelve-pack that I had gotten a bum to buy me, I sat, drunk in an underpass, as Marisa threw up a piece.

My pager vibrated, and I saw my phone number. Shit! But I ignored it. I wasn't near a phone, and wasn't in the mood to walk eight blocks just to be bitched at. An hour and ten pages later I was on the phone with my dad. He knew I had thrown a party, and he was really mad.
"What are you talking about…" I screamed into the phone, "I didn't throw a fucking party!"

My dad was very angry and yelled back, "First: Don't swear at me. Second: Michelle you threw a party and we know it. So get back here NOW!"

I was in serious trouble. My parents knew that I was not doing well, but had basically given up trying to punish me for just drinking or smoking. But now that my actions had affected their house they were really made, and I knew it. I knew that my parents were close to sending me away somewhere, to a boarding school or something like that, so I was somewhat afraid to go home. "I'm not gonna go." I told Marisa as I leaned on the payphone, nervous and drunk, smoking a cigarette.

"Michelle you have to, don't be even more stupid." I haven't been stupid. What the hell does she know? But I went home anyway. Something in my gut told me to, so I did.

I got home and my parents were right. It was obvious I had thrown a party. It now smelt of a combination of incense and cigarette smoke, and still there were beer cans laying around. "So what." I shrugged to my parents.

"SO WHAT? SO WHAT?" My dad bellowed. "Michelle, you're going to clean this house up, and then we are taking you somewhere to talk to someone."

No. No. I'm not going away… gotta go, go, go Michelle. I ran around to the side yard, grabbed my bike, and rode away as my parents stood on the porch yelling for me to come back. I'll go to Thomas'. Thomas and I had not been on the best of terms over the last couple of months since my drinking had become so frequent. He was tired of me showing up at his door, drunk and wanting to drink more. I got to his house and he was home. But he didn't invite me in.
"What's the matter?" Thomas asked me in a monotone.

I told him how my parents were angry that I had thrown a party and that I had run away from the house because they said that they wanted me to go "talk to someone."

"What the hell did you expect Michelle? You threw a fucking party, of coarse they're gonna be angry. You can't just expect that you're never gonna get consequences."

Thanks for the intelligent bullshit Mr. Hillard. "Well, can I at least come in for a little bit, I think they are gonna be out looking for me soon." I spoke to him annoyed that he was not more on my side.

Somewhere in the time we became friends, Michelle moved more towards alcohol. For all our buddies it was a common poison, but Michelle’s choice of places and times to drink made her look more out of control than the rest of us. She would bring water or Sprite bottles to school filled with Vodka or Gin to her classes. Our group would chill at many places to get stoned. Some would drink, but Michelle was almost always already drunk.
Michelle and I reestablished, somewhat, the friendship that had ended abruptly over the summer some time during freshman year. Sometimes the time spent with her was fun, but other times it seemed like she was just doing her own thing and it just happened to be in my house or presence. Her thing being: working on random projects, stroking a satin blanket and holding a bottle with some sort of alcohol in it. She would tell me how she never made it to school because she had gotten so drunk earlier that morning she had passed out on her porch. The conversations I had with her friends often entailed the most recent story that displayed how drunk she had been getting. No one drank as much as Michelle and no one thought it possible for this craze of Michelle’s to ever be interrupted.
-Thomas Hillard

"Sorry Michelle, I am in the middle of doing a lot of homework… if you're here I will just get distracted."

Are you fucking kidding me? And I thought you were one of my best friends. Well, Fuck you then. "Come on, pleeeeeaaaassse…" I begged flashing a huge beg-ridden smile.

"No Michelle." Thomas shut the door and I could not believe it.

Where am I gonna go? What an asshole. Can't even help a friend in need, well, I hope he never wants anything from me again. And then, just as I was getting back onto my bike I saw my mom's car driving up the street. SHIT! I started biking away as fast as I could, but being that she was in a car, she caught up to me fast. I kept riding as she yelled to me through an open passenger window. It felt as if everything had fallen apart. Why does this always happen to me. I didn't know what to do. If I stopped and talked to her I would surely be brought back to the house to face what I had done, but if I kept riding then she would just follow me.

So I stopped. She told me to just leave the bike and to get in the car. Hell no I'm not just gonna leave my bike lying on the sidewalk for someone to take. I rode to Seale Park, just a block away as my mom continued yelling, thinking that I was just trying to escape again. I quickly locked my bike and got into her car. She tried to talk to me like a friend, trying desperately to show the love she had for me. And then she told me that she wanted to take me to a drug rehabilitation center. Oh no I will not go away somewhere. I'm getting out of here. It was a quick ride my mother and I had. As we drove through a residential area I opened the car door and jumped out, being still somewhat drunk, I felt little of the fall. I ran quickly away and hid; for a week my parents would not hear from me.

The reality of Michelle’s drinking grew worse and worse until one day I saw her making a mess and fool of herself at Seven Eleven with some of my friends. They were all laughing at her belligerent loud mouth and I asked Michelle if she was drunk. She said no, but in the few years of knowing her and alcohol, I could tell she was again a drunkard by the hazed look in her eyes and the bright red cheeks on her face. I realized then that I couldn’t do a thing.
I finally cut my ties to her through avoidance. I hoped she might find the loss of my attention as a sign that she had to change. So much of the time I spent learning and exploring my life since junior high to that day had been shared with her. And suddenly there was none.
-Thomas Hillard

When Thomas told me that until I stopped drinking he did not want to be around me I just thought he was the biggest asshole in the world. I mean, if he truly was my friend then he would not just ditch me, right? So I forgot about Thomas over a bottle of Gin and my life continued on. I just did not understand how my friends, who they themselves enjoyed their share of alcohol and drugs, could tell me that I had a problem. I saw myself as having no greater problem than any of my other friends. I was lonely and losing friends over alcohol, but as long as I was numb it didn't matter.

I am suddenly reminded of the dream I had been having that night, before I had been woken up. I had had this dream before, and it seemed to be recurring every now and then over the past few weeks. I come to school and enter my 7th grade classroom just like another day. But today when I reach for my pencil I realize that my right arm is gone and my entire other half is missing. I look around the room to see if anyone else has noticed, but I seem to be the only one. A feeling of panic feels my body and I am paralyzed with the fear of living without this other half.
-Nicole Hodges

Cutting and Crying

1996-1998


CRITICAL EVENTS AND INTERACTIONS: Two days before Michelle was to be admitted to Island View, she became overly anxious and began cutting on herself. This form of mutilation continued after her admission to Island View. She has since contracted with her primary therapist and milieu staff to approach them prior to cutting. This has been somewhat successful at this point, as she has approached staff on several occasions rather than engaging in any type of self-mutilation.

-Steven D. Lancaster, L.C.S.W., Primary Therapist, Monthly Resident Review, 2/17/98

It was in eighth grade when I discovered the power that self-mutilation gave me. The razor gave me “control” of my feelings – a control I felt I had otherwise lost. Watching blood run down my skin was like letting tears fall from my eyes; I could feel.

I don’t think I can remember a time when there wasn’t a fire of anger burning somewhere in my conscious. I remember it most strong as a child; sometimes the anger was so intense I thought that claws would explode out my fingertips. I dealt with all types of emotion through anger – rather than feel sad, lonely, scared, or hungry, I would feel angry. When adolescence began this anger separated me from my parents, our conversations were rather loud confrontations. By eighth grade my angry outbursts and attacks had caused numerous suspensions and meetings at school, bringing me dangerously close to expulsion. It was towards the end of eighth grade that I discovered how cutting could contain my anger.

I stormed out of math class after Mr. Louis and I had gotten into an argument. Simply put, I was a trouble maker who wanted to piss the teachers of and create chaos. It wasn’t as though he had personally offended me or anything like that – it was just a game and in the end I was rarely having fun. Usually I ended up having to face my anger alone. I stomped into the girl’s bathroom and punched the stall wall. I am not exactly sure what made me do it or why, but before I knew it I was ripping at my skin as deep as I could with my fingernails. What would possess me to claw at my own flesh like an animal I can’t exactly say, but I can say that I felt less tense. I pulled down the sleeves of my sweater and went back to class without any further disruption.

That day I had found an addiction that I thought would keep me away from the authoritative trouble and just make me feel better. I would keep a razor with me at all times just in case I needed it; in case I needed it to feel relief. Most nights, not much dissimilar from some people’s nightly prayer, I would cut myself. I felt relief I couldn’t get from drugs and reliance I couldn’t get from guys.

I was completely loaded with speed and was tweaking hard that night. I began to feel a frightening sensation of both physical and mental disconnection from my body when I decided to pull out my razor. Blood oozed from the cuts I had carved upon my pale legs and all of the sudden I was inclined to “preserve” this feeling of freedom. I pulled a coloring book out from under a pile of books that I would sometimes color in when I was on speed and allowed my blood to drip onto the innocent pages of the coloring book. Once I felt enough blood was on the page to satisfy preservation, I closed the coloring book and put it away. This became part of my nightly routine, every night adding to the book a page of red and brown blood.

I can’t remember what made me do it, but with summer only weeks away I sat nervously in a chair outside of Mrs. Krumboltz’s office. I had grown scared of my addiction with cutting after realizing how hard it was for me not to do it. I did, afterall, know that cutting was wrong – it wasn’t a justifiable social activity. And cutting was a secret that I kept – if my friends saw such slashes on my arms on legs I would get weird looks and dumb faces. What is wrong with me? I figured I would take a step in my life and ask someone for help. Mrs. Krumboltz was my school counselor; she had basically kept me from getting kicked out of school. All of the bad kids loved her because she was who would always talk to us and listen. I really trusted her, and so I decided that I needed to tell her my secret.

But as I sat across the tiny office from Mrs. Krumboltz I couldn’t find the words to ask for help – they were not words I knew well. She asked me what I wanted to talk with her about and I stared back at her with blank eyes. Help! I pulled up the sleeve of my shirt to show her the ragged gashes. I impatiently awaited an answer. I thought Mrs. Krumoltz held the answer to everything; I expected she could fix me and make me all better.

“What types of drugs having you been doing lately Michelle?” Mrs. Krumboltz asked knowing that my group of friends and I drank often and smoked.

“Oh, you know, just a little bit of pot here and there.” I told her through lying eyes.

“You sure?” She asked me warmly. How I wanted to tell her, tell her everything that I did, and just give all my problems to her to deal with. I felt pregnant, about to give birth to a dead baby. How I wanted to crawl into her mothering arms and have her tell me that she would fix everything. But I knew that all of this could only be in my dreams. I nodded to her, and she knew I was lying.

“Well, Michelle, what do you want me to do?” I then realized that she couldn’t help me; I kept her at too much of a deceptive distant for her to help me mend my wounds. I drearily picked up my bag and dragged my feet away from Mrs. Krumboltz’ office. I guess I’ll just stop on my own – not too bad. I tried to talk myself into believing I could change on my own.

When I got home from school that day I threw out all of my razors and the coloring book filled with blood, convinced that I would never do it again. Three days later after a huge fight with my parents over a phone call from Mrs. Krumboltz about our meeting, I cut again. I didn’t return to doing it everyday, I just did it when I felt it was really needed. Snapshots of my injuries sent my mother into tears and my dad into confusion. They would try to check my arms and legs to protect their little baby from hurting herself, but I didn’t care. I didn’t want them to see my cuts, but if they did, what could they do?

I wasn’t able to stop cutting until I was able to start crying. I had to allow my body to release itself naturally instead of my forced control. Working with Steve and Kim, they helped me through my mutilation addiction. It was hard not to attack myself when I was sad and angry. Sometimes feelings would build-up so much inside of me that I thought I would explode, and it was hard to know that I could easily release the build-up. The more honest I became about my feelings, closing in on the deceptive distance that had kept Mrs. Krumboltz from helping me, the less I desired self-harm. As I look at the numerous scars that fill my arms and legs I realize that I will never escape my feelings.

A Mama's Skinny Chicken

Summer 1996

I sat outside on the front-porch working on a crossword puzzle and smoking a cigarette. It was about two in the morning, and I couldn’t get rid of the jitters and irritations caused from my earlier lines. I had been up for three nights and was sweaty, worn out, and about explode. I had been chain-smoking and crossword working for the previous hour; I just couldn’t do it any longer. I took a final drag then watched the flaming cherry disappear as I smothered it into the garden.

I stepped into my house, and was nauseated by our “warm and cozy” living room. I turned on the television in hope of distracting my thoughts enough to let me fall asleep. I watched for a couple impatient moments and was soon distracted. Without the calm of pot or the numbness of alcohol I feared tonight would the forth sleep deprived night. But I needed sleep.

It was then that I remembered the Valium and Secenol, which were prescribed to me for anxiety and insomnia. I popped a couple of pills and returned to the late night images that flashed before my tired eyes. The longer I sat watching the television, the more an irritation of impatience seemed to tickle my skin as thick syrup seemed to flow through my veins. Ten minutes later felt like sixty so I popped more pills. Like a perfunctory robot I returned to the couch. The itchiness and irritation tapered, but still I existed. I was able to watch the television for about twenty minutes this time before I grew frustrated that I had not already fallen asleep. I took a couple more pills, and watched more television. Sand dripped through the hourglass as the pills were stolen from their homes. It was not long before I found only empty bottles. Uh oh…

The room was fuzzy and my mind was flustered but calm. Finally my eyes grew droopy and the syrup that before ran through my veins was now champagne. I'll just go to sleep and deal with mom and dad in the morning. I was not in the mood to get in a fight with my parents about abusing medication; it didn’t cross my mind that the amount of pills I had taken could be harmful. My mind and body grew exceptionally comfortable as the minutes ticked. All I had wanted for the last hour was to be able to fall asleep, and now I was tired enough to do so. I crawled back onto the couch and fell asleep watching MTV.

My mother awoke me ten minutes later shaking my shoulder and yelling something that I couldn't understand. She had been awoken by the volume of the television in combination with an open living room door. My mother had already scene the empty pill container on the table, and was yelling at me about the whereabouts of the medicine. While I was aware of what was going on, it felt like a dream, like I was watching my life from a movie theatre. When I was eventually able to communicate with my mom that I had accidentally taken the pills because I couldn’t sleep she yanked me off the couch and told me to get my clothes on. I fell to the ground unable to support my own body. My mom began crying, asking me why I would do this to myself. What is she talking about? I just wanted to sleep… My mom thought that I was attempting suicide. My mom helped me up the stairs to my room where she threw a sweatshirt over my head. I tried to tell her that I didn't mean for this to happen, but I was having trouble speaking. My sister was awoken by the commotion and sleepily stepped out of her room to see what was going on.
"Michelle, are you OK?" I heard her say through a weak voice. I couldn't respond.
"Just go to bed Nini, Dad and I are going to take Michelle to the hospital." And then everything went black.

I opened my eyes. It took me a couple of minutes to realize where I was; I was in a hospital. I had IVs inserted into my right arm and my head drummed. The last thing that I could remember was being at the top of the staircase with mom and Nini. I didn’t remember eating a hamburger that a nurse had fed me for lunch earlier that day.

Mom was sitting next to me and smiled when she realized that I was finally awake. I was surprised at how easily it was for me to speak. I asked my mom what was going on. It had been two days since my parents had driven me to the hospital. After getting into the car, I went in and out of physical consciousness and was quickly driven to the emergency room at Stanford Hospital. I had to drink a large container of charcoal liquid. If I could drink it, and keep it down, I would not have to get my stomach pumped. My dad explained how I just chugged the drink right down (it probably helped that I was barely conscious). I kept the liquid down, and the doctors put me in the hospital until I fully came aware. When I heard what had happened it scared me to think that it had been two days, two days, of which I had absolutely zero memory.

All of the sudden a feeling of escape surged through me. I needed to get out of the hospital as fast as I could. With cold and abrupt words I told mom to take me home. I hated hospitals, and wanted to get as far away as I could before the dismal smell sunk into my skin. My mother responded with words that sounded unreasonable to me, but probably reasonable to most anyone else. She explained that it was the doctor’s decision when I would leave, and it was not up to her. Dr. Cheng, entered the room at that moment. He was a young and oriental man who looked to be having a good day. He asked me politely how I was doing. "I need to go home, I can't stay here…" Dr. Cheng told me that they still needed to run some tests, and that it was policy that be hospitalized until it was positive that I was stable. He doesn't understand, I need to leave. I'm fine, some doctor he is, he can't even tell that I'm OK, I've gotta get outta here…

Extreme irritation unleashed through my veins, and all I wanted was to get out of the hospital. I had to leave, and had to run, I just I had to. After attempting all types of manipulations and ideas, Dr. Cheng denied me telling me that I was still told to remain in the hospital. Dr. Cheng then asked my mother to step outside to have a word with him. These were the secret words that exist between doctors and mom. Sometimes I felt like there was an entire life that existed through these secret words that I was sheltered from.

I've gotta run. I pulled the IV out of my arm, threw open the door, and ran down the corridor towards an exit sign. As I ran, Dr. Cheng and some nurses chased me, shouting for me to stop. All of the sudden an empty metal stretcher was pulled around a corner by two nurses. I banged roughly into the stretcher as pain seared through my right leg. I guess this is why they tell you not to run in a hospital. Delayed by pain, a couple of nurses caught up with me, taking each arm in a strong hold. I was back to face the doom of Dr. Cheng. My mom took me home just a couple of hours later.

It was this event that my mother began to think of me as her “skinny chicken”. She had been just outside the door talking to Dr. Cheng when I attempted to exit. As my drug-thinned body ran, the hospital gown exposed my bare-backside. My shaved head added to the picture, and my mom refers me that summer, as her “skinny chicken.”