Sunday, March 20, 2016

Medical Case History - Patient Frederick McIntyre

Caucasian; Male; 24 years old; Baptist
Attending - Doctor Christopher C Moresby

The subject was admitted directly to the New York State Psychiatric Institute on February 27, 1925. He was delivered from the docks in a mobile, but otherwise catatonic state. Prior to his overseas travels, his medical and academic records present no causal symptoms for his condition. Rather, it is indicated that he was exposed to one or several traumatic events during his travels.
My researches into his foreign travels, while not conclusive, do indicate that he was associating with known dangerous criminal elements, including but not limited to known bootlegger Jonny Di Castillo and members of the L'Amour gang (prior to their subsequent incarceration in Nairobi, Kenya).
Unfortunately, as none of his companions managed to return to civilized climes, the full detail of the subject's experiences will never be known. To date, the only commentary ever obtained was a tearful testimony from Ms L'Amour about how the subject deserved so much more. She and one of her incarcerated colleagues, an alcoholic Irishman, have made oblique references to a pyramid, a statue and some sort of illusion.

For the first six months of the subject's sojourn at the institute, his condition remained largely unchanged. Therapy was entirely ineffective. Attempts were made to apply electro-shock therapy. Initially these treatments appeared successful in alleviating the subject's catatonia. While it did not restore him to wellness, he was ambulatory and capable of speech, and, in the most limited capacity, conversation.
By October 1925, these treatments were ceased in the hope that he might now see results from traditional therapy. Said therapy was far more successful than previous efforts and by Christmas that year, it appeared that the subject might be discharged at some point in the new year.
On 12 January 1926, as part of general therapy for the subject and a dozen other patients that the Institute hoped to soon discharge, an outing was organised to the Museum of the City of New York. A substantial Egyptological exhibit was on loan from the British Museum.
For most of the patients, this excursion was a positive experience. For the subject however, it appeared to do significant harm. All reports indicate that a short way into the tour, he espied a statue of a Pharaoh. Unlike the other statuary present, this particular carving was pitch-black. There was no identification of the Pharaoh, but it captured the subject, such that he remained transfixed there and had to be manhandled away when the group departed.
By the time they returned to the Institute, the subject was once again near catatonic, but muttering to himself. No-one managed to identify what he was saying in full, but it intended in "-ho-tep" so it was clearly influenced by the events of the day.
During the night, the subject erupted into a psychotic fit, in which he fatally assaulted another patient in a most brutal fashion, as well as maiming an orderly so severely the man will limp for the rest of his life.
The subject was placed in a restraining jacket, in a protective cell. Each night, he became possessed of the same psychotic rage. It quickly became evident that the only appropriate clinical measure available to ensure his ongoing docility was a lobotomy.
On 12 February 1926, I carried out the procedure. The procedure itself was uneventful and the subject was safe and calm. So much so, in fact, that after the procedure, his subsequent monitoring was marked with a lack of vigilance. On 19 February 1926, after lights out, the subject snuck out into the Institute's gardens.
For those unfamiliar with the significance of this date, know that a fierce snowstorm hit the city that night.
The subject, Freddy McIntyre, was found the following morning, frozen stiff. Dead from exposure. His bearing, however, was one of sublime peace and happiness. Indeed, his face held a beatific smile, unlike any seen in his time with the Institute, as if finally, in death, all of his worries were resolved and gone.

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