dispatches from crazyville

The day I met a psychiatrist for the first time, I was terrified. I knew I had to reveal all the things I had been thinking and doing, things I was embarrassed about and ashamed of (and hadn’t ever told anyone) to a person I’d never met before. I’d never gone to a psychiatrist. I hadn’t wanted to see a psychiatrist at all, but the people who love me convinced me that my life depended on it. I knew the doctor would confirm one of two fears: a) I was broken, irreparably; or, b) I was making it all up.

I was a first year teacher. Most days on the drive home from work, I wanted to drive my car very fast into something very still. And most days, what stopped me was the fear that I might live. When I got home, I did work–planned, read student work, averaged grades–and there was never enough time to get everything done. I was failing. I didn’t sleep. I felt trapped, and like I had no skin. Every time anyone talked to me, it felt like they were literally stabbing me. Robbing me of something. After these exchanges, the conversations would bang around my skull for hours, frantic pinballs, as I revised my parts, hating myself, knowing that the other person in the conversation hated me or thought I was stupid, or a liar, or fake, or just ridiculous. I invented a thousand ways to get people who didn’t like me to like me–gifts tangible and not–to make them like me again. Except they already liked me.

Having conversations and doing a job are pretty basic things. I expected myself to be able to do them. And I loathed myself for my ineptitude. The feverish narrator in my head ranted. What the fuck is wrong with you? Just suck it up and do your work. You’re a fucking asshole who can’t do anything. You suck at your job. You suck at life. You hate you, with good reason, and so does everyone else. Why don’t you just stop wasting everyone’s time and energy and die?

Had I not sought help when I did, I’d be dead now.

I needed the psychiatrist to help me. In order for him (he was a him) to help, I had to tell him my insides. I didn’t have a language for my insides, which turned out to be a big part of my problem. But if the psychiatrist could help me, that meant I was crazy. Mentally ill. Too weak to just suck it up. Too whiny. Or, what if it turned out I was like Hannibal Lecter crazy? What if I had to live in a psych ward with people who drooled and shouted and weren’t allowed to wear belts?

How could I convey myself to him, precisely? What if I said the wrong words?

His office was an old Victorian house that had been converted. Iron steps led to a small stoop. A sign instructed patients to ring the doorbell. I pushed the doorbell and a voice demanded my name. After a moment, the door clicked. I entered waiting room was small. Worn green carpet, washed out watercolors of empty landscapes, somber people. Sour breath. Sadness. The air leaden with waiting. I checked in. Without looking up from her computer monitor, the receptionist said flatly, New patient. She handed me a clipboard.

Fill that out and bring it back with your insurance card. Doctor A– will be with you soon.

I sat down. As I filled out the required information, I filled up with dread.

Symptoms.

I had to write it down? Writing it down made it indelible. Undeniable. Unrevisable. Known. The doctor’s idea would be shaped by what I wrote. The insurance company would file it away. My name, flagged.

Symptoms. I cut myself.

I finished the form and returned it to the desk. Soon after, Dr A– appeared at the top of a staircase. L–, he called. Pins of panic shot out of my heart and lodged themselves under my skin. Shh. Don’t say my name. Oh, god. Don’t say my name. Everybody can hear you. I wanted to slam my hand over his mouth. Instead, I followed him down the stairs. His office was in the basement, flanking a dreary conference room. He waited at the door to usher me in, then shut the door behind me and introduced himself.

I’m Dr A–.

L–, I said.

His office was spare and revealed nothing about him except that his taste in lamps was as questionable as his taste in framed decor. The watercolor on the wall opposite me was a sailboat next to a fence on a beach. A beached sailboat, like a metaphor for impotence.

Tell me why you’re here, he said.

He was about 900 years old, a white-haired white guy in a suit, an archetype of a psychiatrist. The only thing missing was a beard. I started jiggling my leg so furiously that he became blurry. I told him everything I could think of. He must have asked me some questions, but I don’t remember them, with the exception of:

You’ve never been in treatment before? Never? How old are you?

That settled it. The loose skin of his face puckered up into itself with incredulity. His eyebrows hung like question marks punctuating his questions. I panicked. I was crazy.

And the slightest bit relieved I hadn’t made it all up.

No, I said. I’m 25.

Silence.

He reached forward to shake my hand and I ducked.

It was nice to meet you, he said.

I sat there feeling crazy.

Finally he said, Come back in two weeks.

I left. Now what?