Something Was Wrong - S2 Ep5: Devastated in the Wake of Your Delusions

Episode Date: September 11, 2019

*Content Warning: gaslighting, domestic abuse, emotional and physical abuse, distressing themes, childhood abuse, medical trauma, factitious disorder.Music from Glad Rags album Wonder UnderSources :Mayo ClinicPsychology TodaySupport Something Was Wrong on PatreonPurchase Everything Sucks - A Gratitude Journal for People Who Have Been Through Some Sh*t

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Interesting. Okay. That's what's happening. That's what's happening. Well, the day she's supposed to be going and getting her overriot, I'm off for the day. And I know Jason's taking her to Stanford. And then I expect to hear in the next few days how everything's going.

Well, my phone rings. And it's Jason. And he says, do you know where Sylvia is? And I go, well, you're supposed to be taking her to Stanford. And he goes, she told me you were taking her to Stanford. She told me you were taking her. And then right then it was back in the day of call waiting. Call waiting.

And I was like, hang on just a second. because work is calling me. And he goes, okay, so I put him on hold. It's the practice manager. And she says, T, something is really wrong. And I don't know what to do. And I was afraid to call you, but I have to call you. I said, what's going on?

And she goes, Sylvia was just here. And she looked terrible. She looked drugged out. She was wobbly. And I asked her. I said, hey, I thought you're going to Stanford today. To, you know, and she goes, I am. And she said, okay.

She goes, do you need a ride? Like, what's happening? And she goes, no, no. So the practice manager went back up front to help a client. And when she came back down the hall, she saw her, Sylvia, closing her purse and then walking out the door. What she was doing at the hospital. We don't know, but something was wrong.

She said, I'm not sure what's happening, but something is really wrong. I think we all suspected that she was taking medical supplies. She was where the scoppels and syringes and suture were. The medications are locked up in a cupboard. You can't really get those. But basic supplies, you can access. Anyone could access it works there. But medications are locked.

in a cupboard, so you couldn't get those. And she didn't look right, too. So I clicked back over on the call waiting to Jason and I tell him what's happened. He goes, what the fuck is going on? I said, I have no idea. But my stomach hurt, like instantly. And I go, what do you think is happening? And he goes, I really don't know. And then I got to phone with him and I called my hospital back And I said, what you think is going on? We're all like something is wrong. Two hours later, I get a phone call. It's the young gal that lives next door to her.

And she says, Sylvia just called me. She's at a hospital in town. She's asked me to pick her up. She said that she had her over-removed and that she was AMA, which is against medical advice, signing a waiver because she wants to go home. And I go, you can't go home after you have your ovary removed. That's just dumb. And she said, I know.

but that's what she's doing. And she goes, Dee, I think something is wrong. Yeah, I think something is wrong too. So I tell her what's going on what's happened in the morning time.

All we know is like fire bells are going off and all of our heads, but nobody can figure out what's happening. Okay, I want you to know that. Nobody, we still have no idea. This is such a strange thing.

Like, we're still all just like standing around. Our mouth is open, like trying to figure out what the hell can be going on. Well, we find out what the hell's going on. And let me tell you.

something. We could not have dreamed what was going on. We could never in a million years have believed what's going on. The young gal calls me and she said, um, are you sitting down? I said, what the hell is going on? Please tell me what's happening. I'm sick. And she said, I went to pick her up. She was in the waiting room in a wheelchair. She looked like hell. She said, I was furious. Like, how can they be releasing this woman. She said, I wheeled her to my car and I picked her up and I put her in my front seat. And as I was turning to go, Sylvie said, where are you going? Where are you going? And she was taking the wheelchair back. It's not your wheelchair. It's the hospital. And she goes, okay. So she rolls the wheelchair into the emergency room entrance. And she said,

how on earth are you guys discharging this person who can barely walk, who looks like she is going to die, Right now, how can you release her? I mean, she was furious with the nurse. She was furious. And the nurse goes, she wasn't here for her over removal. She got fluids. So at this point, now the firebells are going off in this gal's head, too. She drives her home.

She puts her in the bed. And then Sylvia gets out of the bed. And she goes, I have to go to the bathroom. She's in there, like 15, 20 minutes. and she comes out, and when she's crawling back into the bed, the friend notices, because her shirt comes up, right? So she's getting in the bed, she crawling into bed, and her t-shirt rises up. And she sees a bandage that was not there when she picked her up because she knows because she helped her in the car. So the shirt rose then to, so she knew that wasn't there.

So she confronted her. And she said, what the hell is going on? What is going on? And right then in there, Sylvia said, it's all been a lie. I don't have cancer. I just cut myself open and sewed myself back up so that you guys would think I had my over removed. She said, I'm not sick. And I started telling a lie and I didn't know how to stop.

And it's out of control and I don't know what to do. Yeah. It was just unfathomable to me that someone could do this. And I was just, I mean, I remember being angry and, sad and shocked and I just I didn't even know how to process it. I think I was just like in complete shock. I had never ever heard of anything like this happening before. My mom's my best friend, so it's just hard to see someone you love go through such heartbreak and loss.

Blown away. I felt sad for tea because she loved Sylvia. like a daughter and took care of her. She was educated enough to know what she was doing and how to, how to present it to everybody. We found out that the reason somebody dropped her off and somebody picked her up because she really wasn't going in and getting treatments done, but she'd go into a bathroom stall and cut herself or shave her head or those kind of things go, I can blow you away. Then after Sylvia fell asleep, she called me, the neighbor.

And I said, okay, we need to call her mom. We need to get her mom here. And we did. She said, it's going to take me a day and have to get there. She's in Canada. She couldn't leave until the next morning. She said, you have to act like nothing's wrong until I get there. And I'll take her to the hospital and we'll 50-150 and we'll go from there.

Okay. Did the neighbor girl swear to secrecy? Yeah, absolutely. She was like, please don't tell anyone? Absolutely. And the girl convinced her that I'm going. Yeah, I'm on your side. It's going to be okay.

So I have to keep with the routine, right? It was my day and the next day. So as you can imagine, I was up all night long, stomach upset, talking to all the people at my place of work, talking to my husband. I go over the next day. I walk in the front door and it smells like a weed factor. just gunga. Like, so I walk in and I was like, oh, God. I mean, I cannot tell you how much weed had to have been smoked for that house to be like that. And I look in on her and she's passed out. Well, I would assume so because she clearly had smoked her brains out. Probably

stressed out, right? I just did what I was supposed to do that day. I came in, I cleaned. I left her a note saying I was there and I taped it to the bedpost, but she never woke up or she didn't choose to act like she was awake. And I'm really grateful for that. And then I walked out that door and I never saw her again. Her mom came. They told her they were taking her to the hospital because she was running a fever or something like that.

They convinced her to go to the emergency room and then they 51-50ed her. But this girl was so smart and so convincing and so compelling that she was out in 48 hours. She did not even get the 72-hour hold. She was out. And I talked to her mom and her sister were both there. And I went to the mental hospital, and I talked to the mom and the sister that day. And we were all just kind of like in support of one another, like this is, but you have to remember she's sick. And we were all kind of had that mentality, like, she's really sick.

Something, you know, this was terribly wrong. How did this happen? was nothing true? We're not even positive. Is nothing true? Did she have nothing? Like, well, it turned out she did not have cancer. It turned out that she had cut herself open

for all those procedures and sewed herself back up. It turned out that she was, she had injections that she was giving herself at home and then asking other people to give her injections into her stomach or saline, which is water. None of it was true. She wasn't sick. She didn't have cancer.

She was not getting chemo. She was not getting radiation. She did not have brain surgery. She didn't need a wheelchair. She was mentally ill. Do you think her son was actually sick? No. I think she was doing much house on by proxy.

I do. I absolutely do. Do you think she was making him sick? Yep. Mm-hmm. I sure do. I think she was, if you give somebody medications, it can cause seizures because that's what she did to herself. She did have a seizure.

I was there. I saw her have a seizure, but she made herself have a seizure with medications. She's lucky she didn't kill herself. So I believe that she was giving her son medications that made him sick. She also probably never had a West Nile virus. Correct. Mm-hmm. Yeah, pretty...

Never had pregnancies that failed? No, just probably the one abortion that was that I went there for, yeah. The rest of all. And you do believe she actually was having an abortion? Yeah. Okay. Yeah.

Yeah, she told me she was pregnant all those times and then lost the baby. I think that was all lies for attention. There were several times in this time period where she was sexually promiscuous and doing research, that's part of the illness as well. I knew about those. I was actually probably supportive.

Go, you're nine. You go. You go, you have fun, girl. What was the response like of the doctor and your coworkers? Better shock and hurt, betrayal. But I would say shock, number one, all of us. The day we found out, I go to bed early. I always do.

Go to bed eight o'clock and, yeah, when he called me at 10.30 because he couldn't sleep. The doctor. I knew. I was like, yeah, I can't sleep. I cannot fathom this. And of course, my instant thing was, how could she do this to me? How could she hurt me? How could she lie to me? How could she betray me? Like, you know, when you're taking care of someone to that extent, and you're bathing them, and you're cooking for them, and you're caring for their children, and you are sacrificing your family for her. This went on the whole time span, I'd say from beginning to end, was like almost four years. And telling your children you're sick, telling your children that you're dying, to the point where your children need therapy. So she's 5150, but not really. Not really.

Yeah. And did she have no contact with you? Within the first week of finding out Doc and I got the same email. I had saved it for many years and it got lost. I had saved some things and some things he saved so we're able to put together. But the email that we got said, something like I know I'd lied and betrayed you. I have come to find out that I never had cancer, that I never had all the treatments, that I had a cancerous mass, or I had a cancerous spot in my ovary in 2001 or 2000, and it was removed on an outpatient basis, and I never had cancer. I want you to believe that, and I remember this email very vividly, so it was pretty gushed around close to reading it to you. I really believed that all of my treatments at Stanford were true.

I can picture myself laying on the steel pool table. I can picture myself getting painful procedures. I thought that I did have chemo and radiation. I know that I have betrayed and lied to you, you know, you'll probably never be able to forgive me. I hope someday that you can. I'm still learning that what I have is called fictitious disorder, and I'm going to get help for it was the crux of the letter. The Mayo Clinic defines factitious disorder as a serious mental disorder

in which someone deceives others by appearing sick, by purposefully getting sick, or by self-injury. Factitious disorder can also happen when family members or caregivers falsely present others such as children as being ill, injured, or impaired. Factitious disorder symptoms can range from mild, slight exaggeration of symptoms, to severe, previously called Munchausen syndrome. The person may make up symptoms or even tamper with medical tests to convince others that treatment such as high-risk surgery is needed.

Factitious disorder is not the same as inventing medical problems for practical benefit, such as getting out of work or winning a lawsuit. Although people with factitious disorder know they are causing their symptoms or illnesses, they may not understand the reasons for their behaviors or recognize themselves as having a problem. Factitious disorder is challenging to identify and hard to treat. However, medical and psychiatric help are critical for preventing serious injury and even death caused by self-harm, typical of this disorder. People with factitious disorder go to great lengths to hide their deception,

so it may be difficult to realize that the symptoms are actually part of a serious mental health disorder. They continue with deception even without receiving any visible benefit or reward when faced with objective evidence that doesn't support their claims. Factitious disorder signs in symptoms may include clever and convincing medical or psychological problems. Extensive knowledge of medical terms and diseases. Vague or inconsistent symptoms. conditions that get worse for no apparent reason, conditions that don't respond as expected to

standard therapies, seeking treatment from many different doctors or hospitals which may include using a fake name, reluctance to allow doctors to talk to family or friends or to other healthcare professionals, frequent stays in the hospital, eagerness to have frequent testing or risky operations, many surgical scars or evidence of numerous procedures, having few visitors when hospitalized and arguing with doctors and staff. Because people with factitious disorder become experts at faking symptoms and diseases or inflicting real injuries upon themselves, it may be hard for health care professionals and loved ones to know if illnesses are real or not. People with factitious disorder make up symptoms or cause illnesses in several ways, such as exaggerating existing

symptoms. Even when the actual medical or psychological condition exists, they may exaggerate symptoms to appear sicker or more impaired than is true. Making up histories, they may give loved ones, healthcare professionals, or support groups, a false medical history, such as claiming to have had cancer or AIDS. Or they may falsify medical records to indicate an illness. They may fake symptoms such as stomach pain, seizures, or passing out. They may make themselves sick, for example, injecting themselves with bacteria, milk, gasoline, or feces. They may injure, cut, or burn themselves. They may take medications such as blood thinners or drugs for diabetes to mimic diseases. They may also interfere with wound healing, such as reopening or infecting cuts. They may manipulate medical instruments to

skew results, such as heating up thermometers, or they may tamper with lab tests, such as contaminating their urine samples with blood or other substances. People with factitious disorder may be well aware of the risk of injury or even death as a result of self-harm or the treatment they seek, but they can't control their behaviors and they're unlikely to seek help. Even when confronted with objective proof, such as a videotape, that they're causing their illness, they often deny it and refuse psychiatric help. The cause of factitious disorder is unknown. However, the disorder may be caused by a combination of psychological factors and stressful life experiences. Several factors may increase the risk of developing factitious disorder,

including childhood trauma such as emotional, physical, or sexual abuse, a serious illness during childhood, loss of a loved one through death, illness, or abandonment. Past experiences during a time of sickness and the attention it brought. A poor sense of identity or self-esteem. Personality disorders. depression, desire to be associated with doctors or medical centers, and work in the health care field. Factitious disorder is considered rare, but it's not known how many people have this disorder. Some people use fake names to avoid detection, some visit many different hospitals or doctors,

and some are never identified, all of which make it difficult to get a reliable estimate. People with factitious disorder are willing to risk their lives to be seen as sick. They frequently have other mental health disorders as well. As a result, they face many possible complications, including injury or death from self-inflicted medical conditions, severe mental health problems from infections or unnecessary surgery or procedures, loss of organs and limbs from unnecessary surgery, alcohol or other substance abuse,

significant problems in daily life, relationships, and work, abuse when the behavior is inflicted on another. Conversely, malingering is the purposeful production of falsely or grossly exaggerated physical and or psychological symptoms with the goal of receiving a reward. This reward may include money and insurance settlement, drugs, release from incarceration, or the avoidance of punishment, work, jury duty, the military, or some kind of service. Malingering is not a psychiatric disorder. It is similar to, but distinct from, fictitious disorder.

Malingering is also separate from somatic symptom disorder in which a person experiences real psychological distress from imagined or exaggerated symptoms. Malingering can lead to abuse of the medical system with unnecessary tests being performed and time taken away from other patients. And she had her story so good. Like most people could not have pulled this off. You have to remember how smart she was. Like she was brilliant because she kept everybody in a box so that none of us intersected.

Like her husband didn't intersect with me. She made it to where we were all segregated and separate and that nobody knew what the other person knew. And I believe that she had a whole separate thing with Jason, a whole separate set of lies, a whole separate set for me. She probably had told her mom a whole separate set. She probably just telling her children a whole separate set. I believe that she had all of these balls in play. And somehow she masterfully juggled them, masterfully. How do you think she was getting all of the medications?

Do you think she was just doctor shopping? Yes. Going to a bunch of different doctors? Yep. Well, I don't know what she could have gotten in the nursing when she was doing nursing. Because she may have had access to meds. And in the prison, I'm not sure. But yeah, I do definitely think that she was shopping around.

And I think she would go to this doctor for this med. And she was smart enough to know what to ask for. So she would research and find out what medication asked for. And I believe that she was doing munchausen. Like, I believe she was taking medication to make herself vomit. I believe she was taking laxatives. Because you saw her vomiting. Right.

I believe she gave herself laxatives to have diarrhea because then you're dehydrated. And when you're dehydrated, you look bad. You have the rings on it. your eyes, you have that sallow look, you're lethargic, and I believe that she did, she didn't fake her symptoms

so much, I believe she was having those symptoms. She was creating them. Absolutely, so she did damage to herself. There you go, because there's the mental illness aspect where you almost can't be too mad because she harmed herself.

So it wasn't that she just lied and said she had brain surgery. she cut the back of her head open and sewed it up. So yeah, are you mad because she lied to or are you mad because she had mental illness? It's a fine line. And as a human, compassionate human being, you try juggling that inside your body. I'm trying to figure that out. It's hard to figure out, like, what the hell was actually going on.

So I wrote her a letter, which you have in front of you. Do you want to read it? Sure. So I wrote this letter to her because I did not talk to her and I made myself not call her. I really wish I would have gotten an answer to this letter. I think it would have helped me, but I did not get an answer to this letter. Nothing. Nothing.

I know she got it because I did talk to the neighbor girl on and off for the first year afterwards. And she did keep in contact with her and she did talk to her and she did tell her that she got my letter. Okay. So I wrote this on November 14, 2007. Dear Sylvia, after speaking with you a few weeks ago, I realized I do have a few questions that I would like answered. Remember, all I really know is what this attached brief email was sent shortly after you were hospitalized. You said you were really ill when you were having the seizures in front of your daughter. Do you remember taking 10 to 20 pills by the handful several times a day?

I believe that this led to your seizures. I don't know if you remember what all has transpired in the past four years, since neither you nor your doctor have asked me any questions about what I witnessed while you were ill and delusional. How do you know what is fact and what are delusions? If your view of reality was so cloudy, then how can you properly heal without the information? When talking to you, you seem not to have remorse, but you are stunned to find, out people have abandoned you. I do not detect guilt or sorrow for what you have put others through. The comment you made about why you should tell the doctor or me how you are or what you are doing to get help,

why would I do that? For your curiosity, how about you do something unselfish, something for the others that have been devastated in the wake of your delusions? Because you were sick, does not negate the devastation you have caused everyone in your life. I don't understand how two months ago you were in a wheelchair wearing diapers and thinking you were dying. And now, because you know this is untrue, you just snap into reality. I feel you are downplaying what has happened to you. I know you are in therapy. I am glad. However, I am not sure that that is enough. You are working and taking care of your child while you're fighting for custody of your other child. I think you should be focused on fighting for your mental health. Questions I need answers to. One, are you sorry for what you have done?

Two, do you know what you did was wrong? Three, are you telling the truth now? Are you telling the truth to your counselors? Four, what were you injecting into your body? Five, do you remember taking handfuls of pills, taking things to make yourself vomit? Six, did you ever? Did you ever have cancer or treatment? If so, what, when, and where? Seven, when you would come by work after a doctor's appointment crying and devastated, you had to have come from home and done a great acting job. Is it like two personalities, the sick Sylvia and the planning Sylvia to make the sickness real? Where did you go when you were supposed to be at Stanford getting brain surgery? What are you doing to get better? Do you or did you ever love all of it?

of us. I can tell you that we truly cared about you. The abandoning from all is a self-protection for all of our mental well-being. You have hurt all of us so badly. How can we put ourselves out there to a pathological liar with severe mental illness? What if you lie or hurt us again? Can you understand that? Especially since you have done nothing to reassure us or make any kind of amends, We are not even sure if you are truly sorry for what you have done. You know that I absolutely love you. No way could any person go through what I chose to go through with you without love. I have been devastated and hurt deeply by all of this.

I feel abandoned by you, by your family. I took care of you on my own free will for years. Cleaned your toilet. Cooked for your kids. Laid in bed with you with my dying friend. I moved you five times. I was there for you. I wanted to be there for you. At the end of the day, all I got was, I'm mentally ill. Sorry, I'll be in touch. Great. What am I supposed to do with that? Your illness faked and real has ripped so many people. Can you at least answer my questions and tell me

what and how you are feeling? I do miss you, and I hope the best for you. If ever your counselors want to speak with me, I would be open to that. I do love you, Sylvia. T. Yeah, that's hard. Do you even read now? Yeah. So you never got answers to those questions. I do know that she, because she talked to the the gal that lived next door that she had told her that, you know, we abandoned her. And how could we do that when she was mentally ill? And that's where I knew, you know, how I know all of that. But yeah, how selfish even then. Yeah. Maybe we're fucking tired after doing this for four years with you. And how, like, the audacity of someone to be mad because we abandon you? Are you fucking kidding me?

Like, for real? Right? It's astounding, isn't it? It's astounding. Next time. Like, I did talk to the daughter after she was found out. I believe... Was it before she passed away or after she was?

Before she passed away. Something was wrong is written, recorded, edited, and produced by me, Tiffany Reese. All of the music by Gladwrap. Hear their album Wonder Under on iTunes. Follow the hashtag Something Was Wrong Pod on Instagram. You can now purchase something was wrong merch at www.spreadless.com. The books referenced on this show can be found linked in the show notes. If you or someone you know is being abused,

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