Chapter 11 KAY’LO MENSAH
The Lotus Mind Center
To be honest… I ain’t know how the fuck I felt about comin’ to therapy.
The month went by slow as hell and fast at the same time, and every week when me and Toni pulled up to this shit, I felt my abs get tight, like part of me wanted to get out the car and part of me wanted to turn around and act like none of this shit was ever a problem.
I kept tellin’ myself I ain’t belong in no place like this, but after everything that happened between me and my wife, I knew I couldn’t keep pretendin’ like I was fine.
I wasn’t fine. Toni knew it too. She held my hand every time we walked in here, and even if I ain’t say shit about it, her hand was the only thing keepin’ me grounded.
The buildin’ was laid back and bright every time we came.
Plants was everywhere with soft music playin’.
White folks was in the lobby was whisperin’ like they ain’t want nobody to know they had problems. And then there was me.
Kay’Lo Mensah, sittin’ on a couch that cost too much money, feelin’ out of place as fuck while Toni stayed right next to me, squeezin’ my fingers like she was lettin’ me know that no matter how weird this shit felt, she was here.
We had been seein’ Dr. Mariah Ellington for four weeks now.
She was a Black woman with calm eyes and a soft voice that kinda irritated me at first, only ‘cause she ain’t look scared of me or confused by me.
She talked to me like she already understood parts of me I never even said out loud.
She ain’t push too hard, yet she always asked the kind of questions that made my skin get hot, ‘cause she could see shit I ain’t want her to see.
Some days I barely talked. Toni would pick up where I left off, explain what nights looked like for us, explain the arguin’ and the mood swings, explain the times she woke up and I wasn’t in the bed no more.
She told her about how I paced through the house at three in the mornin’ talkin’ to myself, talkin’ to thoughts that came and went too fast for me to catch.
Sometimes I would snap, sometimes I would zone out so far that my whole body felt disconnected from everything around me, and Toni would touch me just to bring me back.
She held my hand while she talked every time. She kissed the back of it on days when she could feel I was about to shut down. And Dr. Ellington paid attention to everything, her eyes movin’ between us like she was buildin’ a full picture in her mind.
Today was different though. Today was the day she told us what she had been workin’ on.
She waited until we both sat down, then took a breath like she wanted to make sure she chose the right words.
She folded her hands in her lap and looked straight at me, not scared or pityin’ me, but just lookin’ at me like I deserved answers.
“I wanted to take this month slowly,” she said, “because it was important not to rush or label anything too quickly. We ran the psychological assessments, and we tracked your symptoms over the last four weeks. Now that I have a full picture, I want to talk to you about what we’re seeing.”
I leaned back on the couch. I ain’t say nothin’. I didn’t trust myself to.
Toni slid her hand across my thigh and rested it there.
Dr. Ellington kept her voice calm.
“You’re not crazy, Kay’Lo,” she said. “Nothing about what you’re experiencing makes you less of a man or less in control of your life. What you’re dealing with is something many people deal with, and the good news is there are ways to treat it.”
My chest felt tight, like her words was pressin’ on parts of me nobody ever touched before.
“We’re looking at something called schizoaffective disorder,” she said gently.
“It means you have mood episodes, like depression or elevated energy, and you also have symptoms that fall on the schizophrenia spectrum. The combination can make your thoughts feel loud or scattered. It can make your emotions jump from overwhelmed to shut down. It can make you hear your thoughts in a way that feels like they’re not yours.
It can make the world feel too loud or too quiet.
It can make stress hit you harder than it hits other people. ”
I stared at her. I didn’t react, but my jaw clenched a lil’.
Toni’s fingers stroked my knuckles slow, like she knew that first part hit me somewhere deep.
“It doesn’t mean you’re broken,” Dr. Ellington continued.
“It means your brain processes the world differently. You’ve been living with this for a very long time.
Probably since childhood. You weren’t diagnosed because you learned how to push through it, and because nobody around you ever looked close enough to understand what was happening. ”
That part made somethin’ in my chest pull tight.
Childhood.
Yeah…There was a lot of shit I pushed down from back then.
“So what do that mean?” I asked ‘cause I needed her to get to the point.
“It means we can treat it,” she said simply.
“There are medications that help stabilize mood and quiet intrusive thoughts. One of the first-line medications we use for people with both mood symptoms and schizophrenia-spectrum symptoms is called Latuda. It helps regulate the chemical imbalance that’s causing the emotional swings and the racing thoughts.
Sometimes we also use a mood stabilizer alongside it, depending on how severe the episodes are. ”
Toni squeezed my hand harder and kissed my knuckles. Her eyes was full of this gentle pride I ain’t understand, like me sittin’ here and listenin’ made her love me even deeper.
“Baby, this don’t make you nothin’ but human,” she whispered. “You still my man. You still strong as hell. This just somethin’ that been on your back for years, and now you finally got a name for it.”
I shook my head slow ‘cause even though all the shit she was sayin’ made sense, it didn’t feel real yet.
“You tellin’ me I been like this since a kid?” I asked the doctor.
She nodded.
“You learned how to survive it,” she said.
“You learned how to push through without ever understanding that the pain, the fear, the anger, the confusion… none of that was your fault. Your brain got overwhelmed, and you did what you had to do to keep moving. But it doesn’t have to be that way anymore. ”
My stomach twisted. Not from fear or anger. Just… realization, like somethin’ heavy finally slid into place inside me.
She handed me a small packet of papers.
“This is your treatment plan,” she said.
“We’ll start with the Latuda. One pill a day with food.
It can help calm the racing thoughts and stabilize your moods.
It won’t change who you are. It won’t take away your personality.
It will just help you feel like you’re not fighting your own mind anymore. ”
I ain’t say shit for a minute. I couldn’t.
Toni leaned into me and kissed my cheek soft.
“It’s okay, baby,” she said. “You not alone in this.”
I let out a breath I ain’t know I was holdin’, then nodded once.
It wasn’t ’cause I fully understood this shit or that I fully accepted it. But ‘cause I trusted Toni, and I trusted the fact that whatever this was, it finally made sense.
When we left the office, Toni held my hand the whole walk to the car. She kept lookin’ at me like she was proud of me, and that look alone made somethin’ warm settle in my heart.
We drove to the pharmacy. I ain’t say much, and she didn’t force me to.
When the pharmacist handed me the bag with the prescription in it, Toni smiled at me like it was the first step toward breathin’ again.
“Baby,” she said as she buckled her seatbelt, “you ain’t crazy. You just finally got help for somethin’ you been carryin’ too long.”
I looked at her, then at the bottle, then back at her again. I shook my head a lil’ and tried to lighten it.
“Shit,” I said, “I might be crazy, but I’m crazier for you.”
She laughed, leaned across the console, and kissed me slow.
“Then take the damn pill so you can stay here with me,” she whispered against my lips.
I held the bottle in my hand, feelin’ the weight of it, and feelin’ the weight of everything we been through this past month, and for the first time in my life, I ain’t feel alone in my mind.
I had her…
And maybe, for the first time, I had a real chance at bein’ okay.
Trill-Land, Jungle Estate
Later that evenin’ I slid over to Pressure’s crib feelin’ a way I ain’t felt in a long time.
My head wasn’t heavy, my chest wasn’t tight and my thoughts wasn’t racin’ in ten different directions like they usually did.
It was like all the noise that used to crowd up my mind had finally quieted down, and even though I wasn’t fully used to that silence yet, the shit felt good. Shit felt strange, but it felt good.
I pulled through the gate and drove around the big circular driveway, lookin’ at all the lights glowin’ across the mansion like always, and for the first time in weeks I ain’t feel dread creepin’ up in my stomach.
I ain’t feel like somethin’ bad was waitin’ for me at every corner.
I ain’t feel the weight I had been carryin’ around since I was a kid.
Toni told me the medicine might take a lil’ minute to settle, but I took my first pill earlier and by the time I hit the steps, it was like I could breathe for real.
Pressure must’ve seen my car on the cameras, ‘cause the front door was already cracked open by the time I reached it. I walked in and went down the hall to the game room. They had the music, cards on the table, and smoke cloudin’ the space up real chilled.
Renza was talkin’ loud like always, his laugh bouncin’ off the walls while he slapped a card down and pointed at Pressure like he was cheatin’.
Pressure was sittin’ back in his chair with a blunt hangin’ from his lips, lookin’ annoyed but cool at the same time.
“Took yo’ ass long enough,” Renza said when I stepped in.