Maybe I Don't Belong Here: A Memoir of Race, Identity, Breakdown and Recovery
Warning: This post uses language that may not be suitable for all readers, please use your discretion.
Extracted from Maybe I Don't Belong Here: A Memoir of Race, Identity, Breakdown and Recovery by David Harewood
Out in paperback on October 13th (Bluebird, £9.99)
Waking up in a mental institution is a strange and bizarre experience made only slightly more bearable by the drugs administered the night before arrival. It’s an odd sensation to come round on a mental ward – in this case the Hollymoor Psychiatric Hospital in Birmingham – and not recognise your own body. It took a while for my hands, feet and legs to understand that they were attached to my body. I just lay there for an hour trying to make sense of what was going on. I knew I was awake and alive, but that was as far as I could make out. I repeatedly wriggled my fingers and toes to be sure they hadn’t been removed. Once I was 100 per cent certain that all of me seemed present and correct, I turned my attention to opening my eyes. My eyelids felt like forty-pound kettle bells and they absolutely refused to stay open. After a minute or two, they settled into a thousand-yard stare as my brain tried its best to focus and understand what all these people were doing in my bedroom. Slowly it started to come together, and I realised I was on the locked ward of a psychiatric hospital. Certainly not the best start to the day for sure and the realisation hit hard.
As my eyes began to focus, it was the decor that they settled on first. The crusty walls, the bedding and the parquet flooring came in for particular scrutiny as I cast a disapproving glance at my surroundings. When did I decide to move in here? Oh, that’s right. This was my second trip into a mental institution. I’ve been sectioned TWICE! I must be pretty good at this. My sense of smell was last to wake up and, eventually, I noticed the distinct smell of piss coming from the bed next to me. I turned my head slowly and caught a glimpse of the mouth-breather in the adjacent bed who hadn’t woken up yet. I gazed at him for what seemed like an eternity, trying to figure out how the hell I had ended up in a bed next to this guy. I was sure I was an actor before this. I was absolutely sure of it! I studied at a really good drama school, had lots of mates and laughed a lot. What the fuck had happened?
As I tried to gather my thoughts, the inner dialogue started to activate and then the usual chatter began, performing its confusing daily pantomime. But something was different today, there was something I needed to remember. What was it? My brother had visited the day before. I remembered because he had become quite upset with me when I tried communicating with him by singing the ‘Welcome’ tune the scientists in the movie Close Encounters of the Third Kind had played to the alien spaceships when they landed at the end of the movie. My brother was not impressed. He’d said something to me that was really important, though. What was it? ‘David, if you want to get out of here, you’ve got to start acting normal.’ Acting normal? Well, I’m an actor. I know I can act! I’ve got to start acting like a normal person, not a mental patient. That’s how I’m going to get out. So, I’m going to get up right now and brush my teeth because that’s normal behaviour. Get the fuck up and start behaving like a person who doesn’t belong in a mental institution.
I sat up in bed and took a moment. I needed to plan what I was about to do because my head felt like it was swimming in jelly and I wasn’t sure where my toothbrush was exactly. Mum came yesterday and she brought me some new kit. There was a comb and a half-full cup of water, a magazine and a white plastic bag that presumably held my toiletries, but it all looked a mess. There were too many things on that shelf. I reached slowly down to grab the white plastic bag and look inside, and there was indeed a toothbrush and some toothpaste, along with some moisturiser and tissues, all the stuff mums pack for their boys when they’re spending the night away. It was all there. Normally brushing your teeth would take around two to three minutes. Under the influence of Chlorpromazine (the antipsychotic drug), however, I discovered that brushing my teeth would now take me forty minutes to an hour. Even taking a single step was difficult, walking in a straight line even more so. Navigating my way to the bathroom wasn’t easy and, once there, catching a glimpse of my rather puffy face and unkempt appearance did little to spur my soul. I looked fucking dreadful. It took a while to figure out that the person looking at me in the mirror was, in fact, me.
People-watching is a particular joy of the acting process and even in there, on this ward and in my confused and sedated state, I found it fascinating. I was the only Black patient on the ward; most of the other patients were white and of a range of ages. There was a beautiful Indian girl who was frail and fairylike who always stood facing the wall. She only moved when someone got too close to her. There was also a creepy guy I ended up naming ‘Iago’ because he wouldn’t leave me alone. One day I happened to fall asleep in a chair, as I often did, and I woke up to find him licking my ear! Well, that gave me a hell of a shock. I couldn’t gather my thoughts enough to tell him to fuck off at the time, so I instead gave him serious vibes for the following couple of days. He ended up leaving me alone. My toothbrushing routine became my secret escape plan and it started each day on a positive note and demonstrated that I was cognisant of personal hygiene and aware enough of my surroundings to make my way around the ward and back to bed. It became a daily performance and, even under the influence of the antipsychotic drugs, I did my absolute best to catch the eye of everyone I saw. Wake up, brush my teeth, say good morning to all the nurses and pretend to read the magazine my mother had brought in. All totally normal behaviour.
Looking back to my first hospitalisation, I recognise that I was probably quite a handful. I was distressed and frightened and, had it not been for my drama school friends Nick and Jez, God knows what would have become of me. This time, here I was again, a large Black man, with a big voice always asking twenty questions about the medicine I was taking. Once or twice I’d notice a male nurse or two lurking by the door, presumably ready to step in should things get out of hand. But I just wanted to know what was going on. When I was eventually released, Mum remarked that our family doctor, Dr Coles, had commented: ‘We’re lucky that David isn’t a violent boy. He’s acting out a lot but it’s all harmless and that’s a very good thing.’ Lucky me.
Many people, particularly men of colour, have lost their lives being restrained in mental institutions. After my documentary aired I twice met people in the street, both complete strangers, who had approached to tell me of their personal experiences of family members who had lost their lives that way. An Indian man described how his brother who had had several psychotic episodes lost his life whilst being restrained and a Black woman told me of her uncle who died in the same manner. Both times I cried. It was so odd, strangers telling you their most intimate stories in the street, in broad daylight, and each time the pair of us sobbing about it. Deep down I was also thinking how easily that could have been me. So yes, I guess I was a very lucky boy. Now, two weeks into my stay, my mother, who visited me at the hospital most days, arrived with a particularly big smile on her face. ‘We’re going home!’ she said. ‘You’ve been doing really well, they tell me, and you can leave here and carry on your treatment with me back at the flat.
The Chinese symbol for ‘crisis’ is actually composed of two characters, one signifying ‘danger’ and the other ‘opportunity’. I believed that buried in my experience was an opportunity for renewal, a chance to reset and build from a different perspective. I’d had a wild summer, but under my mother’s care back in Birmingham I’d recovered. Now it was time to fly the nest once more. I was together. I felt it.
The extract is from Maybe I Don't Belong Here: A Memoir of Race, Identity, Breakdown and Recovery by David Harewood out in paperback on October 13th (Bluebird, £9.99)