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    Flipped: A Drug-Induced Journey to the Event Horizon of Insanity
    Flipped: A Drug-Induced Journey to the Event Horizon of Insanity
    Flipped: A Drug-Induced Journey to the Event Horizon of Insanity
    Ebook140 pages1 hour

    Flipped: A Drug-Induced Journey to the Event Horizon of Insanity

    By Robert P. Cantu

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    About this ebook

    What appears to have been a miracle antibiotic drug to relieve the painful symptoms of Diverticulitis proves to be problematic as an adequate treatment. He goes on to experience many, many debilitating side effects from the drug. The antidote is worse than the original condition. The result is mental illness that goes on to plague him for two years while under the medical treatment. Only through the combined skill of several doctors does he escape the Black Hole of permanent mental illness.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherAuthorHouse
    Release dateAug 26, 2011
    ISBN9781463448288
    Flipped: A Drug-Induced Journey to the Event Horizon of Insanity
    Author

    Robert P. Cantu

    The author has written over twelve short stories, fifteen technical papers published in several magazines, over 50 poems, and is the winner of NAPIM’s Pioneer Award in 2001 and the TAPPI Bettencourt Technical Award in 2007. Cantu worked for thirty-eight years in the chemical industry. Now retired, he lives part of the year in Charlotte, North Carolina, and the remainder of the year in Blowing Rock, North Carolina, where he writes, hikes, and stays active as both an amateur astronomer and naturalist.

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      Book preview

      Flipped - Robert P. Cantu

      © 2011 by Robert P. Cantu. All rights reserved.

      No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

      First published by AuthorHouse 08/12/2011

      ISBN: 978-1-4634-4830-1 (sc)

      ISBN: 978-1-4634-4829-5 (hc)

      ISBN: 978-1-4634-4828-8 (ebk)

      Library of Congress Control Number: 2011914179

      Printed in the United States of America

      Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

      Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

      This book is printed on acid-free paper.

      Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

      Contents

      Acknowledgements

      Dedication

      Introduction

      Chapter 1

      Chapter 2

      Chapter 3

      Chapter 4

      Chapter 5

      Chapter 6

      Chapter 7

      Chapter 8

      Chapter 9

      Chapter 10

      Chapter 11

      Chapter 12

      Chapter 13

      Chapter 14

      Chapter 15

      Chapter 16

      Chapter 17

      Chapter 18

      Chapter 19

      About the Author

      About the Book

      Acknowledgements

      As one can expect, no book is ever completed in a vacuum or completely by one person. This book was written as a consequence of an unexpected turn of events from a moderate illness to hospitalization and descent into a black hole of mental deterioration. I would like to thank Diana, and especially those Charlotte doctors who treated me effectively and offered additional information relative to my illness and mental health. Any errors with medical information, book content, or chronology are strictly of my doing, and I bear full responsibility.

      Dedication

      This book is dedicated to Diana Fowler and Dolores S. Cantu, my mother, for the love, wisdom, and strength they demonstrated during my short-term psychosis. Diana, especially, who inspired me to better mental and physical health by suggesting and recommending many things that quickly put me on the path to recovery. To my sister, Dr. Margaret Cantu, my brother, Jesse M. Cantu, and several local doctors (a cardiologist, gastroenterologist, internist, neurologist, psychologist, and psychiatrist), I give my thanks for their individual support and understanding.

      Do not go gentle into that good night.

      —Dylan Thomas

      Introduction

      Today in astrophysics, there is a theory that once you enter the event horizon of a black hole escape is impossible because of intense gravity. This is a true story of how I entered the event horizon of a mental black hole, but through a medical systems approach to treatment, I avoided being committed. Today, every once in a while when I exceed my physical or mental limitations, I flirt with that past mental state.

      How we are medically treated successfully, or not, along the perilous trail of mental health determines whether we are institutionalized. It seemed inevitable I would end up in a loony bin; however, only one of the nine doctors I met along the way of my treatment alluded to that. You’d think my confidence would soar after knowing that only one out of nine doctors thought me potentially certifiable; not so. The rest believed I would end up being quite sane, but that remained to be determined.

      If you have experienced severe acute anxiety, mild catatonia, panic disorders, paranoia, agoraphobia, or any other form of mental illness, this book is for you. So, step right up, and let me share my condition, which none of us should ever have to experience.

      Robert P. Cantu

      2011

      Chapter 1

      How It All Started

      It was right after the weekend of the 2005 New Year holiday, a Jane Eyre-type winter day. At lunch, I had eaten soup with a lot of okra with those large, slimy seeds, and later that night, I ate a fruit tart containing a cornucopia of fruits and nuts and had probably not taken in sufficient quantities of water or tea. That’s when the whole miserable event began. At work the next morning, I felt feverish, and while speaking on the phone, low voices and sounds began increasing in volume. This was turning out to be one of my very worst days. I couldn’t decide whether to go to see my doctor that day or wait it out.

      Procrastinating has always been a virtue and science for me; sometimes I can be so indecisive. It was just a slight fever, anyway, and I had no pain. I wondered if the flu shot from the previous week had not taken, and I was coming down with the flu. Who would have known what lay in store for me then and for the rest of that year?

      A late afternoon conference call with several of my Canadian colleagues forced me to decide that I would stay through the dreary afternoon instead of visiting my doctor. I went home at the usual time with that slight fever, and around 7:00 p.m., a dull pain started on my left, lower side. Later in the evening, the pain intensified, as well as my fever, which now hovered around one hundred degrees Fahrenheit. The pain started to course throughout my body. My normal body temperature being 97.6 degrees Fahrenheit, over one hundred degrees was not terribly high for me, but it was still a concern. Because I’d had a similar occurrence five years earlier diagnosed as diverticulitis, I knew it to be the same thing.

      Realizing it was getting dark and might be too late to reach my internist, I called for him anyway, but I got the evening shift nurse. The best she could do after reviewing my records and confirming the probable condition was to recommend that I go to emergency for treatment. The pain and fever could not wait until the next day, when I could go see my doctor. My wife, a very slim, blue-eyed brunette, drove me to the hospital emergency care section.

      Still the week of the New Year, I thought the emergency room might be very busy; I toughed it and went in. As I looked over the expanse of the emergency room, it overflowed, wall-to-wall, replete with racial diversity; many faces contorted in pain. Others grimaced with discomfort either from disease, a drug reaction, or overdose. It was a sea of sickness everywhere. What else should I have expected? Even the triage section was overloaded with patients. The check-in staff said that it might be several hours before a doctor could see me. Did I have a choice at this time? No, I was too sick and getting worse by the hour.

      I worried that a man sitting next to me with a hacking cough might be a person with a terminal case of tuberculosis. He kept spitting blood and wiping it into an apparently never-cleaned handkerchief. Right then, I stood up and moved away. Just in case, I didn’t want to contract another disease and add to my situation and complicate matters; the flu season was at its height. In the next room, a pregnant woman kept her arms around her distended belly in hopes of soothing her premature contractions. She, too, was in pain. And the list continued. Dante’s Inferno may not have had such a Goya-istic entanglement of writhing bodies in so many stages of pain. Do you blame me for not wanting to sit next to the cough? Christ, even the large sofas in an adjoining room bulged over with sick people accompanied by their relatives, so I stood against the wall for a long time. Finally, at 1:00 a.m., a nurse called me up, took my vitals, had me change into a gown, and moved me to a small, temporary room. That’s when the check-in and preliminaries began.

      The very small room had the basic vitals-monitoring equipment, yet it was crammed with only a gurney on which to lie down. This was to be my interim room, as no hospital room was available at the time. In other words, I’d need to stay in the room to be examined and medicated. By 4:00 a.m., the pain and fever had increased so that I was extremely uncomfortable, while the hard, metal gurney added to my increasing discomfort. My back was now hurting so I couldn’t find a tolerable position. In the meantime, my blood was taken for routine blood chemistries.

      Later, technicians took several chest X-rays and a magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scan to view the colon. I had to take the fluorescent orange-colored viscous liquid for the contrast agent, and a hell of a lot of it. I think about half a gallon made me nauseous, yet I drank the disgusting stuff; a chilled dye, I’m sure, as if being chilled would mask the bitter, downright disgusting taste.

      By around 7:00 that morning, the attending emergency doctor confirmed a high white blood count and diverticulitis, a right inguinal hernia, and other superfluous conditions. A male nurse, close to my height but about twenty pounds heavier, started to add morphine to the IV for my pain and discomfort. Quickly, I asked him the dosage. He related four milligrams, and I immediately asked him to lower it to two milligrams, as I had an overactive immune system and had no desire to be comatose. He granted my request. It should be noted

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