The security agents first did a body check on me to see if I was carrying something illegal. After seeing I was harmless, they took me to an adjoining recreation room and asked me to sit down for interrogation.
They started by asking me for my university identity card which I had in my pocket that night. When I gave it to them, one of the security agents blurted out, "Yes, you are the one we are looking for!"
Some of the security agents were sympathetic with me. They couldn't believe such a fine-looking young man like me could be engaging in such mischief as sleeping in a toilet. Sympathetic though they were, they told me I had to spend the rest of the night in a police cell. They peacefully drove me to a nearby police station where I was instructed to take off my belt and watch before being led into a cell.
Early the following day, my father and Uncle Gibson Mwangi came for me in the police station. Since I was in a very talkative mood that day, I paraded my knowledge to everyone who handled me. When one officer held a roll of marijuana in her hand and asked me if I knew what it was, I shot back, "That's bhang. For me, I get high on the spirit of God."
And when the same officer asked me another question I can't recall, I got mad and spouted off America's Declaration of Independence which says:
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.Unable to handle me, the officer handed me over to my father and Uncle Gibson who took me to a lecturer called Prof. Nyaga, a family friend who was then lecturing at JKUAT. Actually, I was the one who directed them to Prof. Nyaga's office.
At Prof. Nyaga's office, I continued parading my knowledge. I belted out some verses from the wonderful old hymn, "Land of Our Birth, I Pledge to Thee" - the lyrics full of power for me.
Even though Prof. Nyaga was impressed with my memory, he didn't think I was okay in the head, so he referred me to the university hospital. Perhaps because he knew I would resist going to the hospital, he called two guards who at first lied to me that they were taking me to some other place. That place turned out to be JKUAT hospital.
A psychiatrist named Dr. Kitili examined me at the hospital. She asked me several questions, most of which have slipped my memory. Her only question that I recall was whether I experienced any hallucinations in my thinking. Though I replied "no", she had me admitted at Thika Nursing Home, an about twenty-minute drive from JKUAT.
For several years after I was discharged from Thika Nursing Home, I went regularly for medical check-ups during which I was injected and given tablets to swallow. My family came to view me as mentally sick. I also came to accept myself as ill and voluntarily took the medicine my doctors prescribed for me.
Come to think of it, I now believe my admission to Thika Nursing Home is a good example of what I heard someone call "the XY problem". The XY problem is about coming up with an attempted solution 'X' instead of solving the actual problem 'Y'. That leads to enormous amounts of wasted time and energy, both on the part of people asking for help and on the part of those providing assistance.
Why am I saying my admission to Thika Nursing Home is a typical XY problem? Because even though I had indeed gone astray at JKUAT, I don't think I was mentally ill. What I needed was guidance on how to find my true passions after I found the engineering course I was pursuing at the university to be completely harassing. That's all I am saying.
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RECOMMENDATION: If you've enjoyed the above story on the XY problem, you might also enjoy another one on "Finding the Right Path" which I wrote sometime back. Just click on that link in blue to dive straight into the story.
