“Don’t commit suicide!”

 At the end of March 2001, I was hospitalized for deep depression and suicidality, and released about two weeks later, coming out of the psych ward of the local hospital in Indianapolis to face homelessness and no job.  That afternoon I took refuge in a fundamentalist Christian "rescue mission," which was my home for the next four months, until I became eligible for SSDI, or disability income.  In September 2001 I became successfully employed, by the end of 2004 had shed off my curse of massive recurring depression, and now, over 21 years since my last psychiatric hospitalization, am in absolutely no danger of being re-hospitalized for psychiatric reasons again.  Below is a poetic fictional description of my discharge, with the cheery psychiatrist wishing me on with well wishes and good speed as I went out into the world facing emptiness, poverty, and despair.  Though the account of my departure from the hospital is fictional, the circumstances limned were all too real, and so, this is definitely a poem based on real life as I had lived it then--GF 

“Don’t commit suicide!”

So said the psychiatrist

as I was about to be released

from the hospital,

the one-size-fits-all pleasantness

of the stiff smile plastered

on his face

appearing as though

it had been painted

on an otherwise lifeless

mannequin.

“Go out and face the challenges of life

boldly and positively,

now with your new, healthy attitude.”

 

He forgot to add,

“Go out and face positively

the crummy, low-paying,

dead-end job you have,

the one that doesn’t pay you enough

to live on. (If you still have a job,

as your job is so low-skill

and you so obviously ‘overqualified’

for it with your college degree

you could be replaced

by a chimpanzee,

if a chimpanzee

could be trained

to punch a time clock.)

 

“Go out and return

to your apartment

and pack your belongings,

as you’ve been evicted

and have to get your stuff

out of there by mid-afternoon.

 

“Go forth and accept

boldly and realistically

your homelessness,

or perhaps staving

off that absolute

homelessness

by scrounging up

a bed in the local mission,

where you will be subjected

to mandatory fundamentalist

God-preaching,

despite your atheism.”

 

“Go out and meet those challenges,”

the psychiatrist

admonished,

just as the therapist before,

the one who’d

personally denigrated me

said to do those few years ago,

when he said that

personally degrading

and insulting me

was designed to

help me “meet the challenge

of living on $7.00 an hour.”

 

“Go out and positively

meet and greet

the challenges of your

worthless,

poverty-ridden

life,

that life

bereft of hope,

possibility of change,

friendship,

support

and love.

 

“By all means,

don’t commit suicide!

You have so much to live for,

can’t you see?”

 

No irony in the

psychiatrist’s voice

at all,

just the same

one-size-fits-all pleasantness

as though the mannequin

had a recording

embedded in it

that played automatically.

 

“By the way,

one last thing,”

the psychiatrist added.

“Before you leave,

be sure to

check in with

the receptionist

and sign the papers

for indigent relief

so that we all get paid.”