Forty Days from the Diary of a Delusional Man: Revelations and Meditations

By Jeffrey Hochstedler

This memoir takes a look into the heart and mind of one man who suffers from schizoaffective and bipolar disorders.

Jeffrey Hochstedlers life has seen its share of twists and turnsa culmination of the many choices and decisions made at any one time. In this memoir, he shares revelations and meditations from events in his daily life and how these occurrences shaped the man he is today.

Written in diary format, Forty Days from the Diary of a Delusional Man illustrates how his mind thinks, feels, and perceives. He reveals details from many parts of his lifehis birth in 1957; growing up in Indiana with his parents and brother; battling depression in his teen years; enlisting in the Army in 1981; dealing with his relationships and his schizoaffective and bipolar disorders; and finding solace in art.

With many examples of Hochstedlers art included, Forty Days from the Diary of a Delusional Man shows how he was affected by confusion and despair. But it also communicates how he leaned on art and God to survive each day.

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: Apr 29, 2011
• ISBN: 9781462016761

Jeffrey Hochstedler

Jeffrey Hochstedler earned a master’s degree from Ball State University in Muncie, Indiana, and worked in a variety of positions. A disabled vet, he is a studio artist and writer. Hochstedler lives in Elkhart, Indiana, near his hometown of Goshen. He has two grown children.

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Contents

PREFACE

ACKNOWLEDGMENT

Part I

To Forgive Is

Not the Same as Forgettting

EARLY YEARS

THE BEGINNINGS OF DEPRESSION

JUNIOR HIGH AND GLORY DAYS

BLACK SHEEP

SCARS

HONORABLE DISCHARGE

LIFE AS A CHAMELEON

LESSONS A PROFESSOR NEEDS TO LEARN

BURN YOURSELF BEFORE THEY BURN YOU

DISCIPLINE AND DISCIPLESHIP

BLOWN ABOUT BY VOICES

STRIVE FOR A BETTER TOMORROW

YOU GET WHAT YOU GET

COMPANIONSHIP

THANKFUL FOR PAIN

LIFE’S CHOICES

CONFUSION, DESPAIR, AND PRAYER

Part II

Today Is Forever

FEARED

PEACE, BE STILL

HAPPINESS

AVATAR

TODAY IS FOREVER

WE ARE THAT WE ARE

FLASHBACKS

THE HEARING

THE PRINCIPLE OF A THING

GRACE OF GOD

DADA

MONKEY BARS

DESIRE TO BE NORMAL

SOCIAL CREATURES

PLACES OF WORSHIP

TENDER MERCIES

ON A SOAPBOX

FORGETFULNESS

UP FROM THE ASHES

CHILDREN

CHANCE MEETING OR SOMETHING ELSE

THIS TOO WILL PASS

FORTIETH DAY

EPILOGUE

To my grandchildren,

Benjamin and Delilah

PREFACE

Verbal communication does not come easily for me; however, I found my voice in the written word—that and my art. I can engage in oral communication one-on-one, but in larger groups, my mind spins out of control; I am not able to focus, and I start to feel uncomfortable and frequently speak without considering my words.

The exception to my inhibition to communicate in a public setting is when I am talking to someone or groups of people about art. Working as an art educator with children was something I did rather well. Children don’t make me feel uncomfortable in the same way teenagers and adults do. Children are less inhibited and judgmental when talking to each other and older persons, at least that has been my experience. They are open and honest about what is on their mind. They don’t discern between the right and wrong way to say something.

I can only speak of the visual arts because that is my area of expertise, but I think and feel that, while art can be well produced, it is still highly subjective and open to interpretation. The artist is speaking through the art piece, in a voice that is personal and not necessarily common to all people. Some of my art is done in a representational style, and the average person can interpret what I am saying because it is technically sound and straightforward. With my abstract art, it takes a person with a moderate to high degree of appreciation of art to understand all the nuances of the particular work.

Although I am not a gifted storyteller, since seventh grade, writing has come naturally to me. However, it took me into my college years to become better at the use of proper grammar. I was always able to say things with the pen that I couldn’t utter orally. During my junior year in high school, the English teacher and the history teacher collaborated in assigning students a joint term paper. I got a D from my English teacher because I used poor grammar, but the history teacher gave me an A for the voice I used and the completeness of the content.

By the time I got to Ball State University in Muncie, Indiana, where I was a graduate assistant, working on my master’s degree, I had a good grasp of the written word. My communication courses in journalism at Goshen College in Goshen, Indiana, helped me to avoid the pitfalls of run-on sentences that were common in my early writings. I also learned to speak in a voice that most people could understand. This came in handy when I worked on my thesis paper for my master’s degree. A number of my fellow master’s students wrote thesis papers that were twenty-five to forty pages long, whereas I wrote a 105-page thesis paper on the subject of teaching aesthetics to elementary students. My thesis adviser was totally blown out of the water that I could talk in such length and detail about the subject without repeating myself.

My written communication has not always been well received. I have written some letters in which I thought I was tactful and nonthreatening, but I learned later that it wasn’t read in the way I had intended it to be read. Even in writing this diary, I have had to read it many times just to make sure that the raw emotion that usually comes out in my writing was to a certain degree neutralized. I hope that what I say in these pages opens your mind to what people with mental issues deal with on a daily basis.

I chose to write Forty Days from the Diary of a Delusional Man in a diary format, even though it is basically a memoir. A large part of the diary entries deal with my past and with the relationships that I have had with people. It is written from my perspective of the events and may differ with what these people think or feel transpired. They are welcome to repudiate with what they read, or write their own book. It is not my intent to be judgmental, and I hope the voice I use is purely descriptive and nonthreatening.

The diary entries are revelations and meditations on daily events and historical accounts of my life. I sought to be honest in the expression of my thoughts and feelings. To illustrate how my mind works at times, I have not always edited what I wrote. At other times what I write will be something that I have written over and over to get a point across. Not everything I wrote is affirmative of the faith I have in Jesus. What I say is what I thought and felt the Spirit of God wanted me to write about, but not all of it is uplifting. Nor is this diary to be read as one might read the scriptures. I do not want the reader to interpret what I have to say as a guide to walking the Christian walk. God and I have not always seen things eye to eye. My life is not an example that I would hold up for others to follow. I make no pretense that what I say in these pages point the way for someone to be holy. On occasion what I write will feel like salt in an open wound. Read with care. Read prayerfully.

ACKNOWLEDGMENT

Everyone I refer to in this diary in a small or large way contributed to its creation. Except for my immediate family and two persons who are now deceased, I have changed the names of all others I make mention of. As for the relationships to some of these persons, I could regret and feel bitter about how some of them turned out, but I do not. I make mention of one person, Dexter, who told me before I joined the army that I had chosen God’s plan B for my life. If a person interprets what I write as a tragedy, then he is probably right. However, now that I look back on my life, I am not as sure that God has multiple plans for our lives. I think and feel that everything that happened in my life has and had a specific purpose and meaning, and that it all worked for the good of helping me become who I am.

I want to especially thank my ex-wife, Beverly, for her fortitude and commitment to me for the thirty-one years of our lives together. She gave me two wonderful children, who have become the kind of adults every parent hopes their children will become, in the face of what I was dealing with emotionally and mentally over the course of their childhood and teenage years.

While I feel some sadness that our marriage ended in a divorce, it wasn’t wrong that it happened. Our divorce was very amicable, and we are now better friends than we were husband and wife. Simply put, it was time that we faced the fact that we were not able to achieve and acquire the things we needed to be happy as marital partners. Bev endured and took the worst that I could offer any person in one lifetime. She gave her best to do what she was asked to do, and it was good enough; I have only admiration for her. We are both better persons because of our time together, but sometimes you have to acknowledge that enough is enough.

Having gone through a divorce, I now have a different view of the process and outcome. Many in our society frown upon it as a thing to be avoided, an evil. Yes, it is the breaking of a solemn contract. I don’t have any plans to marry again, because I am still devoted to the one I bonded with thirty-some years ago. I do think and feel God wants his creation to live a life of happiness. I agreed to the divorce simply because it was the only way I knew for certain that would allow my wife, Bev, to know and find the happiness she deserves.

I also want to say thank you to my parents for the way they raised me and the values they instilled in me. I may not be the religious or spiritual person they wanted me to be or become, but they taught me to cherish life and make the best of what we are granted. Even though my mind has not always desired life, my heart has.

I also cannot leave out my gratitude for the Veterans Administration staff who have contributed to my health emotionally, mentally, and physically. The therapists and psychiatrists have never given up on me when I had relapses and needed adjustments of my medication. They do not get enough appreciation and yet continue to do what is required of them. The media often portrays the VA negatively, and I have my own stories, but overall my experience is that the VA offers veterans the best possible.

Part I

To Forgive Is

Not the Same as Forgettting

EARLY YEARS

The first three diary entries I have written in an interview style to personalize what I have to say about my past, especially the early years.

16 November

Jeff, why don’t you begin by telling the story of your early childhood?

"One of the first wars of what would become a thirty-year cold war of political ideals had come to an end. The world’s two major superpowers were just beginning what would be known as the space race. In this environment of political conflict I was born, on April 18, 1957.

My parents were the average age for two young people to get married. My father grew up in a farming family. My mother graduated from high school, but my dad did not. Both were raised Mennonite; however, my father had close ties through his relatives to the Amish community.

Mom and Dad met at a youth meeting at her church. He traveled from central Indiana, where his nine brothers and sisters lived with their parents, because there were not a lot of marriage-age girls in his church community.

They didn’t date all that long before he popped the big question of marriage. She accepted his proposal because she would soon turn eighteen, and according to her mom, she would have to pay her share to live at home. They honestly loved each other as much as two people could.

My father’s father was a Mennonite preacher, so when their day came, they joined their two lives as one at his church. On their wedding night, I was conceived.

I don’t have many memories of the early years. I guess our family was a happy one, even though we were dirt poor. My earliest memories were when I was four or five and we lived on a 180-acre farm off State Road 9 between Wolcottville and Lagrange, Indiana. Father did farming part-time and worked in trailer factory full time. I had chores which involved cleaning out the pigpens, which meant shoveling pig dung into the manure spreader and driving it out to the fields to be spread. I also mowed the yard during the summer with a push mower.

By the time we lived on that farm, I had a younger brother. We played in the trees in our yard and on the train tracks that skirted our family’s property. Once or twice a week, we would cross the cornfield on the back of our farm and go play with the Catholic neighbor boys on their farm. During the winter of 1961, the snow fall was pretty heavy, and in the space between the pig barn to the north, the chicken house to the east, and our house to the south, there was one big drift. We dug tunnels, built a snow fort, and played for hours on end.

Also, that year my sister was born. The only memory I have of that event was we were trotted off to some great-aunt and great-uncle’s home on the east side of LaGrange to stay while Mom was in the hospital delivering my sister. She, like I, was a hard birth. Even though our parents loved all us children, my brother was their favorite out of