September, 10, 2001

No, that's not a typo, I mean 9-10-01. Who knew this day would start 2 days of lasting memories.

At this point in my career I was working on an acute in-patient psychiatric unit. We had 13 beds on a locked unit. Our admissions consisted of people between the ages of 13-100 (actually there was no upper limit, probably the oldest one we had was in their 80's). These people were brought in by the police under Emergency Protective Custody. Nebraska statute states that if someone is showing signs of being a danger to him/herself or others, they could be brought to the hospital by police for a psych evaluation and a decision had to be made within 72 hours to determine what should be done with them. We are staffed with one RN and one psychiatric technician. I look back now and think, "How in the hell, and why in the hell did we only have 2 people on a locked unit with adolescents, sex offenders, manic women, mentally retarded people, incarcerated pigs, psychotic schizophrenics and not get hurt more often?" God was watching over us.

Now, imagine being in jail, for like the 20th time. You know the routine. Part of this routine is also knowing that you can cry wolf saying you are going to kill yourself and you get a free ticket to the hospital aka The Ritz. It works out pretty well for the incarcerated.

September 10th, 2001. I got morning report and found out that Billy, the 6'5 270 pound black dude came in last night for the bazillionth time after beating his wife, for the hundredth time, went to jail, and pulled the Golden Suicidal Card and now was here. I knew him well. I saw his name in the public record often for assault, trespassing, disorderly conduct, etc. I never spent long talking to him. We'd go through the routine questions: Are you suicidal? No. Do you promise me that you aren't going to hurt yourself while you're here? Yes. Small talk for a bit and we're done. Then he'd sit and watch TV all day. Today I told him that the doctor would see him and he'd probably go back to jail sometime this morning or afternoon.

For some reason today I got a weird vibe from him. Something was odd.  I talked with my tech about him and told her to keep a closer eye on him. He was on already on 15 minute checks. She had to physically look at him minimally every 15 minutes and document what he was doing.

It was about 9:15 am. I was in the nurse's station. I hear a scream, "Robyn! Get the scissors!"
Dammit I say to myself, grabbing my keys, unlocking the narcotics cabinet and getting the scissors. We kept them locked up because, well, we're with people who want to hurt themselves and no one really wanted to get stabbed with them either. I grabbed the scissors and ran. He was in room 427. I was scared. Really scared. I ran in there and saw him hanging in his locker by his bed sheet. My tech was wide-eyed. Frozen. I started with the scissors, trying to cut the sheet from the bar it was attached to. Ridiculously feeble, hand-shaking-uncontrollably attempt to cut through this mess. I didn't try very long because I couldn't get through it at all. His weight was pulling it taut and it was knotted thick. I gave her the scissors and grabbed around his butt and lifted him up to release the tension. Take note from above: 6'5, 270#. Mind you I was 5 months pregnant with my daughter, didn't think twice about picking him up though. Ripped ligaments in my crotch to shreds. She was able to cut through it and we got him on the ground. Had a pulse and was breathing. Being African American, it was more difficult to assess his color, but he wasn't blue. A call was made to 911. We didn't have the equipment or personal to handle serious medical conditions when they arose, so this wasn't out of the norm to have to call an ambulance to transfer a patient to our other campus where the Emergency Room was. He laid there silent. Her and I out of breath, kneeling on the floor. He was alive. Paramedics and EMT's arrived and he was transferred to the ER. Overwhelmed with what just happened doesn't even begin to describe the emotions I had.

He came back to the unit later in the afternoon. .

The following morning, 9/11/01, around 9:15 in the morning I found myself watching the TV with Billy. Glued to the TV. Yesterday didn't seem to matter now. We only had 4 male patients on the unit that day. I don't know what ever happened to Billy. Two of the three other guys that were there that day have since killed themselves.

Two days, back to back, I'll never forget.