My name is Ruth Barlow, and I can’t take care of my children.
I was so doped up due to that Risperdal shit that they said would help me with my bipolar mania that when my son was born and they first handed him to me, I looked at him and said “Oh. Hi.” That was all.
My boyfriend, Danny’s father, left me and petitioned the courts for custody, citing me as unfit. But he wouldn’t let me stop taking my Risperdal, despite depression being my problem more than mania. So I stopped taking it myself. Within half an hour of missing my next dose, I was up and cleaning the kitchen. I ran to my baby when he made the smallest sound and played with him and fed him and changed him and talked to him and showed him around his new home. I played some music and danced with him to the music. He laughed at that and eventually fell into a relaxed sleep.
Then Gerald came home from work.
He saw me up and about and asked me immediately if I’d taken my Risperdal. I said yes, lying. I had thankfully had the foresight to wash the pill down the sink rather than leave it in its blister pack where he could find it and find out the truth.
He stared me down. I stared back at him with a “What?” that I hoped sounded genuinely confused.
He stomped off into the bedroom and slammed the door. I heard him, sure enough, going through my meds. (I had taken my antidepressant, Celexa, as usual that day.)
The kids were sleeping, so I went and started cleaning and tidying the living room. He stayed in the bedroom for what seemed an eternity. Then when he came out, he had something in his hand.
“Hi,” I said.
He looked at me with fake concern for me and real concern for himself. He said, “I think you ought to take a clonazepam. You’re really wired.”
Clonazepam is a sedative.
I lost it.
“Fuck off,” I said.
I turned on the vacuum cleaner so that he couldn’t be heard arguing with me, and wouldn’t be able to honestly say “You heard me.”
I started to vacuum the living room carpet.
He came over and switched off the vacuum cleaner.
“We need to talk,” he said.
He might as well have said “Report to the principal’s office.” That was the tone he was using.
“Funny. Whenever I say we need to talk, you say I’m having an episode.”
Oh, shit. That was out of my mouth before I knew I was thinking it. I probably shouldn’t have said that.
It’s going to be a long night.
“Did you really take your pills, or did you just get rid of them?” he asked.
“I took them. I guess I’m getting used to them. I feel more myself now.”
“I want you to take them in front of me from now on.”
“Fuck you. Who are you, the police? Don’t you trust me? This is insulting.”
He stomps off and I hear him moving around bottles of pills in the kitchen. He’s either fixing up something for me, or for himself.
I make up my mind.
Tonight I’m going to my sister’s place, and the kids are coming with me.
He comes stomping back into the living room. I’m dusting the shelves.
“Do you think you need a PRN? Just something to calm you down a little? You’re a little testy with me.”
“And you aren’t testy with me?” I shoot back, as I finish the shelves with shaking hands and move on to the buffet in the dining room.
“Look, you can’t talk to me like that,” he says.
“You started it,” I said, and of course he’s going to accuse me of being like a child fighting with a sibling, and sure enough he says “Fine. Act childish.”
He’s one to talk.
My anger flares. Gerald and his childish manipulations that even a three-year-old could see through!
That night I left. I took the kids with me. I grabbed our ID, our money, our jewelry, some clothes, the baby’s bottles and formula, the baby’s paci, some diapers and wipes and diaper rash cream and the stroller and the kids’ favorite toys and just LEFT.
We ended up at a mothers’ and children’s shelter downtown. Which is where we are now.
“You can only stay here for two weeks, there’s no room. But it should give you time to find other arrangements,” the counselor says. “And there’s a room with computers to look up legal information or jobs or apartments.”
I can’t concentrate and find myself back on the Facebook page for those with mental health issues. A post jumps out at me.
“Hi, it’s Hettie and Mike again, taking a recruiting tour through Houston, Texas this week. Let us know if you want us to facilitate a recruiting group for our kid-friendly non-religious mental health long-term retreat, at your school or shelter or other facility.”
Before I can stop myself I’m typing the name of the shelter, and then Hettie is replying to me and then my whole story pours out.
“We’re coming,” Hettie types. “Tomorrow.”
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