For the most part, I was really good at keeping myself together. Except for the occasional (maybe regular-ish) backtalk.
When it came to my physical lashing out though I had been keeping it together pretty well. Other than that fight with Tammy and the physical assault on myself (no one knew about that) I had been doing better than I had in a long time.
At some point, things had become overwhelming for me. I had grown tired of all the complaining around me. How this wasn’t their fault and that wasn’t fair, how they shouldn’t even be here blah blah blah. All of this mixed with school and my own personal issues had finally reached a breaking point.
I snapped.
I mean snapped! Completely lost my shit. I was screaming and yelling. Swearing and throwing things. Swinging on staff and just all-around losing my shit.
As the staff tried to verbally calm me I just escalated. There was no calm, at all. It was just pure rage flowing through every part of my body. This escalation caused the staff to have to attempt to physically restrain me.
I was NOT going down without a fight. I made them work for that full-floor restraint. Even after they got me on the floor I continued to fight them so hard they had to call for assistance from night office.
I wasn’t calming down for anyone or anything. As much staff tried to hold themselves together ( I was definitely pushing them to their limits) I just wouldn’t quit.
Facility procedure was if any resident was full floor restrained for 30 mins the nurse needed to be called and present to check them every 15 mins after that. So as we hit that 35-minute mark ( I still wasn’t calm so there wasn’t much attention on the clock) the nurse was called.
As I lay on the floor still screaming and yelling and fighting back the front door opens and the nurse came walking in. I looked up to see momma Sheryl looked down at me with her mom face on and my whole body relaxed. “Shit, okay I’m done” were the words that flew out of my mouth as momma Sheryl and I made eye contact. She checked my vitals and once she knew I was okay the staff let me up.
I went right to my room shut the door and refused to talk to anyone. Momma Sheryl came down to check on me but I still didn’t want to talk. She was our night nurse that night and told me if I needed her to have them call her.
even in my moment of full-blown crazy, she had my back and it wouldn’t be the last time she would be there for me, not by a long shot.
“… strong bonds are forged in high emotional temperatures.” ~ Dervla Murphy