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Jonathan's Confinement age 12

Jonathan's Confinement age 12

When I was twelve years old my father was inpatient at a mental health facility, a modern term for an insane asylum. One day after he had been there a couple weeks, my brother, mother, sister, and grandmother as well as myself were paying him a visit. Prior to going into the main building to check in, there was a sign outside the facility stating no one under the age of 13 could visit. My grandmother Jane that always played by the rules said "if I had seen that sign on the way in we could have told them he was 13." After telling the front desk I was 12 years old I was allowed to be in the hallways, but the day room that is filled with the mentally ill and housed the residents, my father being one of them, was strictly off limits. After living in Ohio state hospital for three months and seeing the type of people confined to such a place it would be borderline traumatic had I seen the worst of the worst at such a young age. It is kind of like a culture shock when living in a mental health place. The residents don't follow rhyme or reason or conventional logic which is in direct contrast to the rules of society. It's not a place for a 19-year-old to be or a 12-year-old to see.

Anyways after checking in my family I was led down a hallway to a central location. I was told that this was as far back as I was allowed to go which caused me to break. I had bottled up so much in by this point in my life that I used not seeing my father that visit as a wrongful injustice and began to cry. The staff directed me to the bench outside of the residential area where I sat and bawled. I cried and cried and I believe me grandmother comforted me some of the time, but most of the time I cried on that bench alone. After the visit the staff having heard my cries and the situation decided to slightly bend the rules. They wouldn't let me near any of the residents but rather allowed my father to step into the hall for a second to hug me, and so we did.