FCYU-Feature Story

They Made Me a Zombie
I needed to express myself, not take pills

By Zachary Holman

When I was young I had a horrible temper. Anything could easily anger me; they called me “out of control.” I also had a hip deformity and had to wear special shoes and leg braces when I was little.

Starting at around age 7, after the leg braces came off, I had fights almost every day in school. At home it was the same thing. If someone got me angry I kicked holes in walls, smashed stuff, even threw myself on the floor and banged my head into walls. And it didn’t hurt.

I lived with my grandmother, and then my aunt, but my mother stayed in my life, and they were all fighting all the time. Nobody listened to me, so I held a lot in. This caused the blowups and the tantrums. I would hold in all these emotions—frustration, anger, sadness—for a long time and then the littlest thing would set me off.

Anger actually made me feel physically better. I could have a tantrum for hours and not feel a hint of exhaustion. All the anger I just blew off made my body feel empty. But after I calmed down, my stomach would hurt, and I would have a headache.

It was hard to stop my rage, and honestly at times I didn’t want to stop. “Out-of-control” was the wrong term from my perspective. My rage helped me get my emotions out because I wasn’t doing it in any other form. It felt therapeutic. Plus I wasn’t the only kid in that school who fought; there was a lot of violence there.

‘Play Group’

When I was 9 years old, I was referred to a psychiatrist because of my wild outbursts. I was sent to what the doctor called a “play group.” There were 15 other boys and one girl. The kids seemed calm and friendly, but as they shared their stories you could see why they were placed in the group. The girl was in there for arson. She liked to play with fire and burn things. Being part of this group of kids made me understand that people thought I was really crazy.

The good thing in the group was that no one could judge you or call you anything because we all had issues. Outside the room, people thought there was something wrong with me. I think adults couldn’t understand what could get a young kid so angry. Some of the things that made me furious were people making fun of the way I walk and my aunt yelling at me and threatening me.

My aunt also put me in family therapy with her. That was a big sign to me that said Crazy Kid. I hated it. All I did was sit there and listen to my aunt complain about the things I did. All I heard was “This is unacceptable and it needs to stop.” No one ever asked why I did it or what was going on with me. Sometimes the therapist would ask me what I felt after my aunt left the room, but at that point I was usually already angry and I didn’t want to give much.

Too Much Anger

Besides therapy, I also had to go to the group every Friday, even though it didn’t work for me. My problems were still the same. They didn’t go away. I was still arguing and fighting with people. And I had to miss school to go to group.

So after a few months, I asked my aunt if I could quit and she said yes. She agreed that these kids had more issues than I did and that missing school wasn’t worth it.

But I still had the same problem: When I’d express myself through anger, people thought I was troubled and crazy. The real problem was that at the time, I didn’t know how to express myself in any other way.

Soon after that, I was put on medication. My aunt didn’t want to, but since nothing else was working, this seemed like the only option. My doctor was a Caucasian male, very tall and old. He was friendly and explained why I was seeing him and what was going to happen very clearly.

The medication was called Concerta. He explained to me that the medicine was going to make me calm and more mellow, less angry. He explained how many pills I was supposed to take a day and when I should take them.

In school I would have to go to the water fountain and take a pill right before entering class. It seemed to work at first. I was calmer and didn’t fight as much. But as the days went by, the side effects got worse. After taking the medicine I would feel like a zombie. A week after I started on the drug, I fell asleep in class, which then happened every day. Funny thing is, since I was the “crazy kid,” the teachers let me sleep.

It was terrible. I was missing class because I would go to sleep and people wouldn’t wake me up. I’m a very active kid, but on Concerta, I didn’t want to move or do anything. This medicine did more than what it was supposed to and I knew I had to do something. Even though I didn’t know what the word advocacy meant at 9 years old, you could say I took a stand.

That Zombie Feeling

I knew that even though the medication made me less active and angry, it made me feel miserable and I couldn’t take it anymore. I told my aunt that I wasn’t going to take the pills because of the way they made me feel. She said it was fine, because she could see that taking the pills was ruining my day in school. My aunt went back to the doctor with me and told him that I wasn’t taking the pills because of the way they made me feel.

My doctor tried giving me a lower dose, but it didn’t work. I took the new pills for a couple weeks and it was slightly easier to get through the day, but that zombie feeling was still there. I felt dead. I needed to stop feeling this way, so I stopped taking the medicine.

I know now that this was a bad decision. It can be dangerous to just stop taking your medicine without telling your doctor. There can be bad side effects.

A Better Way

But I did get better without medication. I eventually transferred to another school with a lot of arts programs. The people at the school made me feel welcome and seemed to believe that everyone should have a voice. They didn’t want me to feel that I couldn’t voice my own opinion. The staff cared about me and really worked with me through my issues. From there on, my anger got easier to deal with.

Now that I’m older, my anger is still in me but it takes a lot to bring it out of me. I’ve learned over the years that reacting that way isn’t the right way and it gets me nowhere. There was a lot of fighting at home that I tried to avoid by holding my emotions in. That’s why I was so angry. I never told people what was on my mind and held in as much as I could until I blew up. I think it would have been easier if I had been in a different school at the time and if things were easier at home.

My old school was full of violence and kids who were “out of control.” So we ran around the school and had fights all the time. I think I’ve grown since then so even if I found myself back in a violent environment now I would be able to handle it a lot better and hold myself together.

I think advocating for myself in these type of situations is a lot easier now because I’m able to express how I feel when something is bothering me. I can speak up for myself now and deal with conflicts without resorting to violence—and without taking any drugs.

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