Mainline Spring 2018 by Dianne Heimer

MAINLINE

SPRING 2018

BASEBALL IN THE BLOOD

BATTLING BIPOLAR

SPRING CLEANING A COLLECTION OF STORIES FROM UNDER THE RUG

ONE HELL OF A DATE

LAYING HER TRAUMA BARE

SIGNS OF IMPROVEMENT

DEAR READER, In the summer of 2014, I found myself in a rural hospital in India with a persistent case of food poisoning. This is a gross story, but bear with me. A doctor ordered a specimen sample, handing me a plastic container the size of a pill bottle. I found myself in a bathroom not up to my usual hygiene standards. That’s fine, I figured. I can manage. But there was no soap, no toilet paper, no clean water. And to boot, I hadn’t had a productive experience in a water closet for a number of days. This was my very first stool sample experience, and I wanted it to go well, so I decided to be very deliberate with my next few actions. I uncapped the jar and tucked it up as flush as possible. I strained for the next couple of minutes, until I made some results. About a centimeter of results. Then, I took out the tiny pocket notebook I’d been using to record my trip and ripped out three pages. I meticulously used every inch of those waxy, cheap pieces of paper in a way they were not intended. And I made it out of that room with a story to tell.

As silly as that story is, it’s still not easy for me to tell it. Getting sick 9,000 miles away from home was terrifying. It forced me to handle a smack of hardship, and I wanted to tell a story that’s hard for me to share. I may not have a lot of experience with adversity, but the stories contained in these pages are steeped in it. These stories are ignored by society, seldom told, and some are painful to share. They’re about people struggling to come back, to survive, to find acceptance. And unlike the story of my quest to keep my hands clean, these stories will leave a good taste in your mouth. Enjoy.

Maxfield Morris Editor-in-Chief Spring 2018

Photo by Vanessa S. Nelson IV

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CONTENTS

HOME TEAM ADVANTAGE Like father, like son: Life on the mound.

FLIRTING WITH THE DEVIL Memories of an unbelievable encounter.

LEARNING TO FEEL AGAIN A photoshoot celebrating recovery from abuse.

SPREADING THE WORD Bridging the gap between the deaf and hearing worlds.

I AM NOT MY DISEASE One manâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s fight for mental health treatment. SPRING 2018 | MAINLINE

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TEA E M

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A grueling battle with cancer abruptly derailed the playing days of former City College pitcher Danny Chavez, Sr. But he was granted a second chance to reconnect with the game, coaching his son, Danny, Jr., and passing down lessons on pitching and perspectives on life.

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Danny, Sr. says this year has been one of the best times he’s ever had, especially considering that his life was nearly cut short before he ever got to this point. DANNY, SR. GREW UP PLAYING

EVERY BASEBALL PLAYER HAS A SIMILAR DREAM: FOR HIS SON TO GROW UP PLAYING BASEBALL, FOLLOWING IN HIS FOOTSTEPS.

Imagine that you’re a former ballplayer who’s now a new father to a little boy. From the moment you introduce him to a small white leather ball with 108 red stitches, anticipation builds until the day he discovers he can catch a soft underhand toss from just a few feet away. It builds from the moment the boy awkwardly holds a wiffle ball bat in his hands, not quite sure how to stand, until the moment he can consistently hit line drives in the batting cage. It builds from the moment you squat down in a catcher’s position, hopeful that your little ace will throw a perfect strike in the front yard. “Just focus on the glove, son.” He winds. He fires. Then the anticipation momentarily halts when you realize that you should’ve positioned yourself away from the front window. “Don’t worry, buddy. We’ll keep practicing.” THAT FEELING OF ANTICIPATION

and pride is a familiar one for former City College pitcher Danny Chavez, Sr. Now an assistant coach for the Panther baseball team, Chavez, Sr. has four children and has coached his oldest son, Danny, Jr., all the way through high school and now for City College. Danny, Jr. is a starting pitcher, just like his father, for a baseball team that is a serious contender in 2018. 4

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baseball at Grant Union High School in Del Paso Heights, winning a section championship in 1989, before going on to pitch at City College. He then coached varsity baseball at Grant for 10 years from 2008–2017, including the years that Danny, Jr. attended the school. While at Grant, he also coached his nephews Polo and Luciano Portela, who both have City College ties. Current City baseball coach Derek Sullivan was well aware of Danny, Sr.’s presence in the local baseball scene by the time Danny, Jr. came to City College during the 2016–17 school year. Danny, Jr. posted a 3.29 earned run average in nine appearances for the Panthers as a true freshman in 2017. Sullivan actually approached Danny, Jr. about potentially bringing his father onto the coaching staff for the 2018 season as an assistant pitching coach. “It was a slam dunk,” says Sullivan, who also played at City College from 2000–02. “He brings a heart and soul to the team. He fits right in. Everyone loves him. I think he gives our pitching staff an edge.” 2018 marks Danny, Sr.’s first year as an assistant coach for City College, and Danny, Jr. is thriving as a main component in the Panthers’ pitching rotation. Through midApril, Danny, Jr. is 4-0 in five starts with a 1.82 earned run average. Sullivan says that Danny, Sr. is the coach who always makes sure the team is staying loose, reminding them not to take things so seriously. “He brings another point of view,” explains Sullivan. “As head coach, I have to deal with all the nuts and bolts, but he’s a unique guy to have around with that experience. He brings perspective. He makes sure that the guys have fun, not like work. Danny’s a guy who’s lived it.” THE PERSPECTIVE OF WHICH

Sullivan speaks was born from survival.

In 1990, Chavez, Sr. pitched as a true freshman for a Panther team that reached the postseason under coach Jerry Weinstein. Chavez got the call to pitch in a regional playoff game against Chabot College. “That was really the last game that I ever pitched that meant something,” recalls Chavez. In the days following the Chabot game, life threw Chavez one of the biggest curveballs he’d ever have to take a swing at. Chavez felt well enough to practice, but something was off. After hanging up his No. 19 jersey, something told him he needed to pay a visit to the doctor’s office. After a number of blood tests, his primary doctor relayed that they’d found something serious and needed to run more tests. The results came back confirming that the 19-year-old Chavez had testicular cancer. “Everything comes crashing down,” says Chavez. “Whenever you hear the word ‘cancer,’ the first thing someone thinks about is death. This is it. There’s no curing that.”

L IK E FATH ER , L IK E S ON Danny Chavez, Jr. (right) wears No. 19 on his Sac City jersey in honor of his father, Danny, Sr. (left), pictured in 1990. The two also share a nearly identical windup. SPRING 2018 | MAINLINE

Playing baseball was all that Chavez ever wanted to do. He felt that with the lessons and experience he was earning at City College, he could’ve been on his way to a professional baseball career. But the diagnosis felt like he and his dream had struck out. Despite the new, devastating reality, baseball had already taught Chavez some great lessons and bestowed upon him an important life attribute. “You realize the game of baseball has trained you not only to compete in the game, but to compete in life. So, basically, I was going to compete for my life now,” says Chavez. “Baseball taught me to not give up. There’s always a chance if you’re willing to work hard and stay mentally positive.” Staying positive was not easy. For most cancer patients, chemotherapy is one of the most physically draining, mentally taxing and spiritually testing odysseys of a lifetime. Treatment was different in the early ’90s, says Chavez, Sr. He remembers staying a week at a time in the cancer ward as they administered what he called “poison” into his veins. He dropped 50 pounds in a matter of weeks. “It takes a lot out of you,” he says. He endured a total of seven Monday– Friday chemo sessions with two-week

You realize the game of baseball has trained you not only to compete in the game, but to compete in life. So, basically, I was going to compete for my life now.”

D U G OU T DA D A former City College pitcher (bottom left), Danny Chavez, Sr. has a wealth of experience to relay to the Panthers’ pitching staff, which includes Danny, Jr. (No. 19), who soaks in Danny Sr.’s advice between innings at a 2018 home game at Union Stadium (right).

breaks in between. Once chemo finished, he had to return every two weeks to check his white blood cell counts. Slowly, every two weeks became every month, then every other month, then every year. Danny, Sr., who turned 47 in February, has been cancer-free now for nearly 28 years. Most of his post-cancer life has been spent raising his children — Andrea, 21, Danny, Jr., 20, Alicia, 15, and Louie, 13 — who all know the story. It’s because of Danny, Sr.’s battle to survive that they have life in the first place. And now he gets to be back teaching the game he grew up loving. “If I didn’t have kids after (cancer), I don’t know if baseball would even be in my present,” says Danny, Sr. “Baseball is what we do. I never thought that tee-ball would be the reason why I’m coaching again. I’ve been coaching now for over 15 years. It’s been a real great ride.” MOST KIDS IN THIS GENERATION

might go with Derek Jeter, Mike Trout, Buster Posey or Jose Altuve as their favorite baseball player. Danny, Jr. has a different answer. “My dad is my favorite baseball player ever,” he says. “I remember being little and him just teaching me, being my coach. I would pass up opportunities to go to Major League Baseball games just to go watch him play at Land Park on Sundays and watch him pitch. He was my big leaguer my whole life. He still is.” Danny, Jr., who wears No. 19 on his cardinal and gold City College jersey in

honor of his father, approaches each day with a unique lens that helps him enjoy the game the way he feels it was meant to be played. “I’m here today because he survived,” says Danny, Jr. “Enjoy all of it because you don’t know when your last pitch is going to be. You go out one game, and the next thing you know, you’re fighting for your life. I just go out there, and I love every minute of it. I love having the family environment. My dad’s here. I love when my family’s here in the stands. I can just look up smiling and just enjoy it because I know that it can get taken away from me at any time. It really just helps

me be in the moment and play the game right. Just have fun. That’s the best way to play the game.” FROM GRANT HIGH TO CITY COLLEGE

and back again, the circle is complete. Danny, Sr.’s fight for his life is one he’ll never stop fighting, though it may take different forms. But he feels that in this moment in time, he has the upper hand. “I’m here 27, 28 years later, so I like to think I’m still winning,” he says. “I wouldn’t want to be nowhere else but here, back at Sac City, coaching again. I

can’t express what Sac City has given me baseball-wise and friendship-wise. We groom, as we always say, ‘City Guys,’ and I’ll always be a City Guy. Now my son is in his second year here, he’s going to know what it is to be a City Guy. That just gives me pride that he recognizes what it is with tradition and family.” With his son by his side, proudly wearing the same cardinal baseball cap with the gold ‘S’ on the front, Danny, Sr. shares his story. There’s a modesty in his demeanor and an appreciation in his eyes. Danny, Jr. holds the same gaze, ever mindful

of his father’s fight. He knows that he is the same age now that his dad was when he was originally diagnosed: way too young to suddenly have a death sentence hanging over your head. But Danny, Jr. also understands the perspective. Any pitch that he throws from here on out could be his last. His life could easily have never happened. He’s here to enjoy every moment life grants him. And after all, it’s not often one gets to suit up for the same team with their favorite baseball player. 1 SPRING 2018 | MAINLINE

THE

DEVIL

FLIRTING WITH HE’S HANDSOME, SHE’S NEW IN TOWN. COULD HE BE THE ONE?

AF IRS

PH O TOS

BY JA

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JAN E

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OCTOBER

1974

It took just one truckload to transport all of my belongings from Sacramento to Davis: clothes, a bed, a chest of drawers and a couple boxes of my belongings. I put everything away by suppertime. That year, everything had turned upside down, and I was surrounded by a vortex of activity. I turned 23, arrived in a new town, dove into a new job at UC Davis, and moved into a townhouse with a new roommate. I thought to myself, “The only thing I’m missing is a boyfriend.” Eager to get more involved in my new town, I was delighted when my roommate, Jackie, asked me to dye stage curtains for her play. She was staging “Dracula: A Musical Nightmare,” in the Old Silo building on campus. It was Saturday night, around 10 o’clock, when I drove to the local laundromat to dye the curtains. I hoped the place would be empty, but there was an older woman inside, folding her clothes. Rolling up the sleeves of my old gray sweatshirt, I shoved all the bulky material into a large washer, inserted quarters, and waited. When the tub filled up, I poured an entire box of gold dye into the washer and closed the lid. I settled into a chair to read an old magazine, when a handsome stranger appeared in the doorway. He wore a red plaid, button-up shirt underneath a tweed jacket and indigo Levis. He stood there momentarily, scoping out the room. He appeared to be looking for someone, or something.

SEPTEMBER 2016 I’m surfing the Internet on my laptop, not looking for anything in particular, just letting my curiosity lead me to unexpected places. I raise my gaze out the floor-toceiling windows, enjoying the view of our rhododendrons and raised garden beds; everything is green. Back on the laptop, I find a familiar, beige VW that pulls my memory back to my college years. 10

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12 AM LAUNDROM AT BEIGE VW BUG HANDCUFF S STRIPPED INTERIOR G I R L NE XT DO O R A 23-year-old Mary Jane stands in the yard, her Volkswagen parked in the background.

OCTOBER 1974 The man turned around and walked back to the parking lot, returning with a duffle bag full of clothes. When he strolled through the door, I noticed his blue eyes, his clean-shaven face and movie-star good looks. He’s tall and lean, and has the demeanor of a young professor. He also looked like a guy-friend I knew from high school. I ran my fingers through my shoulderlength, auburn hair, hoping to look presentable. I pretended to read the old magazine as I sized him up. He knelt down on the floor next to his duffle bag and meticulously examined each item of clothing. Whenever he found a soiled spot, he applied what appeared to be Fels Naptha Soap. I decided that a guy washing his own

clothes must not have a girlfriend. My eyes wandered from the stranger out to the parking lot, where I spotted a VW bug parked next to mine. I thought I was seeing double! The Beetle was beige with a sunroof, just like mine. It had a Utah license plate which even had two of my initials: MJ. I memorized the license plate: MJE052. The streetlights glowed on the side-by-side Volkswagens, and I realized it had to be the stranger’s car. My wash finished, and I pulled the wet mass from the washer and heaved it into a dryer. By this time, the older woman had gone, and the handsome stranger and I were left alone. “You have an unusually large wash load, and it’s very gold,” he said. “I’m dyeing stage curtains for my roommate who’s a drama major,” I said, as I fed quarters into the dryer. “I’m

“

THE HANDCUFFS?

I’M A LAW STUDENT.

DON’T WORRY,

I LOST THE KEY.

”

helping with her production, ‘Dracula: A Musical Nightmare.’” “I’m Chris Hagen, a law student,” he said, barely looking at me. “I’m new here in town.” His body language gave him a sensitive, non-threatening air. I found him easy to talk to despite his good looks, and I hoped he might be attracted to me — I certainly was to him. I plunged in. “I moved here last weekend after starting my new job at the Student Health Center,” I said, talking fast. “It’ll take time to make friends here. Do you dance? Davis has some wonderful restaurants. One of my favorites is The Brewster House. They serve a delicious broasted chicken. On weekends, late in the evening, they move the tables and chairs to one side to create a huge dance floor. You should see the crowd.” Inside I was kicking myself, but even though my eagerness showed, Chris still seemed interested in me. We kept talking. His intelligence became obvious as he chose his words carefully. We discussed fascinating subjects, such as running, music and even religion. His eyelids fluttered softly as he formed ideas into words. By midnight, my dryer had completed its cycle. Chris’ finished, too. Our timing seemed too good to be true. We walked out into the cool night air together, put our laundry in our Beetles, and stopped for a moment to stare at our twins.

“May I look inside your car?” he asked. “Of course.” I opened the driver’s side door, and he looked in at my red car seats and a clean interior. He then walked to the front of my car and motioned for me to open the trunk. We stood looking down at the crowbar, chains and spare tire. His asking to look in my trunk did seem a bit odd, but I thought it was cute that he showed an interest. I asked Chris if I could look in his car, and he opened up the passenger door for me. The inside of his Bug was stripped down to the metal — no fabric lined the walls, and the carpet and the passenger seat had been removed. I discovered a pair of handcuffs lying on the floor. At first I thought they were fake, but when I picked them up to get a closer look, I found they were real! I turned around to look at him and asked, “Why is your car all stripped out … and why the handcuffs?” “I like it that way,” Chris said. “The handcuffs? I’m a law student. Don’t worry, I lost the key.” I believed him, but the interior of his car bothered me. With the passenger seat

removed, where would I sit if he were to ask me out on a date? We stepped away from his car and looked up at the stars. The October air was wonderfully cool; the sky was clear. In the dim light, he looked at me and asked, “Can we continue our conversation at your house?” Hesitantly, I said, “Sure, but you can’t stay long, because I work in the morning, and I’ll be working every weekend.” We hopped into our cars and snaked through neighborhoods, heading to the end of our lonely street. As we parked our cars, I remembered that my roommate was spending the

T WIN B UGS Right: Mary Jane poses with a friend in front of her faithful VW Beetle. Above Right: The twin Volkswagen Mary Jane saw that night in 1974, now on display in the National Museum of Crime and Punishment in D.C. SPRING 2018 | MAINLINE

STO L EN B EET L E Old newspaper clippings saved from the Davis Tribune and the Woodland Democrat.

weekend in the Bay Area. It suddenly hit me that I’d brought a complete stranger home — and we were completely alone. “What the hell are you doing, Mary Jane?” I scolded myself. I didn’t know what else to do but invite him in. I thought it would be too awkward to turn him away. When I stepped into the house, Chris brushed past me and immediately began looking around. He walked into the kitchen while I stood in the middle of the living room, speechless. He was silent as he made his thorough inspection of the kitchen. I was glad we hadn’t left any knives out. I tried to lure him back into the living room to sit on the couch, but he seemed happy standing in the kitchen, so I just looked at him. His hair was combed flat except for a few rebellious curls, and it was very dark, and all one color, as if it had been recently dyed. I was growing increasingly nervous not knowing what to say or do, so I babbled, hoping he’d turn back into the normal guy I met at the laundromat. “It’s amazing how much we have in common. I don’t think I’ve ever met anyone quite like you. We have twin Volkswagens. Your license plate has my initials. We’re both new in town, both runners, and the mole on your neck looks just like the one on my leg.” I showed him the mole on my calf. His face turned to stone. I continued making small talk, but it wasn’t working. The pleasant, thoughtful person I’d met earlier no longer seemed to exist. He’d taken on an arrogant new persona, and I wasn’t interested in it.

“

HIS FACE

TURNED

TO STONE.

”

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SEPTEMBER 2016 Apparently the Volkswagen is on display in Washington, D.C., and I can’t shake the feeling I’ve seen it before. Then I realize — it looks just like Chris Hagen’s car. The details of that night rush back into focus. Golden curtains. A handsome man. A stripped-out automobile. The car is at the National Museum of Crime and Punishment. I keep reading, half expecting to see it belonged to Chris Hagen, but it wasn’t Chris’ name in the article.

OCTOBER 1974 “You have to leave now. I’m tired and need to go to bed,” I said, trying to sound polite and strong at the same time. A humorless grin spread over Chris’ face. For the first time all evening, he looked straight into my eyes. He said flatly, “I’m not leaving.” Oh, no. “My roommate should be home any time, and she won’t be happy that I brought a guy home with me.” “Oh, I’m sure she won’t care. I want to meet her,” Chris said with a sly smile. Outwardly, I hoped to appear composed, but I was horrified. It was clear he delighted in making me feel uneasy, and I was really starting to get scared.

I nervously straightened the fruit on the counter. Trying to remain calm, I said, “I’m going to bed now. Let yourself out when you get bored.” I hurried up the stairs and imagined his eyes were following me. After closing the bedroom door, I collapsed to my bed, clinging to my teddy bear. Our only phone hung on the wall downstairs in the kitchen. I wanted to call for help, but I had a gut feeling Chris wouldn’t let me near the phone. I heard his voice coming from downstairs. “Please come back down here. There’s something between us. I need to talk to you.” His voice had changed, it was sweet again. I wanted to return downstairs to talk to the lovely man I’d met at the laundromat, but instead I said, “No, I need my sleep. I work in the morning.” There was total silence except for the ticking of my alarm clock. Minutes passed

before he called out again, “I’m coming up there now.” “You’d better not!” I heard his footsteps creeping up the stairs, one by one. I remained silent, sitting on my bed, almost too petrified to breathe, as I waited for my door to fly open. Time passed, and I lost track of where he was. I surprised myself by dozing off, and I woke up with a start. My alarm clock now read 3:00 a.m. The house was as quiet as a morgue. I tiptoed to my bedroom door and turned the knob. I looked down and saw him sleeping in a fetal position on the bare floor. He looked up at me, so I suggested, “Why don’t you go downstairs and sleep on my couch?” I couldn’t sleep, so I sat up in bed the entire night. At 7:00, I got up and quietly changed into a pretty dress and black pumps for work. As I descended the stairs, I could see Chris lying on my sofa. I walked past him and said, “Good morning.” I proceeded to the kitchen and grabbed two ripe bananas. “I’m going to work now,” I said. “You need to go. Here’s your breakfast.” I handed him a banana. We both walked out the door and got into our cars at the same time. I gripped the steering wheel, and my heart was racing as I watched him drive off. I felt a huge sense of relief as he disappeared down the street. When I settled into my desk that morning, I felt lucky to be alive, but I also felt incredibly stupid. I thought about calling the police to tell them about my encounter, but I was too embarrassed. After all, I had invited Chris into my home, and the only crime he’d committed was refusing to leave when asked. Jackie returned home early Sunday evening. I told her about the cute guy I met in the laundromat who drove a beige VW bug just like mine. I did not

give her any more information; we’d been roommates for only a week.

THREE MONTHS LATER, JANUARY 18, 1975 As I headed out the door for work, I discovered that my Volkswagen was missing. I ran back upstairs and knocked on Jackie’s bedroom door. “Jackie, do you know where my car is? It’s gone!” “No, it can’t be. Keep looking. You’ll find it,” she said in a sleepy voice. I looked up and down the street again and found no sign of my car. I hurried back upstairs to inform her that my car really had been stolen. Jackie, now sitting up in bed, asked, “Did you hear someone jiggling the door knob in the middle of the night? It sounded like someone picking the lock! The rattling stopped when they heard my lunatic dog barking.” “Nope, didn’t hear a thing. I must’ve been sound asleep. Wonder who it was?” One week after my car’s disappearance, the police found it in a cow pasture near Colfax, California. While processing the paperwork for its release, the clerk explained, “There’s been a homicide, and the police believe the crime may be related to the person who stole your car.” When I inspected my trunk, I found that the contents of my glove box were gone and my crowbar, chains, and spare tire had also been stolen. Chris Hagen flew into my mind. I shuddered.

SEPTEMBER 2016 Investigating the VW’s owner, I find myself watching a clip of a handsome

“

I HEARD

HIS FOOTSTEPS

CREEPING UP

THE STAIRS, ONE BY ONE.

”

man speaking to a judge in court. I’m immediately stunned by the man’s smooth delivery; his dark, curly hair and his intelligence, because it’s everything I remember about Chris Hagen. It hits me. This is the same man from that night, but his name’s not Chris Hagen. I feel sick to my stomach. My husband walks into the room and notices me stewing over the computer. He asks, “What’s wrong?” “I just discovered that Ted Bundy once spent the night at my house.” I’ll never forget my chance encounter with Ted Bundy a lifetime ago. In that dingy laundromat I thought I might have met my soulmate, but in reality, I had come face to face with my worst nightmare. By the time I met Ted Bundy, he’d killed between 10 and 20 young women. Before he was executed in a Florida prison in 1989, he was known to have killed more than 36 women. Bundy himself claimed there were well over 100 victims. Luckily, I was not one of them. 1

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LEARNING TO

FEEL AG 14

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FROM SEXUAL ASSAULT TO SELF-LOVE BY MARISSA REYES PHOTOGRAPHED BY BRANDON BARKER

GAIN SPRING 2018 | MAINLINE

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I WAS 3 YEARS OLD WHEN AN OLDER

family member pulled me into a room and molested me. As I grew up and learned about sex, I remember thinking, “Oh, God, am I going to be defective?” The event distorted my boundaries, and I ended up in dangerous situations. My first boyfriend assaulted me twice and would have raped me, if I hadn’t been able to shove him off me. For the following eight or nine months, his guilt made him emotionally and verbally abusive. I came to believe that I deserved such treatment, which created long-term self-loathing within me and I became suicidal. I made excuses for my boyfriend’s bad behavior, telling myself, “That’s just what happens in relationships,” because I didn’t know any better. His abuse furthered my problems with dissociation. During trauma, my body would desensitize and my mind would go blank, but it started to happen in consensual situations. If someone kissed me for the first time, I would freeze and be unable to remember how it felt. When I got older, that turned into having to be inebriated to be physical or sexual with someone. If I wasn’t, I’d have such intense anxiety that I would shut down and wouldn’t be able to feel anything. For four years I’ve worked really hard on recovering. I go to therapy, I try to take care of myself, and I’ve forgiven myself and him. Although I had modeled before, I decided to go out of my comfort zone and do a different kind of project: to be able to pose for a photographer and feel good about myself, as well as to start an important conversation.

When Brandon Barker of Beardoir Photography and I talked about this shoot, neither of us could have anticipated it going the way it did. Our original concept was a bodyscaping theme with harsh lighting and deliberate color. Shortly after, I approached Brandon with the storyline of “Sexual Assault to Self Love.” He said he loved it and would do his best to honor it. Brandon was respectful and attentive to the fact that this was my first shoot I had done completely naked. As we worked, he checked on me constantly, “I know this is really vulnerable — are you OK? Do you want to take a break? Do you need anything?” I had done projects with Brandon for about a year, so I felt very comfortable and had a voice in everything we did. I never felt pressured or obligated to do anything. He recognized my vulnerability and treated me accordingly. With Brandon as my collaborative soulmate, the photo shoot became one of free-flowing creativity. We decided to use dish soap on my body for color contrast and movement. Red signified the assault and negative emotions, green represented cleansing, and honey and Sweethearts candy conveyed self-love. The first pose we did was of me embracing myself. Initially, I thought the pose showed pain, but when I did it, I felt a sense of strength. When I looked at it later, I realized that the last time I’d seen myself in that position was the first time I saw myself naked after I broke up with my ex-boyfriend. I looked in the mirror, held myself and started crying because my body SPRING 2018 | MAINLINE

I FELT STRONG AND BADASS: I GOT UP.” was finally mine again. It was a reclaiming of myself, and when Brandon sent me the picture, I cried then, too. In most of the subsequent pictures, my face is hidden, similar to the photo of me kneeling with red dripping from my hands. The transitional pictures in black and white symbolize me getting up from the assaults. I love seeing my muscular back and how it is clear that my body is actively trying to push up off the ground. When I saw these photos, I started crying... again. The introduction of green dripping down my spine is one of my favorite pictures. I felt strong and badass: I got up. The green became not only cleansing but also represented my energy and my reclamation. After a few shots of the green dripping across my chest, I tried to take off the dish soap and it started sudsing, as if I was literally cleaning the assault off my skin. I happened to have a bag of Sweethearts candy with me, Brandon had some honey, and we were inspired. It was messy and so fun. We played with arrangements of the candy on me, resulting in shots that were colorful, silly, and absolutely gorgeous. I’m incredibly proud of these pictures. When I first saw them, I thought, “These are beautiful — how is that me?” I never thought I’d be strong and safe enough to be naked in front of someone without fear of being attacked. I hadn’t thought of myself as secure in who I am, liking who I am, or believing that I’m deserving of love and feeling good about myself. Ultimately, my journey has been learning to feel worthy. Before the shoot, I never called myself a model. When asked, I’d say, “I just take photos with this dude sometimes.” Modeling has been great for me. It’s offered me a unique freedom to express myself without fear of judgment, and it has helped heal me in ways that I didn’t know I needed. 1 18

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MY BODY WAS FINALLY MINE AGAIN.

ASL ADVOCAT E Professor Kevin Clark, a founder of Deafhood Foundation, fights for deaf rights and has taught at City College for 16 years.

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SPREADING THE

WORD THE A DVOCATE S W H O BR OU G H T AS L T O SA CRA MENTO S CH OOL S AN D T H E ON G OIN G STRU GGL E FOR DE AF R IG H T S . BY ROSE VEGA PH OT OS BY J A S O N P I ER C E A N D J A C K S O N D U R H A M

ois Diamond is seated at her dining room table wearing a smile, a pink top and lipstick to match. She is vibrant, in her early 80s with shoulder-length white hair, perfectly curled with ends flipped toward her chin. She fingerspells her name for me, a practice I’ve become fluent in from ASL class at City College. Later, Diamond demonstrates her sign name and laughs because it’s similar to the sign for “devil.” Diamond, who is deaf, is the person responsible for bringing American Sign Language classes to Sacramento City College. “My No. 1 goal was to try and get people to sign well and possibly become interpreters,” Diamond says, signing along as she speaks. Diamond moved to Sacramento from LA in the ’70s and visited American River College to explore its deaf studies program. “I was shocked that the students didn’t learn ASL,” Diamond says. “They learned a different sign called Visual English.” Visual English, also known as Signing Exact English, translates English verbatim into signs.

Diamond was determined to set up an American Sign Language class, but since ARC already had an established SEE program, she looked elsewhere. That’s how she ended up at Sacramento City College to talk to then-president Samuel M. Kipp. “I explained the importance of having interpreters. We can have them for job interviews, to get jobs, we can go to college — deaf world will improve,” Diamond says and signs. “Anyone who sees sign will agree: ASL is a deaf person’s natural language,” Diamond says. “It is not English; it is their own language of concepts, ideas and visual language.” Kipp told Diamond that City College didn’t have money for the class, to which Diamond replied that he simply needed to cut a class that wasn’t important, like macramé or sewing. He told her he would have to get back to her, and within a few weeks the administration decided it wanted to offer an ASL class. “I was asked to teach the class,” Diamond says. “I am not a teacher. I don’t have the experience. So I went to the library

and read all the sign language books and set up sign language coursework.” The first class was small, composed of about 12 students. “The following semester the class doubled,” Diamond says, “and the third semester it tripled.” Diamond was in the process of setting up an advanced ASL class when she realized she couldn’t teach three classes. So she decided to recruit more deaf people to teach alongside her. Leo Reid and Ernest Whisenant, who are both deaf, began teaching at City College, along with Jane Tallmon, who is hearing. “My dream came true — that I got several interpreters,” says Diamond, laughing happily. She was responsible for bringing even more interpreters to the area, going on to start other ASL classes at American River College. “I really love interpreters. I have many interpreter friends, and I am so happy to see Sacramento grow with the interpreters that we have,” says Diamond, doing the sign for happy, turning an open-faced palm toward her heart and moving it up and down. SPRING 2018 | MAINLINE

Diamond recalls a former student, Peggy Selover, whom she encouraged to become an interpreter. Selover ended up moving away, and while at Gallaudet University, she met Ted Kennedy and started working on his campaign. Selover sent Diamond a letter asking whom she was going to vote for. “‘How the hell do I know? There’s no interpreter captioning when they give speeches. I read the newspaper,’” Diamond told Selover, who relayed the message to Kennedy: Deaf people weren’t involved in politics because they had no interpreter captioning. From then on, Kennedy had Selover make sure there was an interpreter at every one of his campaign stops. Diamond taught at City College for three years. While she was teaching classes at night, she also worked full-time at NorCal Services for Deaf & Hard of Hearing. It soon became difficult for her to do both, and she started looking for someone to take over her classes. Pat Masterson was translating for Diamond at the time, and Diamond felt that Masterson would be the perfect person to teach ASL. “I think you can. I think you are very qualified,” Diamond told Masterson. “I will teach you how to plan the lessons out. I will tell you how to teach.” In the early ’70s in Sonoma, California, Pat Masterson was volunteering with the

special needs class her sister taught. Her sister had read about the benefits of using ASL when teaching children living with disabilities, and together, they decided to learn it. “We wanted to find a class, but there were no classes at the time,” says Masterson. “So we were talking to a neighbor, and she said, ‘I know somebody who has a deaf daughter,’ and so she taught us in her home. She welcomed us in her home every Tuesday afternoon.” Today, Masterson’s office is in the Performing Arts Center at City College, tucked away in the far right corner of a small hallway by the ASL classes. Binders line a bookshelf on one wall, and above her desk there are two colorful hands making signs. Her path wasn’t a straight shot to teaching ASL, though. Masterson ended up leaving Sonoma for Sacramento, taking ASL classes at City College and ARC, but she says she was always happy that her first sign lesson was face-to-face, outside of a classroom. When she first moved to Sacramento, she started working for Resources for Independent Living, an organization that provides resources for people living with disabilities. At the time, they had several deaf employees, including Lois Diamond. It was there that Masterson and Diamond first met. Resources for Independent Living was a large presence in the Sacramento deaf

community. That remained the case until 1977, when the NorCal Center for Deafness was founded. Diamond and the other deaf employees at RIL left to work at NorCal. Masterson eventually followed, since her focus had shifted to pursue signing.

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T H E D E AF C O M M U NI T Y IS V ER Y WA R M AND EM B R A C I NG OF P EO P L E WH O TA KE T H E TIME T O L EA R N A S L .

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When an interpreter at City College had to stop working, Masterson stepped in. “I enjoyed interpreting,” says Masterson. “I think that the deaf community is very warm and embracing of people who take the time to learn ASL.” Due to the growth of ASL and the school’s desire to expand, Masterson began teaching, and she discovered how powerful that was. “I realized that in a class of 30 people,” she says, “those 30 people can then go out and teach more people.” So much of Masterson’s teaching career came together through chance — but with a laugh, she says she must enjoy it, since she’s been doing it for 38 years. Natalia Reynoso remembers her first day learning ASL. Professor Masterson walked in and communicated only by signing — no words were spoken. Reynoso remembered thinking to herself that she was ready for ASL. Reynoso, 19, Early Childhood Education major, is a part of a group of four students that practices ASL together outside of class, along with Jessica Contreras, Xavier LeBlanc and Rebecca Lee. The group still gets together regularly. Reynoso wants to be an elementary school teacher. Before meeting the group of fellow ASL students, she hadn’t decided P I ON E E R I N G P R OF E S S OR Lois Diamond teaching a 1977 sign language course. Diamond brought the first ASL classes to City College.

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FO UR DECA DES I N ASL Professor Pat Masterson has been teaching and interpreting for 38 years.

on a major, but after talking with Contreras and the other group members, she realized that she wanted to work with kids. “I took sign because I always had an interest in it. I actually grew up learning sign because the elementary school I went to had a program,” says Reynoso, whose mother was also taking sign courses at City College at the time. Reynoso remembers nights when her mother would come home and teach her new signs. “I learned about all the oppression that the deaf community has had to face,” says Reynoso. “I want to be that person that makes everyone feel welcomed, special, accepted and connected.” Though Reynoso says that in Sacramento a lot of people don’t know sign, she’s still managed to bump into a signer or two since taking classes. At a Tyler the Creator concert, she made a new connection. “I was on the floor, signing the song,” says Reynoso, “and there was a women next to me, and she said ‘Oh, my gosh, you know sign. I know sign, too!’ and we literally signed for 10 minutes.” Reynoso may become a certified interpreter, if her educational path allows it. Since starting her education, ASL has become a huge part of her identity. “To me, it’s such a beautiful language because it’s so unique,” says Reynoso. “You use your hands and your body and facial expressions to have someone be able to understand what you’re trying to say.” Jessica Contreras started taking ASL classes about two years ago. Like Reynoso, she remembers her first sign class well. “The first class is very intimidating,” Contreras says. “There’s no talking, and it’s super different, but it’s beautiful.” Contreras, 20, realized that the best way to learn was to practice outside of class, and she found that community with Reynoso, LeBlanc and Lee. “Somehow all four of us sat in the same area every single day and eventually became friends,” says Contreras. “And then we practiced outside of class, and now it’s been over two years.” Contreras aspires to be an elementary teacher and wants to be able to talk to all of her students. She hopes to make deaf students feel welcome. “The more languages I know, the more families I can communicate with,” says Contreras.

Before taking ASL classes, Contreras had no experience with anyone deaf. The program pushes students to interface with the deaf community at social events, and it’s opened up a new world to Contreras. “They’re so welcoming,” says Contreras. “They know I’m new at this and a little slower than them, but they teach me new signs.” She was feeling a little intimidated when she went to her first social, a part of the Sign course where students meet up

with members of the deaf community to chat. She was a novice to the language, but she’s grown since then. “I’ve had the opportunity to just randomly bump into deaf people in stores,” says Contreras, “and I’m able to have conversations with them — no problem.” Kevin Clark stands in front of the class wearing jeans and a long-sleeved black T-shirt; he’s sporting his signature black cap. SPRING 2018 | MAINLINE

He’s taught at City College for 16 years. He flicks the lights on and off slowly — that means it’s time to pay attention. Clark points his left index finger, curls his right hand into a fist and places it on top of his index finger. This means practice. Students then group up into twos and threes and practice the new signs they’ve been given. I’m one of the students in Clark’s Sign I class — still very new to the language. So when I sit down to interview Clark, we’re not in the same room. There’s an interpreter on a video chat relaying my questions to him and his responses to me. Clark begins to describe his history with ASL. “It’s my first language,” he says, “and later I learned how to read and write in English.” 26

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Besides ASL, Clark also knows British Sign Language and Japanese Sign Language. Sign runs deep in his life. “My parents are both deaf as well; we have deafness in the family,” Clark says. “I’m third generation, so we all know ASL.” Clark learned ASL from his parents and attended the Missouri School for the Deaf, the same pre-K–12 school his two siblings and parents went to. While attending UC San Diego, he did research with the Salk Institute to see what areas in the brain light up when using ASL compared to English. He also attended Gallaudet University where he graduated with a degree in deaf education. “I wanted to build bridges between the two worlds, the hearing and the deaf

worlds,” says Clark. “I wanted to help hearing people understand deaf people.” Sometimes that urge takes the form of activism. In 2010, Clark was influential in stopping bill AB 2072, a bill written without the involvement of the deaf community. It proposed to give parents who had newborn deaf children a pamphlet that promoted oralism. “Their strategy was to eliminate ASL from deaf education systems and reduce the use of ASL in the California State schools,” says Clark, who worked with others to defeat the bill. It was vetoed by then-Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger. “Oralism” is a dirty word to Clark. It involves lip reading, speech and trying to mimic mouth shapes, and it was promoted

SIG N S QUAD Jessica Contreras, 20, often meets with a group of friends outside of class to practice ASL.

extensively by Alexander Graham Bell, leaving a lasting impact on the deaf community. “Oralism, trying to force a deaf person to be a hearing person so that they can be more of the majority of society,” says Clark. “They don’t want these kids exposed to any sign language or any deaf culture because that’ll wreck their ability to speak.” As the interpreter tells me, Clark signs that last part sarcastically. Clark’s parents lived through a time when the Alexander Graham Bell Association influenced deaf schools to fire deaf teachers and promote oralism at all costs. Clark’s father was in class one day when he couldn’t pronounce a word correctly. The teacher got more and more frustrated with him. “She submerged him in a bathtub,” Clark says, “and put his head under the water and said, ‘Say it right, and if you don’t say it right, you’re going back under.’” His father began to turn blue in the face and eventually the principal intervened. The teacher was fired, but Clark’s father was forever traumatized by the event. Clark’s goal is to promote the message that signing is good, that it’s OK to be deaf. He was a founding member of the Deafhood Foundation, which fights for economic and social justice for all deaf people. As Clark explains, the deaf community is very small. Everybody knows each other somehow — maybe through a cousin or a shared teacher. “It’s easy to travel all over the country,” says Clark, “because very often we can create those connections with other deaf people, even if we’ve never met before.”

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I WA NT ED T O B U I L D BR I D G ES BET W EEN T H E T WO WO R L D S , T H E H E AR I NG A ND T H E D E A F WO R L D S .

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While Diamond was teaching classes, she was also juggling another job, had gotten divorced and was raising a family. Her schedule was hectic, and after three years, she made the choice to leave City College. Even though she wasn’t teaching, Diamond stayed involved in the community

— dropping in on interpreters’ classes, helping with job training and workshops. Her goal remained the same: She wanted more people to learn sign. Over her long career she sees more and more people signing out in the world, at restaurants and events. For those in the deaf community, when people who can hear take the time to learn even the basics of sign, it’s encouraging. As for Diamond, she always signs and speaks when she goes out — because she never knows when someone might know ASL. “I wish everybody knew ASL,” Diamond says. “I’m so proud of people learning sign language, and I see big changes. Now, everybody knows a little sign.” 1

Back at Lois Diamond’s house, she explains that she never really stopped teaching, even after she left City College. As I was leaving, I found out just how true that was. She signed, “Nice to meet you,” and when I fumbled back a sign, she corrected me and showed me the phrase again: Nice, Meet, You. She put her left hand flat, facing up and slid her right hand over, then let her fists give each other a knuckle bump and pointed toward me. E DUCAT I O N GOA L S Natalia Reynoso, 19, is learning ASL to make her a more effective communicator as a teacher.

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I AM NOT

Written and photographed by Jason Pierce

A trip into the depths of my mental illness

The waters of the Sacramento river are running fast and high. Three days of rain have swollen the river. Murkier than normal, its golden-brown surface shimmers with reflections from a sliver of sunlight peeking through the blue-grey clouds; they slowly roll the same direction as the river, headed toward the city. A floating Christmas tree, its trunk sticking straight up out of the water, makes its way swiftly downstream on the far side. Itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s a sad reflection of what a mighty tree it was before it was decorated in someoneâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s house, then discarded. 30

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WIN DOWS I N TO T H E S OU L A self-portrait from December 2017 that Jason took to document his emotional state.

It’s cold outside, mid-40s with a crisp January wind. I’m near the edge of the river on a sandy bank, sitting on a half-charred log I assume was burned by a homeless person trying to stay warm or young kids having a late-night rendezvous. I’m here on the banks because I walked here from my apartment. I’m not sure how far I walked; it was all kind of

fuzzy. I somehow made my way down a two-lane road that runs atop a levee. No sidewalk, so cars zip by just a few feet from me as I alternate from one side of the road to the other to avoid obstacles. It crosses my mind more than once to just step out in front of one of those cars and end it all right now. I walked along this road because my mind is malfunctioning. Wires are crossed somewhere deep inside, causing an unbearable amount of confusion, and I’m trying to escape it. There is an intense battle happening in my head between emotions and logic. It’s like having two opposing sides of a debate screaming at each other, with bullhorns, amplified with large speakers. Relentless and endless, both sides are so loud and overwhelming that they are only comprehensible in small pieces. Slightly louder, and drowning out any positive thought, are the voices saying, “You suck,” “No one cares,” “You’re a failure,” “Imposter,” “The world will be a better place without you.” Now I sit on the edge of this river, and I want to die. Not because I really want my life to end, but because I am tired. I’m tired of the nonstop barrage of negative thoughts in my head. Tired of the confusion, tired of questioning reality. I’m tired of seeing the devastating effects this is having on the people around me. So tired I can no longer see any other option than to hit the force quit button on my malfunctioning brain and turn it off. It’s so powerful, it blinds me from any kind of rational thought. I grab my phone and reach out to the only person I ever reach out to — my girlfriend. There is just one problem. She has been so affected by the negative side effects of this that she has come to her own version of the end. She has had enough and is just as confused about what is happening as I am. She pushes back at my cries for help as if I can control what I am doing or saying. Everything is just so messy. Before I realize what’s happening, I find myself standing above the river on a short bridge, jumping in, the same way I do the icy alpine lakes of the Sierras. The fall was short. As I went underwater time came to a trickle and I became hyper aware of where I was and I didn’t want to be there. Shocked by the cold water, I quickly swim to shore. “I can’t believe I just did that,” I thought, “and no one has any idea.” I start the long

walk back home, cold and exhausted, alone. As I look back months later, I don’t think I would have done it if I really thought I was going to die. It was my way of screaming to the world, “I need help.” The depression didn’t win this battle, but it still might win the war. This situation I found myself in last winter didn’t just appear out of thin air or develop as a response to a negative life experience; it was the final stages of the longest and darkest stretch of mental instability I have ever suffered. Jumping in the river was only the beginning of the end, as I came crashing down from two years of severe mental health issues that led to two suicide attempts in one weekend and 11 days of hospitalization. Depression was not new to me. I’ve dealt with it throughout my life — it would normally come and go, and except for the rare exceptions, it was very manageable. But this depression moved in permanently, bringing with it an obnoxious friend called anxiety, and the two of them threw a party. At the same time, but not necessarily concurrent, I was exhibiting many of the classic signs of mania: overachieving, racing thoughts, restlessness, confusion and reckless behaviors. I’m just one of 44.7 million adults over the age of 18 with some form of mental illness and one of 10 million adults who have had serious functional impairment because of it, according to the National Institute of Mental Health. In my case, it’s been called many different names by the doctors who have diagnosed me over the years — ADHD, learning disability, depression, major depressive disorder, anxiety — and now after the most recent episode they’ve settled on bipolar disorder to best describe what’s been happening to me, diagnosed by “manic episodes that last at least seven days, or by manic symptoms that are so severe that the person needs immediate hospital care. Usually, depressive episodes occur as well, typically lasting at least two weeks.” It’s been called different names because, like so many other people in the U.S., my condition has been misdiagnosed and untreated my whole life. The NIMH estimates that there are 5.1 million adults with severe bipolar disorder in the U.S. and that 51 percent of those adults receive no treatment in any given year. I’ve always been aware of the depression, so that’s what I’ve been treating — admittedly, very poorly, because I always thought I could handle it alone, even in SPRING 2018 | MAINLINE

the worst of times. It wasn’t until this most recent episode that bipolar’s opposite side — mania — was brought to my attention. I never saw manic behavior in myself, because to me, it was just normal. When I started asking the people in my life about the symptoms of mania, though, they all agreed with the diagnosis. “That’s when you would go out with our son and do all the fun stuff,” said Christine Dunning, my ex-wife and mother to our son. “When you did have him, there was always a plan for you to work on and it was always an extreme — hiking for days at a time, traveling a lot, going here, going there, and everything is full tilt. Then, when you didn’t have him, you would be spinning in circles or having your own personal moments of downtime and down moments.” The very first signs that something was wrong with me started to appear as early as grade school, some 30 years ago. I struggled in school, both socially and academically. I had severe mood swings and anger problems. I fought with my siblings a lot and isolated myself socially. I remember often being sad, always looking for space to be alone, where I didn’t have to interact with people. I was sent to see doctors, counselors, teachers and was even prescribed medication — all before I had any real understanding of what was going on. As a kid, I was never able to grasp the bigger idea of mental illness. As a teen and adult, I struggled with many of the same symptoms, and now, as I look back, I can clearly see the manic episodes, too. I started showing some of the more severe signs of mental illness during this latest episode. From the outside, everything seemed great: People in my life loved me and cared for me. I was doing great at City College, pursuing my passions for photography and journalism after leaving a career of 16 years. I was sharing my love of the outdoors with my son, hiking and backpacking nearly every weekend. Everything appeared just fine because that’s what I wanted everyone to see. The first clues that something was wrong came when I began having anxiety — about everything — anxiety that caused my hands and knees to tremble, my heart to race, my palms to sweat. It was mostly the thought of interacting with 32

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people, including my family, that incited it, but often there was no reason at all. As it progressed, it became debilitating, and by the last six months, I felt afraid of everything. I started losing interest in all the things I loved. I stopped going hiking and backpacking. I walked off my job, an enjoyable one graciously given to me by a friend. I stopped going to school with just a few weeks left in my second semester, leaving friends and co-workers to worry about me and pick up the slack. I isolated myself, sometimes unable to leave the house for days as I would lie curled up on the floor or in bed, crying uncontrollably. Occasionally, I would peek through the blinds to remind myself that there was an outside world. As the illness took full grasp of everything in my life, the symptoms got worse — the ones that I shared with no one. I was in so much mental anguish I was rarely sleeping. My mind raced a million miles an hour, constantly. I had mood swings that would lead to confrontations with my family. I started pacing the house for hours at night. On particularly bad nights I would erase my calendar and notes off my whiteboards in my home office and leave ominous messages, trying desperately to clear out my head, not understanding what was going on. The worst days and nights were the ones when suicide became a viable option. Wanting the mental anguish to stop so desperately, I started locking myself in the SI GN S OF PA I N In Jason’s darkest moments, he used self-harm in an attempt to relieve his mental pain.

bathroom, planning how I could finally bring an end to the suffering. I started cutting myself — something I thought was reserved for the lost, depressed, tortured soul of my teenage years. Cutting brought a brief respite from the mental pain in the form of physical pain. It was very dark in my head, but by then, it had became very clear to the people close to me that something was terribly wrong, despite my best efforts to put a mask on and hide the truth. “We saw you sitting on your steps. You were clearly not well. You had been drinking and as you told us, taken a variety of pills,” said Jeff McCullough, a friend of 33 years, recalling seeing me two days after I jumped in the river. “We all agreed at that time that you were going to need more than your friends and family; you were going to need professional help. We ended up taking you to the emergency room.” I’m sitting in a bed at the intersection of two hallways: a short one, the main entrance for visitors entering and leaving the emergency room at UC Davis Hospital, leading into one of the ER units; and the other, much longer hallway, spanning several hundred feet and dotted with doorways leading to places unknown. I’m not allowed to get up and walk around. I’m in the longest of the two hallways, against the wall, with the foot of my bed hanging about two feet into the adjacent

T H R OU G H H I S E Y E S Jason took this photo to illustrate his perception of the world — distorted and often from the confines of his bed

hallway. People blast open the door every 20 seconds or so. It’s very loud. I watch various characters walk in and out. A parent enters with a baby in one hand and another child in the other. Grabbing the child by his backpack, the parent yells, “If you don’t knock it off right now, I swear to God I will have you committed to the psych ward.” I wonder if I am the right person to be in this bed. I was actually just moved to this location after being in a private room for the last day and a half. When I was brought here, I’d been awake for four days straight so having dark and quiet room I was able to do a lot of thinking and healing. Now all I hear is the loud metallic sound as someone shoves open the emergency room doors, not unlike what it sounds like to cock a shotgun, but much louder. I’ve been sitting here for more than 20 hours, and the chaos, noise and bright lights only make things worse. I’m struggling. I don’t feel like I’m getting the help that I need, the help I had hoped to get. I’m not getting any information. I’m not talking with any mental health professionals. The only thing I know is I’ve been put on a 72-hour hold, so I’m stuck here. After 25 hours in the hallway,

I finally get a doctor to stop and talk to me about what’s happening with my care. But all I can get out of him are apologies as he leans back against the wall looking exhausted and states quite coldly, “If I knew this is what it would be like to be a doctor, I would’ve chosen a different career.” I lie back in my bed. “What is happening?” I think. My experience in the hospital brought another ugly side of mental health into focus for me: treatment. In total, I spent three days in the emergency room followed by eight days in a mental hospital. During the course of my 11 days spent in the hospital, I saw three different psychologists for a total of 30 minutes, had two separate diagnoses and was prescribed three different medications. The hospital was not the first time I reached out for help. Two months before this, I tried calling a local mental health hotline because at the time I had no insurance. I was scheduled for an overthe-phone interview, then referred to an in-person intake session at a community program about a week later. I was only then given an appointment to see a psychiatrist, three months from that time.

I didn’t know what to do. I needed help right then. “Economics are a factor. Money — it costs money. If you have lots of money and can pay out of pocket, it’s easier,” says Dr. Gayle Pitman, psychology professor at Sacramento City College. “If you don’t have lots of money and you’re relying on insurance, it’s harder because there’s stipulations around when you can be seen, and how often you can be seen, and if you have a diagnosis, and if that diagnosis qualifies you for treatment. There’s a lot of red tape factors that are hard to deal with, even for someone who’s not experiencing a mental illness, but someone who’s in the throes of depression or anxiety and their energy is being consumed by it — it’s hard to navigate the system with all of that. I think here in Sacramento County, access is a factor, too. I don’t think we have enough mental health practitioners out there that are in a position to serve people that are needing it at that moment.” Having limited access to treatment was a big factor in how my illness deteriorated, but not the only one. Another major barrier to getting help, and one much less talked about, is the stigma that comes along with have a mental illness. In my case, stigma came in two ways. The things I experienced were dark and frightening — I was confused by them. I felt broken. That caused me to be paralyzed with fear about telling anyone, to let people see what was happening. I didn’t feel like any of this was part of me, and I didn’t want to be rejected or labeled. The second came in the form of a societal expectation to be able to recognize what was happening and seek out treatment all on my own while in a complete mental fog. Most people don’t see mental issues in the same light as a physical injury. You wouldn’t expect a survivor of a major car accident to get up, assess their injuries and get themselves medical attention;

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you would call an ambulance. The same outside assistance is required for someone experiencing a mental health crisis. “In order to overcome the collective societal stigma, more people need to come out about having mental illness,” Pitman says. “I think it’s so hidden, and that’s the double-edged sword. It’s hidden because there’s stigma, and people know that if they out themselves as having some sort of mental illness that they might experience negative treatment, or they may lose friends, or people might be afraid of them. I pick up all those stereotypes about people who are mentally ill. And yet, I think that if people could really see how many people in their immediate circle experience some sort of mental illness, I think that alone would destigmatize it to some extent.” Even now as I’m fully engaged in the process of treating my illness, it’s hard to talk about it. It’s hard to show people the scars that I have, inside and out. To try and explain my behavior or convey what it feels 34

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T H E D UA L I T Y OF J A S ON On bad nights, Jason would transform his home office into a more accurate reflection of his inner turmoil.

like to live in a constant mental fog. I still fear how I will been seen by people when they find out that I now have a diagnosis: I’m bipolar. It was really hard to finally get the help I needed and still a struggle to maintain that help on my own, but I’m doing it. Through a free community program, I now see a psychiatrist for medication every three months or so. The psychiatrist and I both agreed on the diagnosis, and I was prescribed Lithium, the most common bipolar medication — it’s used to dull the mania and brighten the depression. I’ve been given some of the resources I need and pointed in the right direction for others, but money and insurance still plays a major role in what I can or can’t do.

Though life hasn’t become easier for me since I started seeking treatment, I am grateful that it happened. For the first time in a very long time, my head is clear — though it feels slightly like I’ve just woken from a dream. I lost a lot during this last episode, but I gained much more. I learned the art of asking for help when I need it, no matter how small I think the issue is. Because I opened myself up, I learned that I can live a normal life if I get help if I ask for it, that this illness doesn’t have complete control over me. “I think it’s important for people to realize that once they can share what’s going on with somebody else,” Pitman tells me. “Then that’s actually a pathway to healing, it’s a pathway to getting better.” This illness doesn’t define me, but it is part of me — a part of me that I want to fully embrace. It’s a part of me that I need to share, so that if others are experiencing any kind of mental health issues, they will see, as I have, that they are not alone. 1

MISSION STATEMENT Mainline magazine is published as part of the Sacramento City College Journalism Department and produced by students in the Journalism 403 and 407 courses. The views expressed in Mainline do not necessarily reflect those of the City College Journalism Department, Sacramento City College, or the Los Rios Community College District. Mainline magazine was founded in 1995 by former City College students Doug Herndon and Paul Estabrook with the idea that the magazine would complement the student newspaper, Express. For more information regarding Mainline magazine, Journalism 403 and 407, or the City College Journalism Department, contact: Jan Haag Sacramento City College 3835 Freeport Blvd. Sacramento, CA 95822 (916) 558-2696 haagj@scc.losrios.edu Find us on the web at saccityexpress.com

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Maxfield Morris

Design Editor

Josephine Newitt

Photo Editor

Jason Pierce

Contributors Nick Pecoraro Jason Pierce Mary Jane Strand Marissa Reyes Rose Vega Photographers Brandon Barker Jackson Durham Vanessa S. Nelson Jason Pierce Dianne Rose Faculty Adviser

Jan Haag

Cover Photos

Jason Pierce

Layout & design by Josephine Newitt. See her portfolio at newittcreative.com

SPRING 2018 | MAINLINE

SACRAMENTO CITY COLLEGE STUDENT MAGA ZINE PRODUCED BY THE JOURNALISM DEPARTMENT