The Winner

When The Party's Over

Drug and Alcohol Detox Timeline.

Stage 1 Minor hand tremors. Stress. Anxiety. Loss of appetite. Sweating. Headaches. Nausea/vomiting. Mood swings. Heart palpitations.

Stage 2 Hallucinations. Mental confusion. Irritability. Withdrawal seizures. Increased blood pressure.

Stage 3 Delirium tremens-On and off fever. Shaking. Confusion. Hallucinations. High blood pressure.

*****

*Julia*

It's been a full 24 hours since I had my nervous breakdown.

Unfortunately James has been in and out of Nate's "compound" since early yesterday morning due to his mom having some issues. He is on no sleep and being stretched in all directions lately. I know it's starting to wear him down. We haven't had the chance to really talk much since I flipped my lid on everyone. We have yet to privately discuss what happened the other day. Privacy is one thing I haven't earned from anyone yet.

Nate is currently in between stages of detox. He has enough of an addiction to have the severity of all of stage 1 for symptoms, Increased blood pressure and irritability of stage 2, as well as on and off fevers and shaking in stage 3. Fortunately no signs of hallucinations, confusion or withdrawal seizures. I had no idea he drank as much he did. I don't think Trisha was aware either.

Looks like the party's over. Now on to the hard stages of cleaning up the toxic mess he made out of his body.

This morning, Nate's fever came back. He's shaking, sweating, experiencing headaches, mood swings, nausea, and his blood pressure is all over the place. The only thing that eases the symptoms- the sedative. He's on Ativan every few hours to get through the day.

"Can you take this damn IV out of my hand already?" Nate snaps at Jonah, clearly in the middle of a mood swing. It's 10am and he doesn't want to lay in bed anymore. The nurse sets him up sitting on the living room couch. Trisha has yet to make her daily appearance, Paul is on the other end of the couch from Nate, and James is sitting on a stool at the kitchen island trying to get as much coffee in his system to get through another day.

"There's gotta be something more you can do. Look at him..." I pace around the room fidgeting with my hands and driving everyone crazy.

"I can take your IV out. It's just saline and electrolytes to keep you hydrated but you're not vomiting so I think you should be ok." Jonah comes back in the living room, snaps on a pair of gloves and takes Nates hand. "Then I need to log in your vitals. You already had your antibiotics, pain reliever, Zofran and an Ativan. It takes time for that to kick in." Jonah pulls out Nate's IV and puts pressure on hand for a few seconds before cleaning the tape off with a wipe and placing a band aide on.

"I do need to change your wound dressing as well as Julia's wounds soon."

"My wound dressing is fine." Nate huffs, not in the mood to cooperate.

He flips through the channels annoyed that both of our faces are still plastered on the tv. How any kind of mental illness leaked out is beyond me but it's the least of our issues right now. We have been too occupied with our symptoms to pay much attention to social media or the news lately.

"Doll, can you PLEASE stop pacing. You're driving me fucking insane." Nate snaps at me and I stop in my tracks. I can feel all eyes on me.

"Sorry." I sit down closer to Paul over Nate who is currently not fond of having a room full of people. Paul is reading the newspaper like an old man even though he can't be much older than me and I can't remember the last time I saw someone under the age of 60 reading a newspaper.