DAY 173 & 174 - 27th & 28th January, Monday & Tuesday
Like I said at the end of my last post, Sally had started threatening Keri and told her she couldn't have any appointments and wasn't allowed to take any of her medication, so yesterday that's exactly what happened. Keri missed her psychotherapy session with Fiona and also didn't take any of her medication. Even after only missing two doses you could see the anxiety difference. Keri kept rapidly pacing round and round the garden. The staff kept a close eye on her as she'd explained why she wasn't taking any medication and didn't have her appointment with Fiona. They tried to keep her distracted with games, movies etc but nothing seemed to be helping.
Eventually, by about 8pm, her key nurse, Emma, persuaded Keri to take some of her medication, especially the Diazepam. She promised that if Keri dissociated and Sally was to come out then she'd make sure she was kept safe and on the ward and that the staff would deal with it if that scenario were to happen. Emma even said it might be good that Sally comes out as they might be able to talk to her. Obviously, the staff working at the time hadn't met her before...
After taking her morning doses of medication she'd missed we all immediately felt Sally's anger about it. I'll use the phrase Keri uses which is she knew "shit was about to go down". Emma invited her to the staff office to sit with the staff as it was obvious Keri's anxiety had gotten worse after taking the tablets. With the staff unable to distract Keri they hoped that being sat in the office with all the staff would be helpful. It was almost like she was on 4 to 1 observation!
After maybe 20 minutes Sally completely exploded and kicked off while still in the staff office. She walked straight out the door and went for the front entrance. Andy tried to stop her from leaving but Sally shouted and swore at him. Her aggressive demeanor and anger made him back off for a second. I think he was surprised at how different her and Keri were. Their alarms were all set off but that split second Sally managed to grab was enough to be able to open the first door out into the ward entrance. From there all she had to do was press a switch on the wall, open the last door and that was it. Emma realised it was Sally and tried calling her but Sally just turned her head around, screamed "Fuck off!" and then sprinted off; described by a member of staff as a 'bolt of lightning'. She was way too fast for any of the staff to be able to catch her, even though two of the males legged it after her and tried, so instead some staff got into the ward car and drove around for a bit trying to find her. Sally's not stupid, she went off road. She managed to find a bus to take her up near the suspension bridge. This wasn't planned as Sally hadn't expected to have to come out as Keri had been doing as she was told. She let Keri out up by the observatory again.
When Keri found herself standing in the dark, with a cigarette in her hand, completely dead on her feet and exhausted, the only thing that got her walking was knowing the suspension bridge was there. Her muscles were completely seized up and fatigued and part of her knew there was no chance of getting over the fence but she wasn't going to miss the opportunity. She forced herself on to the bridge, but as she reached the middle and tried getting over the fence she couldn't even pull herself up enough to get her feet off the ground.
Security arrived and one of them held her arm, immediately noticing how unsteady and wobbly she was.
"Have you taken anything you shouldn't have tonight or had any alcohol?" he said.
Keri shook her head. Even though she said she hadn't, he knew about her DID and suspected an overdose of some kind as he knew about Keri's amnesiac episodes and realised she didn't remember anything until she was up by the observatory. Keri had no fight left in her and started walking with the guard without a struggle. Suddenly her head was swimming and she felt like she was underwater. The next thing she knew she was being lifted from the floor by the two guards. She'd passed out and collapsed. The guards both helped her to their toll booth to get her sat down and got an ambulance and police unit en route to the bridge.
Keri was taken to the BRI in the back of an ambulance with a police escort. She had her bloods taken and was warmed up in a cubicle. Sally came out a couple of times while they were waiting for the blood results to come back. The problem was the officers didn't realise about the personality switches so thought Keri was just deliberately playing up. They had to wait for a couple of hours for her blood work to come back which thankfully showed she hadn't overdosed. They're conclusion about Keri collapsing was that she hadn't eaten for days and through sheer exhaustion her body just gave out. She was told to make sure her fluids and food intake needed to change or it would happen again, except next time she might end up not waking up so quickly.
One of the officers ended up saying some quite hurtful things to Keri which ended up making her cry in the back of the police car. His response was, "Oh, that's right. Bring on the tears." What?! How could he say that after all Keri had been through that night!? He was unbelievable. Her silent crying continued as Keri got to the unit and police even grabbed her arm tightly even though she was walking straight for the door. Staff tried getting her to sit in the lounge on one to one but Keri was too upset. She ended up going to her room. At this point it was no longer silent crying, it was verging on hysterical. It went on for over half an hour with Bernie sat on her chair beside her. I don't think he quite knew what to do. Some of the things he said were meant to be helpful and Keri listened to him but she was crying so much she found it hard to concentrate.
Justin turned up at Keri's door and kneeled down by Keri. He'd brought up her medication. Oh my god! One of them was for her GERD, the other five were psych meds; her Quetiapine, Mirtazapine, Diazepam, Lorazepam and Promethazine. You couldn't even see the bottom of the little paper pot. Keri managed to take them without another Sally fiasco. It was now gone 4am and all Keri wanted to do was lie down but her brain was flying around too much.
After crying to the point of wanting to collapse again, she smoked, got changed into something dry and warm, and spoke to Bernie. He said that she was going to be on 15 minute obs until she fell asleep, as she'd calmed down a little as the medication had started kicking in, and then from there they'd go back to hourly. She agreed as she needed some space. She put on Taken and ended up falling asleep while lying on her bed. Bernie was kind enough to turn off her TV and fairy lights when he saw that Keri was completely knocked out, mainly down to the amount of medication she'd had.
The staff were kind enough to also leave Keri alone to sleep today besides giving her her medication. She didn't fall asleep until nearly 6am and got up around 2.30pm which is pretty good. She woke up to find out that all her leave had yet again been taken away (which involved writing a shopping list to give to staff to get her binge food for a binge and vomit session). She's also been put back on one to one observation. Keri's mum and a member of staff have said there's no point in Keri being on one to one as Sally still managed to get out while sitting with several members of staff in their office and them setting off the alarms. Although, when Keri spent two weeks on one to one, Sally didn't come out and have a rage so I don't know.
Keri has actually been talking today but she hasn't really wanted to be around people. She had an unexpected visit from her CPN. She's leaving in two weeks. Thanks for the warning Sue! She's yet another person who brought up the subject of Keri being admitted into a secure ward. It's all going to be discussed in her CPA on Friday. Sue will be there anyway, and so will Fiona. Both of which have now spoken about maybe moving Keri would be helpful until Sally's under control.
Who spends over an hour on the phone? Keri and her foster mum is the answer! It really perked Keri up. She was happy to hear the reason her foster mum hadn't been able to visit was that she'd been completely manic for ages. Part of Keri had started wondering whether something had happened or she'd done something wrong. After that conversation, she realised this wasn't true so she no longer had these critical or paranoid thoughts about it all. Hopefully Keri's foster mum can visit tomorrow but if not she'll text Keri to let her know. At least Keri's not one to take things personally when it comes to her foster parents. Everyone else? Well, she'd hold a grudge forever!
Keri's actually been trying to stay calm this evening. She's lying in bed watching The Hobbit. She wants to talk to the staff about how she's feeling but is way too exhausted to have an indepth conversation at this time of night. It's gone 3am! I'm going to get her ready for bed myself otherwise she's never going to do it!
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