How long does the Dark Night of the Soul last?

I had a legal order to remain at the mental health clinic for 6 weeks more due to the “escape attempt” and “pushing the nurse at the lab to grab the blood tube”.

(Which in reality did not happened, the nurse was in another table in front of where the tubes were. Not even close. “There are three sides to every story: Your Side, My Side, The Truth”).

At the moment I received the restriction order, I was already out of the “Altered State of Consciousness”, but certainly in a “What the f*ck did just happened” moment. 

One can barely rationalize the Spiritual Awakening experience immediately, and adding that either I could hire a lawyer or accept the legal order was just not helpful at all to understand.

So, it was the first week of the internation and the Altered State of Consciousness, plus the 6 weeks by law, which makes it 7 weeks, so where are the 2 weeks left to make it 9 weeks in total?

At the mental health clinic, I was in two different stations.

The first station is where they keep people with different levels of situations. 

Those first weeks of my sentence, I either could remain like a couch potato or be more active.

During breakfast, lunch and dinner, I volunteered to clean the tables and pick up all the dishes to help the nurses. 

I attended to the music and art classes offered at the first stage, and still in the spare time, I wrote.

But also, the doctors started to medicate me. 

Unfortunately, the side effects of psychiatric medication are terrible, such as one generates anxiety, loses mobility, have less thought clearity, the ability to sleep is gone, hand shaking and tremors, and in men, we can’t have an erection.

In my understanding, these effects are what actually could make men more violent, by supressing their instincts and emotions, instead of helping them to release them. 

Therefore, what is done by doctors is to give more pills to counter the side effects.

From what I saw, some patients ended up with more than 10 pills.

No wonder why some people come back to the underworld after being released, it is too much of withdrawal symptoms.

This is not the path towards healing.

Eventually, a “good behaviour”, or showing that one is more in “reality”, helped me to move to the second station at the clinic, an open cabin house. 

The time at the second station started to be more of a reflection period.

The surroundings of the clinic are so gorgeous, full of nature and with a close walk to the vineyards, which that of course helped.

I kept attending to art and music classes, plus I was given the choice to do some farm work.

It was a time of starting to listen to the inner voice.

After an Ego Death, these 9 weeks felt like a gestation period.

But, there was a point where it felt to be comfortable to be at the clinic, medicated, no worries, just a simple routine and with a fear of leaving the place.  

This could also resemble of how was my real gestation time as a baby in my mother’s womb, warm, being feed, just a simple routine, and it is also said that there is a psychological impact of the birth. 

Instead of bringing up the desire to go out to the world, for me, the place encouraged to remain there.  

It was another internal fight deep inside me.

I also used this time to medidate on the future of my life.

As I accomplished the 7 weeks, in one of the weekly 3-5 minutes short appointment with doctor, they wanted me to stay longer “due to Coronavirus”, but I wanted to leave.

In another, 3-5 minutes short appointment with the psychologist, she told me that it was better if I stay longer, and eventually I felt it like a threat, because she literally said that if I did not stay longer, I could have another psychotic episode. 

So the “people-pleaser” inside me, agreed to stay longer one week more. 

And it happened again, the doctor insisted to stay one more week.

I reached the 9th week, until I had the medical release order. 

I left the clinic the 10th of June 2020.