The Beginning Of My Time

Reno, 2019
St. Mary’s Hospital

On the other side of the large hospital windows, the city looked dim, almost as if a dark filter covered everything. I was on the 17th floor of Methodist Memorial Hospital, awake in the middle of the night. I realized I was in the hospital. 

Again, I found myself confronting this reality.

Inside my hospital room, sounds and lights were muted. The strong smell of antiseptic made me feel as if I had been sprayed with pesticides. Maybe, in a metaphorical way, I was.

In crisp sheets, I listened to the never-ending low whir of a machine. For a heartbeat, I could not remember my name, the city I lived in, or the people beside me. I was surrounded by unknown faces, sterile walls, and a pervasive sense of not belonging to myself. In that silent, fragile moment, I realized how entirely helpless I was—

The thought trailed off, and I forgot what I was thinking about. 

A person with long dark hair lies in a hospital bed, resting their head on a white pillow, wearing a hospital wristband and looking at the camera with a slight smile.

All this I know because writing is another addiction. My words were jumbled, but now I can piece together what happened in my mind. 

I have hemochromatosis, a genetic defect that causes excessive iron build-up in my body. Months before my stay at Methodist Memorial, this overload damaged my organs and ruptured my gallbladder. After an emergency call and several hours, I regained consciousness in St. Mary's Medical Center, without my gallbladder. Although I recognized I was in a hospital, nothing else was familiar.

Who am I? Where do I live? Who are these people in this bright, sterile room? I could not remember or recognize them, but I felt safe. The vulnerability I experienced remains vivid. My memories were blank. The quiet kindness of the nurses and the gentle pressure of a friend's hand gave me brief reassurance.

There was one morning, just before sunrise, when I awoke as a nurse quietly straightened my sheets. For a brief moment, surrounded by the hum of machines and distant hallway footsteps, I sensed I was not only lost, but that my fear was just as much about letting go of control as it was about memory itself.

After my discharge from St. Mary’s, I stayed with friends and moved often. Their concern was obvious, even when I could not feel much. Fear overshadowed everything. My mind felt fragile. Vodka was the only way I felt secure or alone. When physicians revoked my driver’s license, friends took me to appointments, the grocery store, and the Sierra Hot Springs. I could not travel alone. I knew I could not rely on them forever, but I had no alternatives.

In uncertainty, I tried to hold onto small routines. On good days, folding laundry or watering a plant felt like real accomplishments. Sometimes, a friend and I would knit together in silence. The repetitive motion brought brief peace. 

IN LIMBO IN RENO

A few weeks after surgery, with friends, I tried to build a new routine: walking along the Truckee River and photographing nature. Sometimes, viewing these images brought fleeting peace. Still, I felt isolated, without support or connection. My personal story seemed distant, like fiction I’d authored. No one remained to help reconstruct my memories.

Initially, I discovered old diaries filled with my handwriting. It was both disorienting and strangely intimate to read my own words, evidence of a self I could not remember. As I unearthed more, I learned that I had published three romance novels, that I hold a degree in Creative Arts, and an MFA in Critical Research. I once owned an art gallery in Genoa—waves of bewilderment, sadness, and curiosity often mingled together. At the age of twenty, I traveled alone to Prague during winter. Each memory felt like a message from a stranger and, at the same time, a fragile lifeline. 

REDISCOVERING MYSELF THROUGH WRITING

After finding my diaries and piecing together my past, I turned to writing without thinking. It became a way to survive. I saw that I had been writing about my life since I was about five.

I married my son's father at twenty-two. My mother, who meant everything to me, died when I was seventeen. Meeting J. changed my life. He was ten years older and already settled. I let myself become part of his world.

Gradually, I realized I had returned to Trinidad, California, in Humboldt County. I immersed myself in my mother’s letters to her own mother. I read handwritten notes, typed pages, and many descriptions of myself. Each piece revealed my mother’s elegant writing and helped me discover my own identity.

Despite uncovering family history and personal memories in Reno, I remained uncertain about the future. Lacking clear options, some months after my initial hospitalization, I accepted a friend’s offer to use his Burning Man trailer. There, surrounded by dust, I contemplated what the future might hold. But the only future I could understand was a world with me no longer in it. 

I do not recall how I financed my vodka purchases, and I am grateful for this paticular absence of memory.

LIFE AFTER THE EVENT

Support arrived unexpectedly later that year when David, a lifelong friend from Texas, came to Northern Nevada and picked me up. With just a few boxes that I’d managed to hold onto, we ventured southeast. David brought me to Texas. Dallas. Previously, Texas was merely a place I had seen through an airplane window. 

Now, here on the ground, the landscape felt daunting, strange, and lonely. I wondered what it would mean to begin again in an unfamiliar place, to build new routines and connections from nothing, and whether I could find even a small sense of belonging.

Many photos of my childhood show me at the lighthouse, where my father sold his photos. I am a small girl standing in the fog and ocean air.

I still don’t feel I belong anywhere aside from the Northern California Coast. One day, I’ll be back there, listening to the ocean waves sliding across the sand of Trinidad's tranquil coast. 

More information about Michelle can be found at  Medium and Hachette Publishing. 

For consults about amnesia, email Michelle at michelle@michelleokane.org.
@akafeisty.com

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