of a typical, generalized grand mal epileptic seizure. But she didn’t have epilepsy! It directly followed the tonic/clonic convulsions associated with epilepsy and other forms of brain damage.
Immediately after the application of current to her temples, blanching became noticeable, followed by frothing at the mouth. During and after the 'treatment' the body snorted and made other revolting sounds associated with a respiratory system out of control. These outward manifestations of sadistic torture echoed the destruction in the brain and were no less brutal and loathsome.
| “Because of the lower impedance of the blood it is probably the vascular tree (the blood circulatory system), which bears the brunt of the current as it passes through the head. Grossly blanching is apparent with the initial spasm, and is followed by varying degrees of vasoparalysis, stasis, subarachnoid and intracerebral hemorrhage (Sludging of blood into and over the brain). In fact, ten percent of all ECT deaths are directly due to intracerebral damage... "All parts of the brain were vulnerable - the cerebral hemispheres, the cerebellum, third ventricle and hypothalmus. " Shock Treatment Is Not Good For Your Brain —John Frieberg MD] |
The doctor turned to his assistants. He sent one back to ward duties then instructed the nurse and the other attendant to see to the patient and left.
Sentence had been passed; the patient-prisoner found guilty, punishment was measured and delivered. When you are named mad, and the name of your madness is inscribed in that modern Book of The Dead - DM III-R, The Psychiatrist's Handbook of Mental Illness - obviously you deserve your punishment.
The tyrant and the executioner name the malady, accuse, incarcerate and punish others for their own criminal madness.
To be named schizophrenic/witch must surely be a crime. Why else would such inhumane punishment be meted out, disguised in the wretched raiment of therapy? Carve on their tombstones, 'We did it for their own good': never, R.I.P. For those who make the terrible, the unforgivable choice of being different, there is no peace before the inquisitor, or the psychiatrist.
The nurse quickly disconnected the woman's body from the instrument of her "salvation", still twitching uncontrollably, and with the help of the attendant, placed her on the gurney. They wheeled her quickly into the recovery room and left the area: the attendant to the back wards and the nurse to her small office off the long hall.
Two hours later, unattended, the woman died, without protest, without a fight, alone...battered in body and spirit, without ever having been asked, "What's wrong?"
In the psychiatric clinic, souls do not exist, nor spirit, nor Atman, not even the elegant 'élan vital'. Such delusory ideas are hateful to the meat-body, machine-mind of psychiatric medicine. The beautiful word 'psyche' meaning spirit, unfortunate root to the word, psychiatrist, has never been recognized by that evil trade.
Chapter 2
The night was soft, darkest blue. A cuckoo's voice in the cedars called for the dawn, still an hour and a half away.
In the arid mountains of eastern Turkey, the heavy air was filled with the final gathering of the night's moisture; there drifted odors that might have delighted a wandering Phoenician a thousand years before the birth of Christ.
All around was crag and tor in shades of brown and gray, unrelieved except for a few box myrtle, stunted cedar and wild flowers. Here, lovers of desert, hills and solitude could find peace.
At 04:35 AM a man left the compound and stood quietly just outside the gate. He stared into the darkness and saw no color in the surrounding mountains, only shadows.
A modern gate, three inches of tool steel with a Lexan center, had been mounted in a stone wall that was five hundred years old and four feet thick. An alert marine sentry operated the locks. They didn't talk.
Watching him start his run down the mountain road, the Marine shook his head and muttered.
"Mr. Gilbert Austin Piers the III, you are one crazy bastard. What the hell, at least you're not a limp-dick fairy like most of the weirdoes who work around here."
Because Gilbert made the run twice a week, the sentries had his routine worked out in every detail. Gilbert ran unaware that he was a topic of discussion among the Marine contingent.
The first time he went on his bi-weekly jaunt, the sergeant in charge ordered Private Nicols to go with him, make sure he didn't get in trouble. Private Nicols came back to the compound wheezing like a man with emphysema.
Among themselves they called him 'Mad Gilbert’, but there was respect. The private reported on his trek in detail.
"Y'all wouldn't believe it to look at him, Staff. I mean he probably don't weigh more'n one-fifty soaking wet, and what is he, five-ten tops?"
There were murmurs of agreement from the other men.
"Anyhow, off we go. He's wearing them old, baggy tan pants and a sweat shirt got a picture of that French singer, Mireille Mathieu on the front and back."
If Mlle. Mathieu ever had the misfortune to hear the private pronounce her name, she wouldn't have had the slightest idea what he was talking about. His slow, singsong cadence that made every statement a question came from the hills west of Winston Salem, North Carolina.
"He's got his rucksack, always got the same stuff in it, right?" Nichols started to name off the contents of Gilbert's pack, ticking each item off on his fingers.
"He's got his mountain climber's stove, a container of fuel, a metal tin of wax-covered matches; you know, them kind you get in a Boy Scout kit. Then there's two tins of beef stew, a half pound of goat cheese, a few pieces of fruit and two quarts of water in plastic containers."
The corporal who had gate duty that day nodded his head after each item.
"There's a few other odds and ends; a big 'ole survival knife, you know, one of them Ranger jobs with a compass in the hilt. On top is two books. Man, them suckers 'er dog-eared and bent like my Momma's Bible. One's a paperback by a guy called Montaigne (the private pronounced it, Montag-nee) and the other one looks real old, by a guy called, Emerson.
"And like...he don't say shit, he just looks at you with those puppy dog’s eyes, like my daddy's setter. I mean, it ain't like he's some kind of fag or nothin', but he's just too pretty. Do him good to get his nose broke or something, maybe he wouldn't look like them guys advertising fifty-dollar shirts in Playboy.
"He's just there, patient. Like it's okay with him if you screw around that dumb gate for a week, but you know it's weird, him bein' so patient, I really felt like I better get my shit together."
Private Nicols shook his head in puzzlement, remembering.
"So he sees I'm ready and just takes off running, no warm up, no nothing. I've really got to step on it to keep up and I'm in pretty good shape. Not like old Gilbert though. This guy's an iron-man!" Private Nicols voice was filled with admiration.
Gilbert would have been surprised to hear the marines taking such an interest in him. Some people, even friends, accused him of monomania, of being too self-involved. He didn't mind the company of others, but his interests were singular and he seldom met anyone who shared the things he cared about.
When the gate shut behind him, he stood still for a moment, then set off running easily down a dirt track that angled northward
