You can read part 1 here.

When we arrived and told them what was going on, I was taken back right away and put in a room with my parents. Still crying, but had resolved myself to the fact that this was going to happen whether I liked it or not. I definitely didn’t like it.

Since I had been taken to the hospital in the past for the same issue and had been successful talking them out of admitting me, I had the same goal this time. I wasn’t prepared to let my mental illness take me out.

They had me take everything off, and turn my phone in. Then they gave me one of these green paper gowns to put on. That was an interesting moment for everyone. I was stripped down to nothing, with a cup of my urine on the counter.

They said they were going to take me to meet with the doctor. What I didn’t realize was that they were actually taking me back. I wouldn’t be going back to that room, or my parents. Now, I was in an empty room with a bed, and alone. I laid down and planned my approach so that I could talk my way out of the hospital. I was confident and had stopped crying. The counselor came in to talk to me and I told her the truth about everything. I told her I really just wanted to go home and go to sleep. Once we were done talking, it seemed like the odds were pretty good.

She came back a little while later and said that she had talked with my parents and that I had two options. My first option was that I could voluntarily admit myself, or I could choose to be involuntarily admitted. After a few seconds and hearing these choices, neither of which seemed appealing to me for obvious reasons, I asked her “no other options?”. She told me no. I wasn’t really understanding. I had told her everything they had, but for some reason, when she heard it from them it made a difference.

It was at this point that anxiety took over. I couldn’t stop crying. I thought for sure that I was going to get to go home and get some rest. That obviously wasn’t going to be the case.

I chose to be voluntarily admitted. I figured that offered me the best chance of getting out of there in a reasonable time frame. After signing the paperwork, they let me know that they were waiting on a bed for me. I laid there, still in tears, wondering how all of this was going to play out.

I asked them if I could have some Xanax because I was unable to calm myself. The nurse was wonderful and caring. She said that she would put the order in and see what she could do.

Shortly after making the request, they came and told me that they had a bed for me. Time to move.

I’m not sure what time it was when I finally got upstairs and into my room, but I know it was after dark. They did a bunch of the general questionnaire stuff and took my vitals. I was still crying, but in keeping up with my personality I was cracking jokes when the opportunity arose.

Once they finished with me and I knew where my room was, my paper gown and I went to go lay down in hopes that I could get some rest. Wrong. I couldn’t relax enough to stop crying so that I could fall asleep even though I was completely exhausted. Laying there, I begged God for His help. I still hadn’t gotten the Xanax that I had requested.

It wasn’t funny at the time, but now it’s turned into one of the funnier moments of “that day”. When I went to go lay down, I “stretched” those terrible green paper pants to their max, heard a nice pop, and looked down. I had blown my pants out in the worst possible place! I was too tired to care, figured I’d deal with it in the morning, so I tried to sleep, but also keep myself from hanging out for everyone to see.

The entire night was filled with many tears and lack of sleep. They check on you every 15 minutes, and the nurses came in multiple times to take my vitals in between me crying. I don’t think I got more than an hour or two of sleep the whole night. Early in the morning, the nurse that handled my intake brought my clothes in after washing them, but I was far too tired to worry about it. She let me know that they were there and that she had hoped that she tried to be assigned to me as my nurse but that they had put me with someone else. I guess my humor through the tears was good for something.