The worst times

On January 31st, I expressed a great deal of frustration.  I don't remember what it was about, but I asked David if I could spend the night at a hotel so that I could have some time to think.  I stressed to him that I didn't want to leave or be away from him, I just felt like it would help me think.  I cried as I left.  Dave was upset that I was upset, but otherwise seemed fine.

The next day I left the hotel and went straight to work.  I got a phone call from Dave saying, "Can you pick up my medications from the pharmacy on your way home?  I've had a...  weird... day."  I seem to recall calling him, and him saying that things had been weird, but that he was okay.  I picked up medications on the way home.

When I got home, Dave was sitting on a couch staring at the wall.  He told me that he had hit himself with wires and cut his arms.  I think he had burned himself as well.  He said he had run a bath and thought about getting in and drowning.  He seemed off but mostly okay by the time I got home, and kept saying that he had felt "weird" and couldn't bring himself to call anyone or talk to anyone, at least in the morning.

It was a little while after I started talking with Dave before I felt comfortable leaving him and going to the bathroom.  I felt kind of horrified to see that the bath was still drawn.  Somehow that made it all real, and real for me.  I let out the water.  I have an image in my head of me lifting the drain lever and watching the water go down the drain before I turned away.  I don't think that image will leave me anytime soon.

I wish I knew how I felt that day, but I didn't journal for two weeks afterwards and I can't remember any vivid feelings.  I know I was frantic to figure out what to do.  We called BYU's on-call therapist who was utterly unhelpful.  (I knew more about the resources for depression in the area than he did, etc. etc.).  I talked with our psychiatric nurse the next day, to make sure I was doing everything possible, everything advisable.  I checked in with my psychology advisor.  What followed was an intake interview & following assignment to an individual counselor for Dave, along with a pretty immediate psychiatry appointment and ongoing follow up.



This is a turning point for Dave and me, a bookmark for both of us about when things got really bad.  Even though Dave did not try anything that day, and even though he didn't even begin to carry out any plans from that day on, his depression remained severe and constantly present.  A few weeks later, Dave withdrew from half his classes to try to make his stress and workload more manageable.  I don't remember ever seeing Dave happy during this time.