Manic Marti (Part 2)

I get along really well with kids. They gravitate towards me. I think it’s because they enjoy feeling seen and understood. Also, when I’m manic I’m basically an oversized 6-year-old.

There were these two kids who’d play at the park I lived near almost everyday, and soon, we became friends. I brought toys and candy for them, and a lot of the neighborhood kids would join in. We’d play tag and lava, and mostly just chase each other around. All the parents would stand nearby and watch, and to this day I wonder what they were thinking. That was the weird thing about my mania. Whenever kids were around I became the ideal baby sitter- very responsible and fun. I had a lot of energy, but I didn’t give off any dangerous vibes. One day I was playing with the kids, and I noticed a a group of guys I had never met before standing with one of the Dad’s. His friend introduced me afterward, and I immediately did what I was doing with all the adults I was meeting at the time- Uber drivers included- I whipped out my phone and played them my favorite song.

Now imagine you meet an adult woman whose still sweating from being the Swamp Monster, and the first thing she does is whip out her phone and insist you listen to a song. It’s a little weird, right? The other guys shifted uncomfortably and started talking amongst themselves, not really paying attention. But one of them was different. He stood there, quietly, and listened to the entire song. (The song is Colors, by Black Pumas. I highly recommend looking it up.) It was my mantra at the time, a beautiful, soulful song tinged with sadness and all things human. This person, whoever he was, understood that.

His name was Guillermo.

We parted ways, and the next day, as I was walking Penny at the the park, I stumbled into him again. He gave me half his cheeseburger.

We’ve been together ever since.

It sounds like a joke, but we really HAVE been together since that moment. That day we talked for hours, until it got dark. Usually darkness is a sign to head indoors, especially for this particular neighborhood, but we started walking around the park instead, loop after loop, laughing and talking. I was telling him about a tattoo I wanted to get on my shoulder- a crescent moon with a star, inspired by Pan’s Labyrinth- and we looked up into the sky… there was my tattoo! The exact image. That was enough for me. I invited him in to my apartment… and there he stayed, living with me for the next 6 months, until he moved to Alaska with me in July. SIX months. Of living with Manic Marti. I still don’t know how we did it.

Something very important to consider here is the time. We met at the end of January 2020- about a month before Covid. That’s right, we quarantined together, too. So it wasn’t enough that I was manic, the entire world was about to go into crises mode. This is also about the time I lost my phone. I was posting excessively on social media at the time (it was how I helped convince myself I wasn’t alone) and then all the sudden- I was gone. But I wasn’t alone. Guillermo gave me what I needed- he saw me. He treated me like a normal person, and he listened to me. Talk. Constantly, non-stop. But he didn’t mind. He wanted to understand me. I read him my journals, showed him my play collection… I even gave him a play to read- a Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams. He actually read it. He fed me when I didn’t want to eat. It wasn’t just a sex thing, either. We waited a long time before doing anything intimate. Most of the time he just held me. I have no idea where I would be right now if I hadn’t met Guillermo. But it wasn’t all tacos and play-reading. Manic or not, I’m not a picnic to live with, and Covid in a big city like LA didn’t help either. In the six months before leaving that apartment, I got several notices about being evicted,(Thanks Covid) I spent two weeks in a mental hospital, AND I was arrested and thrown in jail for 3 days.

But somehow, we got through it all… and continue to, to this day.

Have you ever noticed that there’s certain people, situations, or environments where you feel more comfortable being yourself? For me, that’s the hood, or ghetto. This might sound strange, but I appreciate how real everything is. People aren’t wasting their money on $8 lattes. They’re working hard to take care of themselves and their families. Simply put, living is about survival. At the same time, it’s also about celebrating and appreciating life without needing to spend a whole ton of money. You appreciate the home-cooked food, the live music, and the company, which to me makes so much more sense. As a survivor myself, I feel at home when I’m surrounded by people who just get it. There’s less judgement. Less censoring. Less prejudice. Often, the hood can be safer to live in because thief’s often like to target rich neighborhoods instead. My car AND my apartment got broken into while living in Los feliz (a trendy neighborhood in Hollywood) … WHILE I was still inside. Up until I became manic, the neighborhood I was living in was the perfect place for me. It was a small pocket of Highland Park that had somehow protected itself from a lot of the gentrification that was happening, and was truly a special place. I loved buying a giant bag of fresh fruit with Tajín, or raspado from the hardworking man who pushed his cart down our street everyday. I got to know a lot of my neighbors. I showed respect to the streets by simply minding my own business. Of course, things changed once I was manic.

I was suddenly attracting a lot of attention to myself. When I said I’d invite anyone over I mean ANYONE- I started getting a reputation for taking care of people who were homeless, and I let anyone who didn’t have access to a shower use my bathtub. Covid was in full swing at this point, and a lot of people were desperate. I started getting close with some local gang members, and let them chill at my place. This is about when the phone calls to the police started to happen. I started getting visited by the cops two, three times a week. Once, a girl even came at me with a bat on the street. People assume I can’t fight, and it always amuses me. I remember her screaming,

“Who are you? Who do you think you are?!” before calming responding, ‘My name is Marti, and you’re blocking the gate to the apartment I live in.’ I then pinned her to the ground without hitting her. I didn’t want to fight. But I wouldn’t let anyone intimate me or boss me around, either, no matter how ‘respected’ they were in the streets.

The thing about thugs, gangsters, and addicts, is this: Darkness is what they know, so they embrace and learn to live with it. For me, my darkness has always been something I’ve tried to push down and suppress. It felt good to be around others who didn’t care what people thought, and embrace the parts of me that had kept me alive. However… darkness is darkness for a reason. I have a lot of discomfort about kids embracing the ‘hoodlife’ because of how glamorized it is in pop culture. I know that’s not new, but it bothers me how a lot of people don’t understand that this lifestyle is rarely a choice.

One night one of the homies and I rode our bikes to a 711 around midnight. I remember swinging open the door and immediately felt something was wrong. I looked at the young cashier, a nice guy who I had gotten to know over the months. He was standing behind the register in front of two customers whose faces I couldn’t see.

The cashier didn’t say a word- his eyes spoke instead. GET OUT, his brown eyes demanded. So naturally, I went inside.

I walked right up to the register so I was standing next to the two guys. Now I understood- one of them had a gun. They were trying to rob my friend. I pretended not to notice.

“Hi ——-!’ I said. Got any of the good chips today?” He stared at me as if I was crazy. So did the two thugs. even my friend had sensed what was up and bounced. There were a couple other people in the gas station, but they were frozen in the back of the store, staring at me. I then proceeded to walk to the chip aisle, grabbed my bag, and stood behind the confused gangbangers, humming as if waiting for them to compete their transaction. One of my favorite survival strategies is confusing the hell out of people. They ended up grabbing a bunch of the snacks at the counter and leaving without paying. But they didn’t demand any money. Before they left, one of them turned to me. All I could see were his eyes underneath the mask.

“I’ll be seeing you very, very soon.”

He then looked me up and down, then left. That night, I was a hero. The cashier and his Dad (the manager or owner of the store) were very grateful and took care of me after that night. One of the customers frozen in the back even bought me a Four Loco. But I couldn’t forget the way that one robber looked at me. The next time I saw him, I did recognize him, from just his eyes alone.

He remembered me, too.

By April 2020, I has been manic for more than 6 months. At this point the heightened energy, never-ending creativity, and zero control over my impulses had started to feel like normal, everyday life. I had been without my phone for about 3 months, and had zero contact with the ‘real world.’ Covid was the only reason I wasn’t homeless. It wasn’t a good time. Mania brings out all my unresolved anger, and I was getting in fights constantly. The cops were making frequent visits to my apartment, and one night, after trying to block them in my living room with a chair, they took me to a mental hospital. I remember feeling extremely uncomfortable in the backseat of the cop car.

“Excuse me,’ I asked. But why is there no cushioning back here?”

“So people won’t hurt themselves,”the cop replied.

I still don’t see how a pillow or two could do too much damage.

“Where are you taking me? I can’t really stay too long, I have a dog.”

“We’re going to a doctor. They’re just going to do a check up.”

“Oh. Okay. Thanks for letting me know. Sorry I tried to trap you in my living room.”

“That’s okay. We understand.”

You would think after this (rather funny) exchange I would have known they were taking me to a psychiatric hospital, but I truly had no idea. Good thing, too. I would have charged them like a bull. But these two police officers knew me on a first name basis at that point and actually cared.

We got to the hospital and they walked me in handcuffs to a small holding room. They had me take my clothes off and put them in a bag. I knew something was wrong when I asked when I’d be getting them back. The police officer looked away and mumbled something about ‘whenever I got discharged.’

“Discharged?’ I asked. ‘I thought you said this was a check up?”

He didn’t answer and left the room. That was the last time I saw him. They laid me down on a bed, with only sheets separating me from other patients in the holding room. The lady next to me was crying and screaming. She was on a bad drug trip and wasn’t making a lot of sense. The orderly’s in the room were basically ignoring her, a couple of them were actually chuckling at the bizarre things she was saying. After a few minutes, I couldn’t stand it anymore.

“Hey, it’s okay.” I told her through the sheet. “I’m here, I’m listening. Drugs are a bitch, aren’t they?”

She stopped crying and hiccuped. She didn’t respond, but she was listening, so I continued.

“You’re going to be okay. Take a few deep breaths, you’ll be out of here before you know it. My name is Marti, by the way.”

She told me her name. The male orderly couldn’t believe it.

“Hey, the two patients are having a moment,” he snickered rudely. I was livid.

“Ignore them. They mean well. They’re just tired, overworked, and undervalued.”

That shut him up. That actually made everyone a lot more civil, as a matter of fact. It’s insane how misunderstood we all are. Before they took me to my floor, I thanked the orderly who has been rude.

“Thank you for your hard work. I appreciate you.”

He looked away and mumbled, embarrased. They put me in a wheelchair, and to the top floor I went. Believe it or not, I still didn’t understand what was happening. I thought I was going to see a doctor, who was going to let me go. I’d be in bed with Penny and Guillermo in no time. So I was cooperative, friendly even, as they took me up the elevator. It wasn’t until I saw ‘my room’ that it hit me. I wasn’t leaving.

Suddenly, I couldn’t breathe. I looked at the nice lady who has showed me my room.

“No.. no.” I whispered. “You don’t understand. I can’t be here. This is by deepest fear.”

It was. For as long as I can remember, I’ve had nightmares about being admitted into a mental hospital. I started hyperventilating. I need to walk,’ I tried to explain, as I attempted to leave the room. ‘No,no,’ the orderly said worriedly. She called for back up. Before I knew it, I was cornered in my room by four giant men.

“I’m begging you,” I pleaded. “I just need to walk a little bit. Please. Don’t do this.”

I’ll never forget their eyes. So sad and apologetic. I tried to fight them off, but they quickly pinned me down. I screamed. They lifted up my hospital gown, and jabbed a needle underneath my ass. ‘No… no…’ I sobbed. Sadly, quietly, they left the room. The lady orderly started to leave also. It was policy that she stay in the room while the men held me down. ‘Don’t leave me,’ I begged drowsily.

The darkness was beginning to take hold. The last thing I saw was her pulling up a chair to the entryway of my room. She turned her back to me as I cried my way into a heavy, deep sleep.

When I woke up, I was in a completely new world.

Did I mention I was basically blind when I was committed? My glasses had just broken and I hadn’t put in my contacts yet. I have TERRIBLE vision. Imagine being taken to a mental hospital when you can’t even see!

My week in the psyche ward felt like a lifetime. It was one of the most challenging, eye- opening, and heartbreaking experiences of my life. It was also, at times, indescribably beautiful. I’ll do my best to summarize.

When I woke up, I was confused, drowsy, and barely conscious. I remember my first time walking into the dining area… I couldn’t see any faces, but I felt everyone staring at me. ‘There’s the one who was screaming last night and had to be put down.’ At least, that’s what I imagined they were thinking.

Eventually, I started to wake up a bit and gather information. At the minimum, I was going to be there three days. The psychiatrist who made the overall decision as to whether you could leave or not only saw you at night. Everyday there are groups, they are encouraged, but not mandatory. Medication is prescribed to you, however no one can force you to take it… Unless, of course, you are believed to be acting in a way that is unsafe to yourself or to others. Then you’ll get a shot that basically acts as a tranquilizer.

You get snack breaks, and every once in a while they’ll open the door so you have access to ‘the garden,’ a closed off patio with sunlight and some grass. I remember trying to work out every chance I got to be outside. I would do burpees on the grass patch as the other patients sat in the shade, watching and thinking, ‘oh she CRAZY.’

There’s a strange union that exists between patients in a mental ward. It reminds of when I worked at a drug and alcohol rehab as a yoga and reiki practitioner. Strangers of all ages from all kinds of different places are suddenly boxed together. A homeless lady with schizophrenia. A Korean teenager with Down syndrome. An Armenian thug with…. Issues. And me. I ended up getting really close with a few of the patients. It was hard not to. For many of us, we were all each other had. Covid had made it so that we couldn’t see any visitors, and we had limited access to a phone.

I remember feeling understood. I’m very grateful for my fellow patients for that.

Sadly, this wasn’t the case with most of the hospital staff. I must have gotten four or five involuntarily shots in the week or so that I stayed there. I remember once it was so bad they had to put the place in lockdown. The clients were sent to their rooms, and 4 or 5 men were brought from another floor for extra security. After they pinned me to my bed and injected me they locked me in my room, and I screamed my rights through the door until sleep finally took me.

It wasn’t all bad, though. I really liked the food. I often gave my dessert away to people who needed it more than I did. We’d have little menus, and every day we’d circle what we wanted to eat. It wasn’t until later I made the unfortunate discovery that laxatives are added to most of the food. But that didn’t stop me from eating. I did yoga while listening to TV in the recreation room. That didn’t last very long. Apparently it was a ‘distraction’ for the other clients who were men.

Sigh. Even in a mental ward.

I went to all of the groups. I wish I could say that I got a lot out of them. I will say this. It is extremely difficult to work in a mental hospital. It has to be one of the most challenging jobs. And that’s what makes it so important. My favorite group leader was a lady who didn’t talk down to us. She spoke as if we were ordinary, perfectly sane people. My least favorite was the stressed out yoga teacher who told me if I wasn’t going to do yoga exactly the way she was teaching it, I’d have to leave. I just wanted to stay in child pose…

I still don’t see what the big issue was.

Looking back, I'm very grateful for my time in the mental hospital. It was eye-opening in a way that made me realize that the system, especially when it comes to health care, is very, very flawed. Medication is distributed to patients as a way to sedate them instead of ‘healing’ them. That's because when it comes down to it, medication can't solve anything. It's a bandaid that causes people to rely on a daily dose instead of looking at what the core issues are. It is necessary? Sure, especially if you feel that it helps you. But I believe that self-work, therapy, and above all, practicing compassion, are equally if not more important when treating a person with mental health issues.

Only a few days after being released I was arrested. This time, they took my ass straight to jail. I'm not going to go into detail about WHY I was arrested... Let's just say it was very, very dumb. You'll just have to wait for my book. But what I CAN say, is that I was taken to jail in a white bikin... Right before starting my period. Something you may have noticed about my life, is that no matter what - it's not boring.

I wish I could tell you that my three days in jail were no big deal... But, man. Speaking of messed up systems. At times I was treated so terribly, you would think it was a movie. But it wasn't. It was real life.

They put me in solitary confinement, and there I stayed. There was nothing to do but sit, and wait. I cried most of the time. One guard brought me a Bible. Another grimaced at the smell of blood from being trapped in a tiny cell with me on my period.

At the end of the third day (it was impossible to tell whether it was day or night because of the unchanging fluorescent lights) I was transported from my cell to a bus of mostly men. We were being taken to the courthouse. During the bus ride, the men hooted and hollered at me. I was not in the mood, and after kindly telling them to SHUT THE FUCK UP, they did. I was then taken to a holding cell with about 5 other women. We were all there for different crimes. In my cell, there was a woman arrested for assisting a murder. The others were a mix of domestic violence and I think there was also a car thief. The guard told us we would be called to court one by one. Some of us would be seen by the judge and some wouldn't, but they wouldn't tell us who.

So we all had to wait... Together. For 6 hours.

This was not a fun time.

There was a high-strung white lady who suggested we do a prayer circle. Why not, I thought. So four of us sat cross-legged in a circle, and we took turns praying out loud. When it was my turn, ‘Dear God...’ was as far as I got. The door swung open and a guard stepped into the room. The girl who had been arrested for assisting a murder was called to court. She was a gorgeous latino lady, and she looked terrified. She left, and everyone in the room stared at me. A black girl who had already decided she didn't like me, said,

“You got some dark energy. You see what just happen when you started to pray?”

I remember really wanting to punch her.

After only a few minutes, the Latina lady came back in tears. She wouldn't tell us what happened, except that she wasnt leaving for another month... most likely until her next court date. I held her hand as she cried.

The door swung open again, and the guard stepped into the room. “MALEY!” she barked. I felt my throat tighten. I followed her out of the cell, and she put me in handcuffs. She took me into another cell, and there I waited. Soon, two other women joined me. They handcuffed us together, so the three of us were attached. Then, we were put in an elevator, and released. Just like that. I remember feeling so shocked and confused as they took the handcuffs off.

“Wait... I can go? What about my clothes? Also, I have no phone, how am I supposed to get home?”

The didn't answer, just opened the door, and almost pushed me outside.

And there I was, blinded by the sun in Downtown LA, still wearing my prison scrubs.

I was free.

April 2020 was, without question, the most horrific month of my life. In less than a month I had been committed to a mental hospital for a week, AS WELL as getting arrested and spending 3 days in jail. After (rather appropriately) getting released on May 5th, Cinco De Mayo; I sank into the worst depressive episode of my life. It was inevitable. What goes up, must also come down... It's like physics in that sense. My manic episode lasted more than half a year. That is an unusually long period for a person to experience mania. Naturally, my Depression came with a vengeance.

In a way, transitioning from mania to depression felt like going to the movies. One moment you're engaged and enraptured in a

Mind-blowing adventure...

... And then- blink.

The credits roll.

The lights come up.

And all of the sudden you're back to reality. Back to the life you briefly got to escape.

That's what it felt like for me. I suddenly became very aware of the financial mess I was in. I hadn't paid rent for the last 5 months. The only reason I hadn't been evicted was because of Covid, but my manager was determined to get me out regardless. I remember the day I got back from jail and walked into my apartment. It didn't feel like home anymore. It wasn't. Suddenly I didn't want to go out. I didn't want to drink, or party.

I wanted to hide.

I wanted to disappear.

I no longer wanted to exist.

It was obvious.

I needed to get the hell out of California.

And just like that, the life I had created in LA- almost seven years of collected furniture, books, plays, fun clothing, costumes, treasures, letters- EVERYTHING I owned- went into the dumpster. I'm not exaggerating- I even threw away the journals I've kept since I was a child. That's my biggest regret, I think.

I literally threw my life away.

The funny thing is, I didn't even shed a tear. I would take a shot of Jose, then drag my overflowing hamper to the dumpster, where I’d fling all the beautiful and unique pieces of my life. I have a vivid memory of staring at my self-love and dream journals sinking into a pile of eggshells and coffee grounds. It still hurts my heart thinking about it.

In the moment, however, I barely felt a thing. Like most victims of trauma, I'm a Master Compartmentalizer. Whatever pain came up I buried with all my belongings in that dumpster. I didn't want to donate, sell, or give anything away. I wanted to purge.

I created a Funeral for my LA life.

In July 2020 I flew to Alaska - my home state- with what mattered most: my dog, Guillermo, and a single suitcase.

My parents agreed to let us live in an unfinished house that was in the process of getting remodeled for an Air B&B, about 45 minutes away from my childhood home, in Palmer, Alaska. Ah...Palmer. The town is SMALL, even more so than the one I grew up in, and the house was remote, truly in the middle of nature. I was very, very depressed.

This was last summer.

In my mind, I had just said goodbye to my Dreams and was now living in the last place my childhood self wanted to be- cold, lonely, Alaska.

Surprisingly, living in a house that needed work was therapeutic. Guillermo and I put down the floors together. We put cabinets in. We slept on a mattress on the floor, and heated cans of soup on the wood stove. It was the polar opposite of living on the streets of Highland Park. Now we were learning to survive on a mountain. Lazy Mountain to be exact. In hindsight, it was probably the best place to be depressed. Being secluded in complete and total nature is very special. It also reminded me of who I am:

A wild woman.

A survivor.

And a big ol’ hippie.

The months went by slowly, but come Spring of 2021... I was starting to feel like myself again. I was teaching yoga, practicing reiki, and guiding meditation. I found kind and welcoming communities in my Crossfit Gym and Yoga Studio’s. I started dancing again.

I came back to myself.

And now, as Winter approaches, I am here. Writing and creating for the first time in years. What a reminder. Being an artist isn't something you can just ‘give up,’ or ‘quit.’

Being an Artist is simply Being who you are.

This January will be the 3rd anniversary of my Bipolar Diagnosis. It feels more like 30 years.

I hope that by sharing my story you feel seen in some way. Bipolar or not, mental health is crucially important to every single one of us- it's just not as obvious as say, a broken arm, or a Cancer Diagnosis. I guess that's what makes mental health so difficult. People often have a hard time believing what they can't see. But this whole ‘suffering in silence’ thing... Can't we all just suffer together? Maybe if we talked more openly about all the scary stuff inside our heads we’d realize that opening up and sharing isn't just venting…

It's therapy.

Author’s note:

Thank you very much for reading my story. If you haven’t yet, please read Part 1. If you resonate with either part, please like, subscribe, and share. You can also follow me on Facebook and Insta: @msmartimaley 💛