Accepting People as They Are

During my last year in medical school I roomed with a guy named Greg. He was the brother of a friend of mine who had moved to New York to attend Union Theological Seminary. Greg had lived with him until he got accepted to Union and he didn’t want Greg to have to live by himself. I was kind of tired of being alone in my apartment anyway, and it was nice to have someone to share the rent.

Greg was several years older than I, but we got along fine. He was neat and had a  pleasant personality. He wasn’t opinionated and didn’t have any rowdy friends. He was taking some classes at Central State University in Edmond, Oklahoma, so both of us were busy, and we both studied in the evenings. There was something unique about Greg though. He was paranoid schizophrenic.

Greg’s brother didn’t actually tell me much about him, so I didn’t know much except for his diagnosis. He had done some outlandish things in the past. He told me that he had once walked down Main Street in his underwear brandishing a pistol, but at the time I knew him he had learned how to control his behavior, and he was on a big dose of Thorazine, I think 800mg a day.    

I didn’t notice anything very unusual about Greg. He was very open and would talk about his history or his experiences if I asked, but I didn’t pry. I didn’t want him to feel uncomfortable.

Greg didn’t drive, so if he needed to buy groceries, go to the laundromat, or just get out of the apartment, I would take him, since I had a car. He rode the bus to school. When we went out he would glance around at the cars behind or beside us. When I asked why he said that he thought someone was following us. I reassured him, but he kept looking around anyway.

The other thing Greg did that was unusual, especially in those days, the early ‘60’s, was listen constantly to a little radio he carried with him every where he went. When I asked him why, he told me that it was to drown out the voices. It was then that I started to realize how miserable he must be, having to listen constantly to hallucinations. They weren’t just the ordinary daydreams either.  They told him that he was in danger, that people were plotting against him, and it was hard for him to ignore them, hard not to believe them, even though he knew logically that they weren’t real. He would tell me sometimes about the voices, I think just to get me to reassure him. 

Greg was kind of childish. He not only relied on me to help him fight against his hallucinations. I also helped him to establish a routine. I got him up in the morning, helped him with his breakfast. He told me his schedule so I could make sure he got to class on time. He was having trouble with his weight, so I put him on a diet, which he followed to the letter and lost twenty pounds in a month. He wasn’t stupid. He was just constantly distracted. I can’t imagine what it was like for him.

Greg and I roomed together for a year and then I left him. I went to St. Louis for my internship. After a couple of months I heard that he had killed himself. He got in the bathtub and dropped a lamp in the water. It still hurts when to think about it.