Daniel Fortune

In today’s post, I will be sharing one of the scariest experiences I’ve ever had. In the past, I’ve be severely depressed multiple times. So depressed that I struggled with intense suicidal ideations. In relation to what I will be sharing today, being severely depressed was more tolerable than my experience being hospitalized for homicidal ideations (5150).

Back in 2018, I went through a season of intense anger and frustration. It was scary, because I couldn’t put my finger on the stimulus at first and no amount of positive thinking would absolve my anger.

After a few weeks, as a response/coping mechanism, I began actively looking for an environmental/emotional trigger to direct my anger towards. Without going into too much detail, there was a person that crossed me and helped cause me a great deal of emotional turmoil in the past.

This person was living in the city next to where I was and I found myself taking the long way home afterwork. With my military background, it didn’t take me long to pinpoint where this person lived and what stores he would frequent. In my manic mind, he became the scapegoat for the anger and frustration gnawing at my heart/mind.

I Was Going To Kill Him…

After a couple days of reconnaissance, knowing where he resided and his travel patterns, my thoughts took a more ominous turn. I had found an adequate target for my unresolved anger and bitterness. After all, he had crossed me and earned himself a date with the warrior of wrath.

Getting away with it wouldn’t be that hard. He would frequently meet people in a predictable rotation of inconspicuous places to make drug deals.

I began ruminating about the means and opportunity to take him out without being detected. My plan was simple… aquire a burner phone (paying a bum to buy it on my behalf in a different zipcode), use the burner to stage a drug deal, and stab him in the throat.

Thankfully, I had a change of heart before I went through with it. I shared what I had been struggling with recently with my family, and consented to voluntarily getting help.

Going 5150: 4 Days in the Hospital

I set up an emergency appointment at the VA to share what I had been experiencing recently. I stopped short of telling them about my specific plan but I confessed that I had been scouting a specific person, hunting for info.

That was enough for them to process me for 5150 and institutionalize me in Fresno for 4 days of treatment. At first, the idea was sold to me as a special PTSD treatment facility (it wasn’t).

Upon arriving at the hospital, they pretty much just fed me pills until I had my fill of the place. It was surprising to me how easy it was for me to just go through the motions and get them to clear me for release.

It was basically 4 days of 3 hots, a cot, and one 20 minute session with a psychiatrist. Seemed more like a “check the box” type experience without addressing any of the emotional triggers that had brought me there.

After just 4 days of pill popping and my fill of green jello, I was released.

I was pissed when, two weeks later, the VA sent me the bill for little vacation. Especially, since, my homicidal ideations were deemed to be a combination of emotional triggers associated with being manic and a specific environmental trigger on my commute to work that reminded me of similar environment while I was deployed to Iraq.

So far (fingers crossed), this is the only time I’ve been institutionalized for homicidal ideations. After the experience, I started taking another route on my way to work. Tragedy averted (*as I wipe my brow).